BEWARE EBAY'S FRAUDULENT FEES

[the blob]

OK, many of you have read me whine about getting kicked off ebay in August for FOUR slow shipping doo hickeys over the course of a year [three from the same guy, only two of which actually arrived after ebay's "estimated" delivery time] (despite 1300+ perfect feedback and 10 years on ebay).

 

A few months before that (due to the same four slowing shipping DSRs or whatever they are) ebay had advised me I could no longer sell through a store and restricted me to 80 transactions a month (and $8K in sales...which I was not going to get close to anyway). I sucked it up and was just running auctions at that point and was making sales, etc. until they said I had not improved quickly enough and booted me.

 

What I did not realize is that although my store had been shut down (it had been one of the $50 or so a month stores, not the "basic" store), ebay had just started charging me for a "basic store" ($19.95/mo) instead even though I could not even use it! I didn't realize this was going on because I was making some big sales via auction and was paying a bunch of fees.

 

So now I have been shut out of the selling business for 6 weeks and I get an invoice for $19.95 and I realize something is going on. My dashboard doesn't tell me exactly what it is.

 

Well, after getting on the horn with ebay it turns out ebay continued to charge me for a "basic" store anyway because I never "unsubscribed"...despite not being allowed to use the store!! nowhere in any communication about my store being shut down was I advised i needed to "unsubscribe" to anything ---I stupidly assumed that I would not be charged for something to which my access was blocked! silly me!

 

Well, after a bunch of screaming they say they will refund one $19.95 payment and cancel the one sought in the invoice. We'll see if that happens. I'm pretty sure I am still out one or two $19.95 payments, but at this point I am too tired to fight these crooks.

 

I don't know how many folks are in the same boat with 10,000 sellers getting the boot in august, but it would make for an interesting lawsuit.

[The-Collector]

OK, many of you have read me whine about getting kicked off ebay in August for FOUR slow shipping doo hickeys over the course of a year [three from the same guy, only two of which actually arrived after ebay's "estimated" delivery time] (despite 1300+ perfect feedback and 10 years on ebay).

 

A few months before that (due to the same four slowing shipping DSRs or whatever they are) ebay had advised me I could no longer sell through a store and restricted me to 80 transactions a month (and $8K in sales...which I was not going to get close to anyway). I sucked it up and was just running auctions at that point and was making sales, etc. until they said I had not improved quickly enough and booted me.

 

What I did not realize is that although my store had been shut down (it had been one of the $50 or so a month stores, not the "basic" store), ebay had just started charging me for a "basic store" ($19.95/mo) instead even though I could not even use it! I didn't realize this was going on because I was making some big sales via auction and was paying a bunch of fees.

 

So now I have been shut out of the selling business for 6 weeks and I get an invoice for $19.95 and I realize something is going on. My dashboard doesn't tell me exactly what it is.

 

Well, after getting on the horn with ebay it turns out ebay continued to charge me for a "basic" store anyway because I never "unsubscribed"...despite not being allowed to use the store!! nowhere in any communication about my store being shut down was I advised i needed to "unsubscribe" to anything ---I stupidly assumed that I would not be charged for something to which my access was blocked! silly me!

 

Well, after a bunch of screaming they say they will refund one $19.95 payment and cancel the one sought in the invoice. We'll see if that happens. I'm pretty sure I am still out one or two $19.95 payments, but at this point I am too tired to fight these crooks.

 

I don't know how many folks are in the same boat with 10,000 sellers getting the boot in august, but it would make for an interesting lawsuit.

 

Sorry to hear about the trouble.

 

Their dash board reminds me of my mobile phone billing dash board, deliberately opaque so that fees are not immediately apparent.

[comicwiz]

After having had a recent issue with eBay charging me for something I wasn't aware of, I got the impression they are starting to try the revenue model where they "try" taking money from it's members, under the guise that members unknowingly are agreeing to it under their TOS or policies.

 

The part that never seems right to me is that 10 out of 10 times if you complain about the charges, they reverse them with little to no resistance. The impression I get is that they never had a right to that money in the first place, and they're just counting on people not noticing.

[the blob]

and this is why i see no moral or ethical dilemna when someone pays for something under a "gift" payment and the seemingly RICO-enterprise that is ebay/paypal misses out on a fee...apparently it seems that they're just making up for it by stealing from some other customer

[Dr. Balls]

[comicwiz]

Dear eBay,

 

If you are reading this, I propose adding an area to your dashboard where you can choose to send a notice of cancellation which attaches a scan representing the cover to MAD Magazine #166 as the members final confirmation they are officially leaving, unsubscribed, and completely done with you.

 

To help you expedite this new change quickly, and on the off-chance you have trouble finding a specimen scan, here you go:

 

 

[the blob]

After having had a recent issue with eBay charging me for something I wasn't aware of, I got the impression they are starting to try the revenue model where they "try" taking money from it's members, under the guise that members unknowingly are agreeing to it under their TOS or policies.

