My Ebay Experience

EBay is a very good and useful tool for shopping and obtaining bargains and products which are difficult to get hold off or have been deleted from shop shelves. As far as experiences go, using EBay has been good fun for the most part and has been both a useful buying and selling tool. There have been some minor incidents but overall I would recommend EBay to anyone.

Like Facebook, YouTube and Amazon-EBay is quite an addictive site once you have been lured into joining and setting up your PayPal account. It is very easy to become swept up in endless searches and buying items you normally can’t find in high street shops. I joined EBay about 6 years ago and in total I must have spent hundreds in CDs, DVDs, clothes, books, an IPod and movie memorabilia.

The great thing about EBay it is accessible 24 hours a day 7 days a week-unless the site is down for maintenance. If you set up a PayPal account it makes paying and receiving payments so much easier than dealing with cheques or postal orders. I have found PayPal to be a safe and convenient way of transferring money to and from accounts. Most of the items I have purchased have been received in good workable order, as many sellers are honest and accurate about what they selling. I don’t see the point in lying. If you receive a product which is not what you were lead to believe you would be receiving-most of us are going to want a refund and will return it. The search engine EBay has is very good; you can type anything in and will bring up options. Most of the items for sale come with images. I am always more inclined to buy something having seen a picture, than not seeing one. Either way we are trusting the sellers and their descriptions.

I have had some negative experiences with EBay with sellers and buyers who try to rip you off. Last year I was selling a mobile phone-it was an O2pay as you go Motorola. Somehow EBay had listed the phone twice. The phone I had set up for sale was on a ‘Buy now offer’. When I checked the next day, I discovered the error and two people had bought the phone, even though there was only one available. I decided to give the phone to the first buyer and I emailed the second person and apologized for the error and explained what had happened. I was polite and honest yet I received a barrage of rude emails, demanding I send them a phone that didn’t exist. When I explained again what the problem was they just kept sending emails, swearing and calling me names. When I tried to report them through EBay, EBay did nothing and never even acknowledged by grievances despite many attempts.

There was a second incidence where I bought what I thought was a region 2 DVD of the Lion King, only to discover that it was a region 1 and it wouldn’t play on our machine. I sent the item back and sent the customer an email explaining what had happened and that I would like a refund. This was agreed by the seller. He said he had received the DVD back and was sending postal orders. The postal orders never arrived and again sent I chaser emails to the customer and he never responded back. Again I reported the incident to EBay and they ignored by complaint once again.

I had another incident where I bought a video of the film Armageddon. The ‘right up’ said the video was in excellent condition, but when I received it, it looked like it had been under a lawnmower. The case was crushed to bits and when you put it in the video to play, all you could see was white snow and thin lines waving up and down. Again I contacted the seller and said I would be returning the video. I said I wanted back my postage back as the damage was not my fault. Once again, despite polite and friendly emails to the seller, I just received rude and unhelpful replies back. The seller said that his description of the video was correct. What a joke.

EBay is all fun and good until you have reason to complain and then EBay falls flat on its face. For any new EBayer I would be wary of the site. Here are some tips which may help you:-

1. Be careful of the products you buy. I would avoid electrical items and items which require pickup unless you can pay ‘cash on delivery’.
2. Read the descriptions carefully before buying.
3. Set up a PayPal account-this is quick and convenient way of payment
4. Have a limit in mind to what you can afford to pay. The site can be addictive
5. Always check the seller has 100% positive feedback. If the seller has less than that I would want to know why-read the comments and judge for yourselves.
6. If you are selling an item I would recommend using a picture or two-this does enhance your viewing figures.
7. Make sure you are accurate with your descriptions of items for sale. Customers will not be happy with being misinformed about scratches or claiming an item is new when it is obviously second hand.