Your Ebay Experiences

[kenshinbebop]

Hey guys, I was browsing ebay for some rather expensive things that are used and cheap on Ebay...only problem is that I've never personally delt with eBay...I was just wondering if any of you've had experiences and if they were positive or negative...and how cheap can thingsget before they're "too good to be true".

[Solid_Snake]

Depends on the item, really.

I've bought hundreds of things off of ebay in the last decade. And I've yet to be cheated once. Go for the Power Sellers. But remember, a huge amount of Feedback is not always a good thing. That would usually mean it's a buisness. And buisnesses have piss poor communication.(sp)

I would also go for things with the "Buy it now." option. Asuming it has one, of course.

EDIT: Also check the negetive feedback ratio. Negetive feedback is not an automatic decision maker, because there are legit reasons for negetive feedback.(Usually prick buyers.)

[Holy Knight]

As Snake said, go for those with a high feedback rating and lots of them. Then there are more chances that the seller is legit. If the item is very popular, that would also indicate that the item has a higher probability of being a scam.

As said, it all depends on the item. As for the value, you set it. If you think it's too high, then don't buy.

[kenshinbebop]

If I were looking at 250 doller retail item for 20 dollers used...?

[Solid_Snake]

If I were looking at 250 doller retail item for 20 dollers used...?

That's a bit hard to trust. But there are factors.

1: Is that the bidding price, or buy it now price?

2: How much longer does the auction have?(If it's a bid war and there's more than a day left, you better believe it will increase ten fold.)

3: Is it piss poor quality?(Things missing?)

[kenshinbebop]

Right I forgot that if there are 4 days left, the price will most likely increase...

[Gray]

If I were looking at 250 doller retail item for 20 dollers used...?


Well, some of the time you can get lucky and come across someone who just wants to get rid of it. For whatever price. Or, you get someone who dosent know what they have, etc. That or it's probably something they couldnt sell, so they're trying tou atleast get SOMETHING from it on eBay. There's alot of factors. Best thing you can do is go up to hte top right of the actuion screen and click on 'Send a message to seller' if you wanna find out more about it that is.

[Tuna]

Right I forgot that if there are 4 days left, the price will most likely increase...
There ya go.

Myself, doing research, thoroughly checking their feedback, and actually asking the seller questions about the item has led to a generally positive set of experiences with Ebay.
^_^

[KazumaII]

Ebay for me is a hit and miss. I mostly buy hard to find comics and such... only time I remember being cheated was a comic seller offering a graded action figure of a 1990 Wolverine figure MIB. It came MIB but wast not graded as claimed by the seller. thankfully, it was not budget breaking for the figure. so, since then It has only happened once. I read all the feedback ask the seller questions about the items they offered and once offered.

P.S. dont buy Wow items from ebay.... just word of warning.

[Holy Knight]

Right I forgot that if there are 4 days left, the price will most likely increase...

Yes, the price will rise if the item is worth 250$.

For example, I've been trying to get Valkyrie Profile (a Playstation game) off of e-bay for months now and even though some prices start as low as 10$, they always end up being 100$+ and easily hit 150-200$.

Learn when to bid and when to leave the item alone. If it's popular enough, it'll appear again, unless it's an extremely rare piece. In that case, you had better have a fat wallet.

[Gray]

I hear they've got programs out there that will bid like one cent more than what it currently is on the very last second of the auction or something like that :lol:

[Cow]

Its called Powersnipe.

[Scandiadream]

I've been buying and selling items on Ebay since 1999. I can count my negative experiences with the fingers of one hand. Do not be afraid of it.

[MonkeyBoy0314]

I've been dealing with Ebay for a while, and I only remember one negative experience. I bought what I thought was an American copy of Dragonball GT: Final Bout for PSX, but when it arrived I found out that it was Japanese. I sent it back and requested a refund, but I never did get that $30 back.

[dr ochanomizu]

It matters not whether you check the feedback or how careful you are with the purchase of an item, you can get ripped off. If you do some search there are blogs and internet sites dedicated to the problems and there are tons.

I have purchased many items on the eBay and had good transactions, but there were several that left bad taste in your mouth. Although I eventually recovered most of the money on those transactions, but the procedures and stacked deck of eBay admin is so unwieldy that in one case, it took almost a year to go through the layered recovery process. Additionally, I had to file a 7-page FBI Internet Fraud Complaint Center Report.

The pros on this con game use to manipulate negative feedbacks by intimidating the buyer not give a bad feedback by announcing that they'll retaliate with a negative feedback on their own. (I think eBay finally got wise and now you can leave a negative feedback anonymously.)

It's always true before and true now... Caveat Emptor.

TS

[Yukito Kunisaki]

Back in may, I tried buying a Sailor moon Boxset and won it for 85 dollars. It was bootlegged and took 30 or so days just to get here. I contacted paypal, and they did sh*t to help me. I had proof and everything and they shot me down. B******s.

[guyverfanboy]

fanoftheguyver - 99.2% (http://feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewFeedback2&userid=fanoftheguyver&ftab=AllFeedback&sspagename=STRK:ME:UFS)

Only 1 bad experience, well 1 or 2 more...

Ebay is kind of a hit and miss, but if you look around you can find fantastic deals! I bought The Cave on DVD for a 1 PENNY!!! O_O

[lav2k4]

. I contacted paypal, and they did sh*t to help me. I had proof and everything and they shot me down. B******s.

