The Energon Pub

I know this is long, but please read!

This is the sad sad tale of Susinko. Before I go on, I must utter these words of warning. Never, NEVER buy Transformers on eBay at four in the morning.

Long long ago, (September 1 to be exact) I was looking to buy a movie Thundercracker (I love me my Seekers!) on eBay at four in the morning. I had just earned some money of my own, and as I am a stay at home Mom (domestic engineer), that is unusual. So of course I had to spend it on some Transformers. Since my town doesn't get any cool things, I decided to eBay it.

Now, I've been on eBay since 2001. I know what to do. I checked the seller's positive feedback ratio (99%, not bad!), and how many items that they had sold (it's easy to get a 99% positive if you have only sold four items. She had over 4000)

So I used the Buy It Now feature. Then to make shipping cheaper, I bought a Robot Replica Frenzy from her too. You see, the problem was, I didn't read all of info she had in her listing. And she had a LOT of info. Apparently, Thundercracker was a preorder that would ship in September. Crud monkeys.

I contacted her in about mid September about my items as I hadn't gotten them yet. She said that they ship in September. It was still September. Okay then.

It is October. She says that she isn't getting her shipments in like she is supposed to. Okay, I knew at the time that the shipments of Transformers were not enough to meet demand. Okay. I could accept that. I contact her mid-October. I get the sob story that she is in fact pregnant and her eBay store is her families sole source of income. I'm a Mom. I decide to cut her some slack.

It is November. I'm getting pretty mad. At this point, I just want my figures. She tells me that she still hasn't gotten my shipment in yet. I tell her to order it from Walmart.com with my money. She ends up sending me Frenzy with the promise Thundercracker will come to me shortly.

It is DECEMBER. I check her feedback when I don't get my Thundercracker. I now see why she has 99% feedback and such crappy service.

***This is the part that you should know***
What she was doing is this. When ever a buyer would give her a negative for not sending out their stuff, she would GIVE THEM A NEGITIVE BACK. Even if they had paid. Since she is a large store, a single negative is no big deal. To a buyer that only has 25 feedback, it is devastating. So she would offer them a deal.
She would remove the negative feedback she left if the buyer would remove theirs. Many responses left after they had mutually agreed to withdraw feedback tell me this is so. SHE HAS OVER 200 MUTUALLY WITHDRAWN FEEDBACKS. Over 200 people she has bullied into saving her eBay rating.

She was kicked off. Her info is fake. Because of my compassionate nature, I now can't do anything about the money she ripped off. I really really wanted that Thundercracker. I can't find him anywhere.

So please, learn from my sad sad tale. Don't just check the sellers rating. Check their withdrawn feedback, as well as read through their feedback before you bid on eBay.

PayPal resolution will crush that bitch.

Use it.

Don't hold back either, you need to call PayPal and demand a service rep to get a proper response.

Also, as a point of disucssion, when money is involved, compassion is for poor people. If you like your money and you want to convert it into goods and/or services, you do not play the nice guy.

Seriously.

Counterpunch speaks the truth.

In addition, never let a seller stretch you out over 30 days. If you let them do that, PayPal will NOT help you. You have to file a complaint within 30 days ( I think) of the end of the auction. eBay's policies on pre-orders is that they must ship within 30 days. Report that to eBay too.


Most importantly, eBay is soon changing the feedback system. Sellers will only be able to leave a buyer a positive. If the buyer does not pay, the course of action for sellers is to file a non-paying bidder report. After so many, buyers will be warned or have their account closed.

Sellers can receive negative feedback for poor service, and feedback retaliation will soon be a thing of the past.

eBay will also only count feedback within the past year as part of the feedback rating. To help out sellers, they will be including free gallery images and lower listing fees.

Things are changing at eBay to help prevent this type of thing.

Lapse Of Reason wrote:

Most importantly, eBay is soon changing the feedback system. Sellers will only be able to leave a buyer a positive. If the buyer does not pay, the course of action for sellers is to file a non-paying bidder report. After so many, buyers will be warned or have their account closed.

Sellers can receive negative feedback for poor service, and feedback retaliation will soon be a thing of the past.

eBay will also only count feedback within the past year as part of the feedback rating. To help out sellers, they will be including free gallery images and lower listing fees.

