Heronext

I sold him the 400 book to him and he wants to send it back... I'd have to pay for HIS return shipping. It's automatic. apparently - if I accept the return through eBay's site, it says I'll pay for the return shipping.

It's not generosity, it's principle. He owns the book. I've offered partial refunds twice. I'd apparently have to pay for return shipping. If he wants to ship it back he can do so at his own expense.

I agreed with people here that a return is the best course of action because of the headaches otherwise involved, but I have not yet agreed to it on eBay. I will see how it plays out for a couple days. Then, I will probably refund the $450 and let him keep the book.

That's what I wish the seller would do; if I had wanted to I would have done it. By the way, someone alerted him to the fact he was brought up in this thread (or he came across it); he has tried to bring this here thread up within the eBay return case thread. He may well prevail but I don't see how that will help.

I believe you just have to Cancel the sale. This is what I generally do now 4-5 days after an auction ends without pay/communication, rather than wait for eBay's interminable process to play out. Poster above is right, an unpaying bidder is a waste of 2 weeks of seller's time and cheats seller out of money you are expecting, and money offered by the under-bidder. Relatively small sample size but this year I'd say I have 5-10% non-paying winners.

I would never accept a second chance offer and would not expect another eBay member to either. If winning bidder does not pay for an item (or returns it), then he/she is a non-valid bidder and all his previous bids should be erased. EBay's second offer is to buy at the bid increment lower than the now-invalid winning bidder, yet the real remaining high bid could be much lower if the two people in question had been the sole competitors at higher levels. This is how my understanding of it has always been - I could be wrong on details of how it actually works.

I only know of IW’s reprints. Is this a reprint?

I think these are specific and sad circumstances not conducive to discussion of whether someone will make money or not.

Getting a membership and using it enough to make it worthwhile is perhaps something not everyone would like to do. I can easily see the “casual CGC customer” being perfectly happy for others to take care of the details. I know people who essentially think of their LCS owner as the most knowledgeable expert they could ever know and their interface to all things having to do with comics and comic collecting.

I wonder if it’s like they quote you CGC undiscounted fees but they get a discount... otherwise why would they do it... kind of like how interior designers get a discount on furniture and sell it to you at full price

Coming up in the Heritage weekly auction ending Nov. 18th

Golden Age Ferret:

You guys are right. Thanks for the opinions

I don’t know, because I don’t have the book here. Next time I will just make it clearer that I don’t know what is going on with the book.

Pics - there were more but just adding those here which show the staples:

Had an interesting thing happen on eBay this week. Thought it was worth sharing to get folks' opinions and maybe elicit ideas to help others (or me) avoid this pitfall in the future. I like reading these types of posts; maybe you'll be entertained. I try to avoid selling any kind of oddball raw book (detached centerfold, popped staples) to avoid the hassles of possible returns from people who didn't read the description. If I do, I make sure to post a detailed description and photos so it's clear what is being offered. I listed a raw copy of Popular Teen-Agers #10 at a starting bid of 9.99 that had two extra staples in odd positions, and was happy to accept whatever the market wanted to pay, even if it was less than what I had in it. The auction was won by Ken Dyber of Cloud 9 Comics, for $416.34. I received an eBay message today that he wanted to return it. Here is the listing details, pics, and the messages I exchanged with the buyer. I'll say up front that I know the best course of action generally is to just accept a return (and that's probably what will end up happening). Listing: https://www.ebay.com/itm/253912197421?ssPageName=STRK:MESOX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1559.l2649 Desc: Popular Teen Agers 10 (Star 1953) FN+ *** L.B. COLE COVER *** spanking panel Grade notes: Book has two extra staples; one set that was driven into the book before the cover was in place. Due to the wear around the cover staples I believe this to be production-related. Book sold as-is. Message that came with the return (Return reason = Doesn't match description or photos) "Hi there, thanks for sending the book with such great packaging. Very solid copy. I looked at the extra set of staples, and see that their gloss & size doesn t match the other size of staples, which tells me there were added after manufacturing, and thus making this book a restored copy. I m not confident this is an unrestored copy, so I d like to return it, which bums me out as I love this cover & the page quality is great, and this would be my first return in about 2 years. Hope you understand. Sorry." My response "I actually don’t understand. I said the book had 4 staples, i described them in detail, included photos, and said the book was sold as-is. The book is exactly as I described." Buyer's response to my response: "I'm sorry that you didn't understand what I was trying to convey. I was under the impression that this comic's extra staples were from manufacturing, which happens from time to time, and, if that was the case, they comic would be unrestored. I was ok with this, which is why I bought it, as you said in the listing "Due to the wear around the cover staples I believe this to be production-related". The staples size and sheen on the exterior of the cover do not seem consistent with the interior ones, and therefore I feel these were added by someone else after manufacturing, which, if true, would make this book restored. We may disagree about when the staples were added to the book, but I thought I was buying an unrestored book, and I believe I have a restored one, thus, this is why I'd like to return it. I'm sorry for an inconvenience, as I said, I almost never return something, and I have been on the other end of returns, as they do happen from time to time. Thanks for your help with this." My response to that: "The frequency with which you have or haven't returned books in the past isn't relevant. Do you acknowledge you are XX of XX Comics with many years of experience in the comic dealing business? Do you acknowledge that the description says "book is sold as-is"? This is kind of a weird book, with four staples in non-standard positions. I gave only my opinion of when the staples were added. I did not present it as fact. I gave plenty of description and photographic examples for potential buyers to make their own determination. Do you acknowledge that? If any potential buyers had any doubt, they don't bid. Furthermore, a book with a cover added after production (if indeed this is the case), is not restored, but has a married cover, which is "qualified". Can you acknowledge that you were mistaken about calling this book restored? I'm sorry, but I cannot accept a return on this. Best I can do is to offer a partial refund." After that, I called him on the phone and reiterated what was in my messages. He fell back on eBay's policy that essentially a buyer can return a book for whatever reason they want. Lay it on me!

There may be a market out there (certain number of people willing to pay a certain amount above publicly available sales records) that is unknowable until the final seconds of the auction. So I don’t see the relevance of the “7+ days” criticism. I’m also not asking for any auctioneer to change their format, merely stating what I prefer and what I personally think is fairer for seller, house, and bidders.

I think this is the case where he was sued by someone who had a deal to get a comic work published by a certain publisher. Supposedly Waid intervened, informing said company about the online behavior of that person(s), and the deal was subsequently cancelled. That’s the plaintiff’s argument anyway.

I think it’s a really complicated subject, as others have pointed out. Those who say “just bid what you are willing to pay” are ignoring the disappointment which comes with having misjudged the market, and not having had time (even a few seconds) to reasses based on others’ interest. As far as I know, ebay invented the “timeout” electronic auction format, whereas a true auction ends when the auctioneer decides there are no further interested bidders. Having said this, I suppose the timeout format could be considered a form of blind auction format which was used for mail-in auctions and is still used for charity auctions and sometimes for the sale of big companies. In short, for me, I think the best format for comics is Heritage-style live, where it is clear to both sellers and potential bidders that no interest remains. I think this is fairest for everyone.

Had a free hour. Meant to be helpful but I guess it could have come off as sarcastic. Hey he bought a collection which is something I’ve never done.

Thank god eBay has made it so easy to understand

Having read the definition, I’ll never be a 100-listing a year seller

It’s LB Cole so it must be worth a million $

Yep. Same series as the later hot lady jungle covers

Has anyone following this thread gone insane yet?