Did you follow the dispute process? I'm curious. You usually win the case when they review it when the time frame is up if you have the proper evidence. Also if the seller never replies to the dispute box, it's mostly a gimme to get your money back. Also I think, if you sell something for X amount of dollars and a person disputes you(for a legitimate reason), the money is automatically stripped from your account until you fix the said problem. If you simply emailed them, then you are SOL without the real dispute process. PayPal ****s a lot of people over.

I hate ebay. I had three experiences, not great at all. I stick to amazon market place for most of my rare/cheap/oop buys. I have had nothing but great customer service from many sellers. I wish I knew more about it before I used ebay to buy stuff.

I may have to return to ebay soon for a game, but I really don't want to.

[Yukito Kunisaki]

Well, heres the thing. They asked me to Fax them the proof, and I had 5 or so days to get to a fax machine. Within these five days, I also had work straight through. My PC is supposed to be able to fax without the Machine, or so someone told me, and I opened my fax program, and tried faxing it. I got an answer by paypal and from there on, errors kept occuring. I contacted them, and told them in email that I cannot fax it because I have fax problems, and am unable to get to a fax machine in the time period. I emailed them about 10+ times, and got all automated replies saying the same thing "This is how you fax...etc." I actually called up Paypal by phone, and told someone my problem. They said the only ways to give them proof is fax, and uploading to them on the site in a timed period. Yea...This was a May 14th dispute, and asking for it 2 weeks ago? Yea, I lost that privilage before they wanted proof. Set up images and everything awaiting them to ask for my proof, and in the end, failure. Few months too late.

[SDAnimeFan]

My most annoying experiences are just trying to sort through the bootleg DVDs. Otherwise I haven't had any problems as of yet.

[VidelCoolGirl]

Everything I've bought from Ebay has been great. Most of it are just used Battle Athletes DVD's, Sailor Moon stuffs, Posters, and a Macbook. I don't browse Ebay much, but I have about 20 stars I think. Esnipe rules.

[KyouryokuSenshi]

My worst experiences were as follows:

I had boughten a pair of socks that smelled like smoke.

I had also paid $80 for a lot of X-Files magazines, $20 for the item and $60 for shipping! Waited nearly two months for them to arrive from the UK. Turns out it was returned to the seller even though the address was correct. Seller offered to re send them to me by boat, which means it would take another six weeks! So I just asked for a refund, and I only got $28 of it!

[Bradster]

As Snake said, go for those with a high feedback rating and lots of them. Then there are more chances that the seller is legit.

I'd say almost the exact opposite in the case of anime, as most of the sellers I've seen with 5-digit feedback ratings deal almost exclusively in bootlegs. (Think about it: would R1 anime distributors really be perceived as being on the rocks financially if this many more 10's of thousands of authentic disks were being sold?)

But I do agree with the "depends on the item" bit. You might be looking for something during the exact week that somebody else is looking to unload it and nobody else has noticed or is interested.

I've been an eBay member for about 8 years, and have only left negative feedback maybe 5-10 times- once for non-shipment of the item, and the rest for deceptive descriptions (i.e. authentic when it was bootleg).

[tenshi_a]

Yeah, if someone has a feedback rating of 5000 over a time period of 10 years, they're to be trusted. If someone has a feedback rating of 5000 over a time period of 10 weeks, they're selling bootlegs and are going to get pulled any moment...

[Cow]

I've been dealing with Ebay for a while, and I only remember one negative experience. I bought what I thought was an American copy of Dragonball GT: Final Bout for PSX, but when it arrived I found out that it was Japanese. I sent it back and requested a refund, but I never did get that $30 back.

Wow I'm behind, I didn't even realize they released it in America. I also got a Dragonball GT: Final Bout for psx and it was the Japanese version but thank god my PSX was modded.

Anyway, I have had great experiences, even better with half.com, that makes things so simple. I buy most of my DVDs through there, 3 bucks? Amazing.

The only thing is I've had a hard time selling was my complete .hack//sign limited edition set with every extra, but that is because I won't let it go for less then what I paid for it.

Edit: just found Maison Ikkoku - Box Set Vol. 1 (DVD, 2003) for 20 bucks (offical R1 release great condition). Another great price from half (which is part of ebay).

[tofuman]

In the past I've mostly boughten anime dvds from Ebay and most of them were in good condition. The only problems I had were a few of the dvds were bootlegs. Now I don't really order things from Hong Kong or China anymore.

[Solid_Snake]

The thing is, with Bootlegs you can tell by just taking a look at the Region coding. All of the Bootlegs I've seen have it posted as Region 0.

Also, check the number of discs.

I thought it was hard to accidently get a Bootleg anymore. I mean, between Feedback, discriptions and pictures you'd have to be pretty careless.

[Yukito Kunisaki]

Yea, the thing about my item's description was that it described the ADV boxset...8 discs, The correct region, the image of the box, but when it got here, clearly a fraud. Sucky thing is most can get away with this crap too.

[Emi]

I hate ebay. I had three experiences, not great at all. I stick to amazon market place for most of my rare/cheap/oop buys. I have had nothing but great customer service from many sellers. I wish I knew more about it before I used ebay to buy stuff.

Amazon marketplace is no better than e-bay. It is just as full of bootlegs and Amazon is just as unwilling to do anything about it. There is also plenty of bad sellers. It's all a matter of knowing what you are doing and a small amount of luck. Both can be great places to buy stuff. I've only used e-bay once and it went great. I've also had good experiences with Amazon marketplace. I was able to get Chobits V.1 w/ box for $15 back in April and the first FMA tin for retail in the beginning of this month.