Things are changing at eBay to help prevent this type of thing.

oh man, now this is good news for buyers like us. i definitely hate sellers who withhold feedback and counter-leave negatives despite the buyer having exhausted all possible diplomatic options before leaving negative feedback. though i can see the point of withholding feedback, it makes for a more or less (mosttimes, depends on your personal experience) inflexible and arrogant disposition on the sellers' part.

http://www.toolhaus.org/

Never Ebay without it.

On a brighter note, if you're still looking for that movie Thundercracker, I see them all the time around here--let me know if you'd like to get your hands on one still for actual price + shipping.

Sorry about your crappy experience.

like they said, get paypal on the horn. hopefully you'll get your money back. people who take advantage of other people are trash.

Yep Counterpunch is once again right on the money with advice, take it to Paypal. So speaketh the Shogun of Seibertron!

As for getting a Thundercracker keep checking around your targets and walmarts.

Ours are getting shipments in and they have been thundercrackers, rescue ratchets, and offroad ironhides so far.

Some places are getting those assortments, some are getting the new allspark ones.

I'm sorry to hear about your experience. My Ebay experiences have all been with terrible buyers, not sellers. Still, I feel for ya.

Most good sellers don't withhold feedback so they can bully buyers into leaving a positive. Most due it to have some defense against the buyers who say, "I got my item, but if you don't refund me half of the price, I'm going to neg you."

With Ebay's new feedback system, the only defense that sellers have against this is to basically file credit card or mail fraud charges against the person. Which, while effective, is a bit extreme. I mean, I've done it to people in the past, but I really don't want to go to the trouble of ruining somebody's credit and/or sending them to jail because they tried to scam me out of a few dollars.

And it really IS always a few dollars. If I sell a 500 dollar item on Ebay, 99 times out of 100 it gets to the person, they leave me positive feedback, that's the end of the transaction. If I send out a 12 dollar item, I get 8 emails wanting to know where the item is (after 2 days) and a "you didn't say that the card was punched, I want you to refund me the cost of the item or I'm leaving you negative feedback!"

Bah.

Professor Smooth wrote:Most good sellers don't withhold feedback so they can bully buyers into leaving a positive. Most due it to have some defense against the buyers who say, "I got my item, but if you don't refund me half of the price, I'm going to neg you."

... If I sell a 500 dollar item on Ebay, 99 times out of 100 it gets to the person, they leave me positive feedback, that's the end of the transaction. If I send out a 12 dollar item, I get 8 emails wanting to know where the item is (after 2 days) and a "you didn't say that the card was punched, I want you to refund me the cost of the item or I'm leaving you negative feedback!"

Bah.

I'm sure I have completed over 2,000 eBay transactions as both a buyer and a seller, and out of those I have 1300+ positive feedbacks and 1 negative. I have sold items valued over $2,000 without a problem, as well as many items for only a few dollars.

My one negative came from a buyer who purchased an Energon Shockblast MISB for about $35. This was when they first came out and were not widely available yet. The buyer demanded a full refund (including shipping) because he said there was a slight crease in the box over the plastic bubble AND he wanted to keep the item. Now, I understand a collector wanting a mint and case fresh boxed figure, but I did not advertise it as a mint box. In addition, the box was indeed perfect when I sent it and it was very well packed in bubble wrap and box filler inside an oversized shipping box. We went back and forth a few times, and I said I would refund everything but he would have to ship it back to me. He refused to do so and actually said that he would leave me my first negative and ruin my then 100% rating if I did not give him what he wanted.

I said fine, leave me a negative and I will do the same for you. We did. He tried to dispute the claim through PayPal and they decided in my favor.

Now this was one transaction in about 2,000. I have since had two newbies leave neutral feedback (yet with positive commentary)because they did not know what they were doing. One retracted after I questioned him.

The point is, there are bad buyers as well as bad sellers. I have lived up to my end of the deal as a seller and had to deal with some crap from buyers. When I get postive feedback from a buyer, it is an indicator to me that the deal will end smoothly and I immediately leave positive for them. I am a bit hesitant about eBay's new system because it is not in the best interest of the seller. It is still not a balanced system.

Ebay's new system is incredibly boneheaded. In an attempt to keep sellers from moving over to Amazon.com, they have announced a system that has most of their high volume sellers expressly saying that they WILL be leaving for Amazon.com.

