Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Bad Ebay experience-help!

Hey guys,

I don't have much experience with this. I bought a motherboard on eBay from a seller I should have checked out more closely. He's got 98.2% positive rating, but there's a ton of feedback that's been recalled by both parties--presumably he talked people out of negative feedback. Anyway, after waiting a rather long time after paying a rather lot of shipping, I received a bare motherboard (in a static bag at least) in a box of foam peanuts. The posting was for a brand new retail motherboard including everything in the pictures--which were of cables, and a riser board, and a box, etc.

I emailed the dude, haven't heard back yet, and googled his email addy. I found a web page dedicated to this guy and his sales. Apparently, he often pulls this, and then uses tons of delaying tactics to hold buyers off as long as possible (presumably long enough so that they can't file a complaint with paypal.)

Anyone had experience with this sort of thing? Several years ago, I managed to bully another guy into giving me my money back for a monitor I bought that was not as advertised, but I think this guy has a little more experience than the monitor guy.

Arg. I don't need this stress right now... and I don't need to lose $150, either. Grr....

Sounds kind of like my boss. Just blows smoke up your ass telling you what you want to hear for 6 months until you threaten with some kind of lawsuit. then things get done. Good luck with this dude.


Oh whoops did i say that out loud?

Heh... don't I wish I had money for a lawsuit. Of course, if I did, I wouldn't care about losing $150...

i just had a bad ebay experience.
trying to sell a laptop.
someone ended the auction with buy it now,
then started talking about his kid in nigeria... not worrying about shipping it out now... just get me the total and i will send it to you.

yea right
i didnt know the nigerian bogus certified check scam had trickled down to used $300 laptops.

now I gotta wait a week to report him as nonpaying before i can get my fees refunded. I even had the auction as US only. ( no offense to my canadian friends )

How did you pay? Even with the waiting period the Paypal and Ebay have, you should always be able to call your bank or credit card company...

Tough situation...

Credit card through paypal.

Take a look at the ebay rules. There is likely some kind of recourse buried there. Certainly some info on how to complain to ebay and have them take action.

Can you dispute the charge or is it considered that Paypal delivered it’s service by transferring the money.

Can you find out where this guy lives?

I've got his address--or an alleged address on the package. Also have an alleged phone number, which I will probably call later today. I just want the money back so I can just get a mobo from a reputable source. Sigh.

good luck man, I always by my mobo's from either zipzoomfly, directron, or newegg.....

So would I, if the chipset was still available retail...

I treat buying on Ebay the same as I treat my money in Vegas. Never spend more than you're willing to lose.

Hope it works out for you.

Well, Ken.. if it makes you feel any better, one of my guys ordered a lot of 10 or 12 hard drives... (partially to pay me back, he keeps stealing them from the spares cupboard at the office when he needs one for a project)... all of them were defective, 2 would spin up and that was it... the others were absolutely DOA... after some doing, the seller refunded his money, and he gave the drives to me, so I stripped all the magnets out of them, they'll come in handy eventually I think.

Bren R.

I've got a hard drive magnet on my fridge right now. Almost strong enough to hold up a ream of paper.

One magnet? My stack of magnets and I laugh at your one puny magnet...

And the practical jokes played with them are... borderline dangerous.

Bren R.

Yeah, hard drive magnets are pretty badass...

Well, the guy did email me back yesterday, and he's taking the mobo back and refunding my money. Maybe he's gotten slightly more reputable. Maybe not...

Quote:

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Maybe he's gotten slightly more reputable.

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If he was reputable he would have shipped the items stated, you just called his game.

Ken, i have to agree with Homedad. I've had two bad ebay experiences and both were because the seller simply put out a dishonest description of their item. They say things like "in perfect working condition" and when it arrives, things that could not have happened in shipping (like static-sound volume knobs or missing parts), are obviously not "working perfectly".

I've been avoiding ebay a fair bit unless it is an ebay store or a truly reputable seller. There are simply too many people selling junk for whatever cash they can grab. Who would ever complain over a $20 bid that went bad?
The fear about getting negative feedback when you are not a power seller or buyer dissuades you from leaving negative feedback for someone else.
I think many of those crooks count on this very thing occurring. I also think many people don't even believe that what they are doing is wrong or immoral in any way because the broken part they never mentioned was only a "small" oversight, no biggie. Uh ya, to the buyer, everything is important dumbasses, and when the shoe is on the other foot...

::Bump::

Ken: how did you make out?

He's got the motherboard now. I have no money yet, but he picked it up from the post office today. We'll see.

In case anyone's keeping score, I just received my money back today. PM me if you want to know who not to buy a mobo from--I'm not going to publicly smear him.

Ooh, a private smear!


How dirty. . .

In the immortal words of Dorothy Parker "If you can't say anything good about someone...........................come over here and sit by me."

Indeed... Well, I told the guy I wouldn't leave any feedback. Let's just say that people should read feedback pages very carefully before buying things on eBay (duh...) Don't just look at the numbers. There could be retractions.

98% sounds pretty good, but in the world of Ebay, I'm reading all the feedback from anyone who's feedback is below 99.9% I've been an avid ebayer (both buying and selling) for several years now. Reading feedbacks is essential for safe Ebaying.

i wish ebay would allow you to sort feedback. i would love an option to just show neutral/bad/retracted feedback. no sensein reading the good ones it tells you nothing.
Jake

It's good to see them in chron order though too. Sometimes someone with a spotless record might have a spat of two or three negs all within one week. Obviously something went bad at that time. Usually still a safe person to buy from.

I do the same as far as looking at anyone without a perfect rating. Not that I expect everyone to have 100%, but more of a check as it if they have had problems recently or if it was something from years ago. I usually hunt for the last negative feedback even if it has been a while and see what it says.

On an opposite note, just because someone does not have 100% doesn't mean that they are crooks. I've got a rating of 99 (waiting 2 weeks for one guy to give me my positive feedback) but my percentage is 98.1%. I've had 117 positives received, but it doesn't count them if they are from the same person. I have 2 negatives. One from May 2000, and the other from July 2004. The first one I paid the guy and he didn't ship and never responded to emails. After about 2 weeks, I left a negative for him. That got his attention, so he left me a negative in retaliation. He had my money but didn't send anything to me because he was on vacation. What a dumb time to have an auction end, right as you are leaving for vacation. Anyway, I completed the transaction with him in another auction after he appologized, and the very next feedback on my account was a positive from him. Too bad I can't go back and erase that unjustified negative. The second one was similar. I made my payment minutes after the auction, like I always do when buying, and no email, and no package. After 3 weeks, I left a negative. They too retaliated and left me a negative with the words "Sellers Beware!" claiming that I hadn't paid them. I, to this day, have the PayPal transaction record to prove that I DID pay right after the auction. Again, I wish that I could get that one wiped off my record too. That eBayer has a 12,452 score with 97.7%, but hasn't sold anything on eBay since 2002 and is no longer registered. But I can't make it go away, so I will forever have to live with a less than perfect record.

Now, if I had these negatives more recently on my account, I would expect some people to be cautious, but since they are from 5 and 7 years ago with me having 81 positive transactions since then (no negatives), I feel that people trust me (as they should) on eBay.

So check out everyone before bidding. Someone that looks pretty good may not be, and someone with some negatives, may really be a super star on eBay.

Part of it is the total number, not just the percentage. In your case, 117 is a fairly high number of auctions, but enough that 2 negs screw the numbers. If I got a negative, I'd probably have a 90% or so, just because I've bought such a small amount of stuff. This dude had about 3-4000 auctions. So 98% is much more significant.