 

The part that never seems right to me is that 10 out of 10 times if you complain about the charges, they reverse them with little to no resistance. The impression I get is that they never had a right to that money in the first place, and they're just counting on people not noticing.

 

makes me wonder how much I have been overcharged by ebay/paypal over the years, refunds that never got credited, etc. i know, i have a responsibility to myself to carefully scrutinize their bill, but that doesn't give them a right to set up a system by which they knowingly overcharge customers with the expectation that those customers will not catch everything.

 

it's like this supermarket i (unfortunately) still go to. at least 10% of their sales items don't ring up at the sales price. the cashiers then make it very difficiult on you and slow to check the prices when you say something wrang up wrong -- they send someone off to check the price. people on line are giving you the stink eye. most of the customers are yuppies who can't be bothered over a 50 cent overcharge, but i do it on principal. once the person came back to tell me i was wrong about the price...i then went back into the store and ripped down the huge sign that showed I was right and presented it to the cashier and got into it with the guy who told me i was wrong...(this was over a few bucks, so not just principal)

 

and if you don't catch the overcharge until after the receipt is printed, you need to waste 15 minutes in customer service to get it fixed. heck, one where the cashier clearly charged me twice for an item (because it was something she had to weigh and it showed up twice on my receipt!) she insisted I was wrong and went through every single item in $250 worth of groceries to show me I bought two of the same item (olives from the self-serve olive bar) that happened to weight exactly the same...yeah right. and when she finally admitted her mistake I had to spend another 10 minutes at customer service to get my $7 back.

 

i'm not sure why i keep on going back other than their organic milk is like $1.50 less a half gallon than my other market...

[the blob]

o.k., with the refund it looks like i am only out one $19.95 payment

 

astrangely enough, for the invoice in the month where they blocked me from selling via store, they didn't charge me for any store subscription! i remember that i looked at that invoice to make sure they weren't charging me anymore and it all looked cool so i was lazy and didn't look at the next invoices.

 

thing is, had i not been booted from selling entirely and was chugging along making $300-$1000/mo in auction sales i never would have realized they were still charging me for a store i could not use

[Boba]

It astonishes me that eBay boots people for 4 slow shipments,

when the place is fraught with dirt-bags thriving on honest buyers.

[the blob]

It was 4 out of 98 feedbacks over the course of the year. Problem was that I had not been doing a lot of volume (though dollar-wise, my sales had been healthy, probably averaging $750/mo) and it's all based on % of overall feedbacks/volume.

[Boba]

Silly.

 

eBay used to be for the common man to sell his garage sale stuff.

I liked it that way, and I hate what it's become.

[Mijael.Levy]

I getting tired to say this, but we really need something else than ebay to sell our comics

 

 

[Dr. Balls]

With six billion people in the world, it was only a matter of time before businesses realized that the amount of people who are ignorant to their policies far outnumber those who take issue with their business practices. In my limited scope, this is pretty much prevalent in all types of companies, not just Ebay. I don't understand the heartburn that Ebay causes people.

[InvstmntComcSuply]

 

astrangely enough, for the invoice in the month where they blocked me from selling via store, they didn't charge me for any store subscription! i remember that i looked at that invoice to make sure they weren't charging me anymore and it all looked cool so i was lazy and didn't look at the next invoices.

 

thing is, had i not been booted from selling entirely and was chugging along making $300-$1000/mo in auction sales i never would have realized they were still charging me for a store i could not use

 

I think that was the same month that they started the new fee structures. IIRC they gave everyone signing up for a new store the first month free. I know that I got the first month of my store free. i wonder if existing store owners also got a free month.

 

It is interesting the timing of the purge seemed to coincide with an opportunity to get a free month on store fees.

[RockMyAmadeus]

and this is why i see no moral or ethical dilemna when someone pays for something under a "gift" payment and the seemingly RICO-enterprise that is ebay/paypal misses out on a fee...apparently it seems that they're just making up for it by stealing from some other customer

 

 

 

[the blob]

yes, i know rma, other than your warehouse of comics, your entire retirement savings must be in ebay stock given how this issue is clearly a big concern for you... it's kind of like coming down on someone for paying their drug dealer with a counterfeit 20

[RockMyAmadeus]

 

 

[seanfingh]

[Dr. Balls]

[Hepcat]

I getting tired to say this, but we really need something else than ebay to sell our comics

 

Try a brick and mortar store and ads in trade publications then why don't you?

 

I'm fed up to here with all this incessant whining and complaining about Ebay. Ebay has enabled hundreds of thousands of cottage retailing industries that wouldn't otherwise exist. If you don't like it, go back to retailing the way it was done twenty years ago.