Buyers are protected FAR more than sellers. As a buyer, you can file a Paypal claim or do a credit-card chargeback and get all of your money refunded. Yeah, you might not have the item you wanted, but you're not out anything.

I sold a figure once to a gentleman in the United States. A few DAYS after he won the auction, he moved. He also didn't leave a forwarding address. After about a MONTH he emailed me threatening legal action if his package didn't show up. I pulled up his tracking number and it showed that the mail carrier had tried to deliver it several times, failed, and the package was on its way back to Japan.

He demanded that I ship the item to him again once I received it. As you may know, shipping from Japan is bloody expensive. He'd won the item with the opening bid and re-shipping it to him would mean that my profit on the sale was negative several dollars. I wasn't going to do that. I told him I'd ship it back to him if he paid for shipping again. He refused, did a paypal claim, got his money back.

There is no protection for sellers. I could ship an item and the guy could STILL do a paypal claim on me or do a chargeback. Then I'm out the cost of the item AND the shipping cost. Now, Ebay has taken even MORE away from sellers.

This, btw, is why I lobbied to have Carbomya reopened. I hope it helps everyone.

Professor Smooth wrote:He demanded that I ship the item to him again once I received it. As you may know, shipping from Japan is bloody expensive. He'd won the item with the opening bid and re-shipping it to him would mean that my profit on the sale was negative several dollars. I wasn't going to do that. I told him I'd ship it back to him if he paid for shipping again. He refused, did a paypal claim, got his money back.

Sorry if I'm not understanding your story correctly, but I don't see how that's unfair. He paid for his item and he didn't get it so I don't see why he shouldn't get his money back. You got your item, which you can re-list.

Counterpunch wrote:PayPal resolution will crush that bitch.

Use it.

Don't hold back either, you need to call PayPal and demand a service rep to get a proper response.

Also, as a point of disucssion, when money is involved, compassion is for poor people. If you like your money and you want to convert it into goods and/or services, you do not play the nice guy.

Seriously.

I agree with CP. Business is business. Don't believe people when they tell you about their hardships. It's a tactic to get at your money. If people are professional then their personal life should not come into play.

Omega-1 wrote:

Professor Smooth wrote:He demanded that I ship the item to him again once I received it. As you may know, shipping from Japan is bloody expensive. He'd won the item with the opening bid and re-shipping it to him would mean that my profit on the sale was negative several dollars. I wasn't going to do that. I told him I'd ship it back to him if he paid for shipping again. He refused, did a paypal claim, got his money back.

Sorry if I'm not understanding your story correctly, but I don't see how that's unfair. He paid for his item and he didn't get it so I don't see why he shouldn't get his money back. You got your item, which you can re-list.

The buyer gave the wrong address. The seller has to pay for return shipping, then to pay to ship it out again? Hardly fair. I'd charge the buyer to ship it again too, or refund the amount paid less the shipping expenses incurred.

Lapse Of Reason wrote:

Omega-1 wrote:

Professor Smooth wrote:He demanded that I ship the item to him again once I received it. As you may know, shipping from Japan is bloody expensive. He'd won the item with the opening bid and re-shipping it to him would mean that my profit on the sale was negative several dollars. I wasn't going to do that. I told him I'd ship it back to him if he paid for shipping again. He refused, did a paypal claim, got his money back.

Sorry if I'm not understanding your story correctly, but I don't see how that's unfair. He paid for his item and he didn't get it so I don't see why he shouldn't get his money back. You got your item, which you can re-list.

The buyer gave the wrong address. The seller has to pay for return shipping, then to pay to ship it out again? Hardly fair. I'd charge the buyer to ship it again too, or refund the amount paid less the shipping expenses incurred.

I wasn't talking about what the buyer asked for but about the Paypal resolution. If the item is not to be re-shipped, then shouldn't the buyer get his money back? I don't think the seller should get to keep the money and the product. As the having to pay to have it shipped back, I didn't know the seller had to pay for that. Perhaps a more fair resolution would have been to make the buyer pay for that charge.

Omega-1 wrote:
I wasn't talking about what the buyer asked for but about the Paypal resolution. If the item is not to be re-shipped, then shouldn't the buyer get his money back? I don't think the seller should get to keep the money and the product. As the having to pay to have it shipped back, I didn't know the seller had to pay for that. Perhaps a more fair resolution would have been to make the buyer pay for that charge.

