Hi all - I'm just joining the group, and sorry to have to do so! As I continue to sell, I realize there are indeed bad buyers out there. All it takes is one to cause anger and trepidation going forward selling on eBay.

My experience (this is the second buyer of the ilk) has recently been with a buyer who claims an item was not in the condition you described, and not asking for a refund but instead asking for partial credit. To me that's a rip-off attempt - at least for me because I'm an honest seller and know exactly the condition of items I sell (mostly re-sale both used and new).

I have learned from this most recent experience - that regardless of what or how many photos you use in your listing description, it is wise to take multiple detailed photos of any item for your own records. If had done it with this particular item, I could have simply emailed the photos to the person to shut them up. I did not take photos in this case because I used a stock photo instead (it was a new item).

I will not make that mistake again.

And once the issue is officially resolved, I will block the buyer AND add her to whatever "bad buyer lists" exist here.

Hi All, Sorry to be here but this damn eBay system that favors buyers and treats sellers like trash is really getting to me today!

I sold a 100 year old brooch to a lady in Canada and said in my description that it was missing a rhinestone. She wrote me once received that in fact it was missing two, and that if I wanted positive feedback I had to give her some money. I wrote back and told her to return the item to me for a full refund, but that I don't give partial refunds. She left me negative feedback. I thought it was pretty clear that it was feedback extortion, and contacted eBay about it. The guy at eBay told me that he would file a report and investigate my claim, and to leave a feedback response to her claim. I left a response, and eBay removed it as 'feedback abuse' while her attempt to extort me wasn't accepted. Honestly, I can't think of a clearer case than this one - in one sentence she asks for money and in the next links it with her feedback. But I guess eBay needs them to say it CLEARLY  and in all caps before they will do anything about it. This feedback system is so unfair, and if there was anyplace to sell that was even close to as good as eBay, I'd be there in a second. Maybe it's time for me to finally get my own website and not have to deal with eBay's lopsided and unfair policies?!?

If you want to know who she is, just look at my feedback. Not satisfied with taking away my 100% she also now is demanding that I give her money without the feedback, and has turned down again my offer to refund her if she returns the item.

Selfish evil woman!

But now, I leave negative comments as positives. Better to warn other sellers at least. And I report them to ebay. I don't know if it does anythin g to them, but they should at least be reported.

... received an email to my personal email account the day after Christmas - not through ebay - saying she won an auction of mine but didn't receive the item instead received an "empty priority mail envelope".  And, wanted to know when her item would be mailed.  My first thought was I goofed.  Then I came to my senses.  First she said she won 2 items - wrong.  It was a .5 oz jar of cosmetics.  It went first class, as stated in my auction, and I do have my post office receipt - so the priority mail envelope wasn't even a good story.  I emailed back and said that anything she had to say should has to go through ebay and I needed a little more information than just her name and the date the auction ended.  Haven't heard back - I wonder why.  Nice scam but it didn't work.  I am patting myself on the back that I recognized this right away.

Hope everyone is having a great Holiday Season.

Yes, there are some pretty bad buyers out there.  Lots of good ones though and that is what makes up put up with the bad.

I go with ebays 4 day rule for opening an unpaid item case and they do it automatically which is good. I'm not sure about refusing to allow someone to bid on your item.  I believe you can but I'm not sure about how to do it.  I do know that if you've had a bad experience with a buyer you can block them from bidding on your items in the future.  Also when you're listing an item there is a place where you can put some restrictions like - if there have been 2 unpaid strikes in a month - something like that.  All you have to do is check the box. "No returns/exchanges" is a tough one.  I don't do it because I think a lot of them are bluffing - if they want to, (and you know you're right) let them open a case - that usually doesn't happen I have only had one listing where I completely disagreed with ebays ruling. 

Just experienced a buyer who retracted a bid dishonestly. name: wendymom. Makes me mad that all a buyer has to do is choose from the 3 choices and boom! they can retract a bid. Just like that. Very dishonest. I instantly blocked this buyer and suggest you all do the same. She sent me a message calling me rude also and that she was going to spread the word around that im a rude bad seller. I responded by saying that i would not want to deal with anyone who associates with a liar anyways. Better for me. Ha ha. Anyways i have had 6 non-payers in the last month and never a consequence for the buyer. never.

Hi,

I am a newbie seller on eBay.  I kind of just started selling things around the house that I've had for a while, and it has been a lot of fun...up until yesterday.

Now I am very new at this, and have only sold like 12 things so far.  I get feedback a little more than 50% of the time, so I only have 7 feedbacks right now.

This week I sold a keyboard to a buyer that was in tip-top shape. I had lots of pictures showing different angles to show that it was in great shape.  I had been keeping up with the tracking info of the keyboard after I shipped it, as it was by far the biggest sale I had made, and I wanted to make sure everything was okay and that the buyer was happy.  I left the buyer a message as soon as I saw that it was delivered.  Well, three days later I get this email (in horrible broken English) saying that I had sold a defective product, and that the keyboard was cracked, that keys were loose, etc. and also accusing me of posting pictures that hid the flaws.  Needless to say, I was shocked.  I have been very particular about all of my postings, and have ALWAYS pointed out flaws if an item had them.  Heck, I even flipped through every page in a book I sold and indcluded in the listing that it had one dog-eared page crease.  I have been very meticulous in my listings and I want to represent my items honestly.