The seller has to pay the shipping from Japan up front. He may have got the item back, but it still cost him international shipping from Japan - which is very expensive. In some cases, if an item is returned undeliverable the original shipper has to pay to get it shipped back. That may or may not have been the case here.

Bottom line - the buyer made an error and it cost the seller money.

Lapse Of Reason wrote:

Omega-1 wrote:Bottom line - the buyer made an error and it cost the seller money.

That really depends on the policy of the seller. If he had a policy then maybe Paypal would have rewarded him the shipping cost. Is that not how it works offline?

Omega-1 wrote:

Lapse Of Reason wrote:

Omega-1 wrote:Bottom line - the buyer made an error and it cost the seller money.

That really depends on the policy of the seller. If he had a policy then maybe Paypal would have rewarded him the shipping cost. Is that not how it works offline?

Policy or not (I tend to dislike long disclaimers that cover every minute detail of a transaction or user agreement or whatever), if I personally sell something to someone, and they give the wrong address, I'm not going to be happy about having to pay to reship it. It is rather presumptious of the buyer to expect the seller to shell out the money to reship when the mistake was the buyer's fault. The buyer should acknowledge the error and accept the responsibly. It seemed that in this case, the "it's all about me" mentality reared its ugly head. The shame is that PayPal decides on the buyer's behalf without regard to the seller's loss.

If any of this was the seller's mistake, I would think differently.

Lapse Of Reason wrote:Policy or not (I tend to dislike long disclaimers that cover every minute detail of a transaction or user agreement or whatever), if I personally sell something to someone, and they give the wrong address, I'm not going to be happy about having to pay to reship it. It is rather presumptious of the buyer to expect the seller to shell out the money to reship when the mistake was the buyer's fault. The buyer should acknowledge the error and accept the responsibly. It seemed that in this case, the "it's all about me" mentality reared its ugly head. The shame is that PayPal decides on the buyer's behalf without regard to the seller's loss.

If any of this was the seller's mistake, I would think differently.

You may not believe in policies but it's what protects the seller. If the buyer doesn't like your policy, they don't have to buy from you. I'm not going to arguing who was right and who was wrong because we are only hearing one side of the story. If you don't have a policy, you leave things up for debate. That's all I have to say about this.

Paypal does not give a damn about your policies. If the buyer does not receive his or her item, then Paypal will refund every cent of the buyer's payment. It's one of the reasons that my shipping is so blindingly expensive. To cover my own ass, I need to ship EMS. I could ship via a cheaper method, but I would not have a tracking number. Without a tracking number, the buyer can claim he'd never received the item and get his money back.

I'd have had no problem shipping the gentleman his item a second time, providing he paid for it. Instead, he filed a paypal claim, got his money back, and then tried to complete the transaction outside of Ebay.

During another incident, a package meant to go to the Netherlands wound up in New Zealand. I don't know how this happened, but it eventually made it's way back to me. I explained the situation to the buyer, shipped it to him again (on my own dime) and got some GLOWING positive feedback from him.

Most sellers of collectables on Ebay will go out of their way to keep their customers happy. That's because we're fans too and mostly sell on Ebay to finance our own hobbies. We know how we like to be treated and treat others accordingly. If something goes wrong in a transaction, we'll always do our best to make it right. That's why it's so frustrating when buyers immediately assume they are being scammed and wind up screwing the people who were trying to help them build their respective collections.

Then again, maybe I just put too much thought into selling.

First off, I'm sorry for my late replies to your comments. Real life has been busy. You know how it is.

Counterpunch, you are right. Compassion is for poor people. A hard lesson, but at least it was with a relatively cheap Transformer and not something more expensive. Also it's been about six months since I bought that item. I don't think that Paypal will help me out after all that time, will they?

Lapse of Reason, your comments about eBay's new feedback policy make me happy. Thank you for letting me know.

Shanx, thank you for the website. I will use it.

Prime vs Wild and TFBuyer, thank you for your kind offers. I was able to find a Thundercracker on my own. Thank you again! Which leads me to thank...

Maldroth. At your advice, I searched my local Walmarts one more time. I wouldn't have gone quite as far as I did without assurance that Thundercracker was still out there. At last I found the last remaining two that are a reasonable distance from my house.

Thank you to everyone who posted about my issue. I learned quite a few things and they will hopefully will keep me from getting scammed in the future.