Well this fruitcake that bought my keyboard has made zero sense thus far in his requests.  First he claims that I sold him a broken product and that he "stayed up until 2 am trying to fix it."  First of all, if I was a buyer and truly received something that was broken, I wouldn't try to fix it myself - I would contact the seller and resolve it with them.  Secondly, he has tried several roundabout ways of saying he can't send pictures of the damaged keyboard to me.  He even accused me of having a "strategy" of keeping buyers from being able to send pictures to me!  Nutjob.

But the really strange thing is that he refuses to send it back for a full refund.  Instead, he wants a partial refund, and he says that if I don't give him a partial refund that he will leave negative feedback - so basically he's blackmailing me. Classy. I'm almost resolved to give him his partial refund (he's only asking for $35 for a $300 item) but at the same time, I feel like he wins if he gets his $35.  I feel like this buyer feels that he can take advantage of me because I am so new and because I have such a low feedback number right now, I'm sure he knows it will basically destroy my chances of selling much more on eBay (even though this experience has almost made me want to thrown in the towel since it happened so early on in my eBaying).  He hasn't left any negative feedback yet, but if he does and if I can't get this thing resolved, I will repost so that you all can check out my feedback and add him to your "bad buyer" list.  I checked out his feedback yesterday, and he had recently left bad feedback for another buyer, but even a lot of his positive feedback that he left for buyers had negative comments in them.  He just sounds like a totally miserable person that wants to bring everybody down.  A real winner - and he can't speak English either.

If you are selling computer graphics cards beware of the guy that bought item number 110874738753 from me.

I sold a Nvidia 470 with a waterblock installed.  Two weeks after he received it, I get an email that it was DOA.  Two weeks was a bit much, but I'm not trying to rip anyone off.  So I told him to send it back and as long as it was in original condition, I would give him his money back.

Never heard back from him, but I received his box almost a month later.  It was postmarked exactly 3 weeks after my last email.  Again, kind of weird.

When I opened the box I saw that he had removed the waterblock and tried to install the original fan shroud.  He had not replaced all the thermal pads on the fan and over half of the screws were missing.  So it wasn't making contact with the chips on the card.  Needless to say, this is why the card didn't work.  I sent an email (again, never responded to) saying why I not refunding his money and returned the card to him.

So now I'm being called a thief and liar.  I've filed a complaint with ebay, but I'm not expecting much.

Accoding to this guy's site, he modifies cards to work with Apples.  Just something to be aware of if you are selling any old computer parts.

Here's one for the records. I sold an item to someone and it got lost in the mail.  I refunded her money, left positive feedback, and she did the same thing, but she kept contacting me about the item to see if I had been able to find it. I spent a LOT of time trying to figure out what happened to it. The post office failed to scan it when it left, so she decided that I never mailed it.  After I told her I had given up finding it and would just file for the insurance, she started sending me email saying I had never mailed it to her because I was trying to back out of the transaction. I explained that I had a receipt for postage, that the post office had a reference ID opened, and that I had gotten as much for the item as I had expected.  To this, she sent more email calling me snippy and saying she wished she had left negative feedback.  I put her on blocked bidders, but because we had exchanged messages previously, hers still make it through.  I cancelled all of my current listings and will no longer sell anything on Ebay. If you want her buyer ID, check my feedback under item  310418600885

I'm just a home seller selling as if it was a garage sale, don't even make a profit. I've been an Ebay seller now since 1998 (14 years) and have never meet anyone this insane. Who needs this??

I've been the victim of more than a few bad buyers in my short time with ebay.  Most of them were "new" members that eBay let slide because they "didn't understand how eBay works".  The latest one was the worst by far.  Lukiegames in Miami Gardens FL just pulled a huge scam on me and eBay not only let them get away with it but helped them get away with it.  They ordered a large lot of video games from me, then clamed that one of the more expensive games wasn't shipped.  I refused the partial refund (witch was twice the retail value of the item) and the case was sent to the resolution center for dispute.  Even with 3 different forms of documentation and proof that all items were shipped eBay took less than 30 minutes to side with lukiegames and give the refund of the full price of the lot.  Even with my perfect score and outstanding record compaired to lukiegames record of scamming sellers and cheating buyers.  That meant nothing to eBay because they make more money off the larger stores.  Larger stores that are scamming small sellers and selling the stolen items on their own website (where the prices are a lot cheaper than what they sell on eBay).  This is a warning to anyone that sells vintage video games.  DO NOT buy or sell to or from Lukiegames.  They will make a few purchases to gain your trust then scam you with eBay's help.  If anyone else had the same problem with other big video game buyers please let me know so I can block them before they try to scam me too.