eBay non paying buyer

[chief wahoo]

I opened an unpaid item case on eBay earlier this week. It's been 4 days, so I can close it out and receive the fee credit. What happens next, does ebay ding/suspend the buyer? I suppose I could neg the buyer but I'll probably receive the same in retaliation. Are there any other steps or follow-ups?

 

[tribefan]

4 days is not a long time for some people. I know I get distracted from the hobby for a week at a time.
How long did you wait before you opened the case? I'd give at least two weeks in total.

 

[chief wahoo]

Sorry, let me clarify ... the 4 days refers to how long eBay requires that you leave a case open before you can resolve and/or close it out to get reimbursed for the selling fees. The auction ended on Sept 29. I opened the case 8 days later on Oct 7 after sending at least three emails/invoices to the buyer. The buyer actually responded saying he would pay but never did.

 

[mrmopar]

I have not sold anything in a very long time, but I don't think you even have the option to leave a negative feedback for a buyer anymore, period. I could be wrong though. It certainly should be allowed w/o fear of retaliation if you win a non-paying case, but I don't believe ebay has advanced that far yet.

I still have not seen any improvement in the feedback field either. It seems to take forever to leave feedback as a buyer and I can only leave 25 at a time (even though there is an option to expand the list to more - i just get error messages). I select the feedback, leave the message and then wait for the page to update, which can take several minutes per page. it is not my computer, it is the site. I also frequently report listing violations as they relate to me seeing unnecessary crap in my searches (key work spamming) and nothing ever happens. I have reported several sellers who have hidden text. In one example, a guy is selling a modern collectible lunchbox with a few current Dodgers on it and if you click/drag anywhere in the large blank white area under the description, you'll find a list of 1000s of Dodger names typed in white that you can't otherwise see! The guy is hiding it to get keyword search hits and they still don't care, even though that is specifically against their own rules!!! Ebay doesn't seem to care about operational issues, but they will roll out these unwanted and unnecessary changes to everything else all the time just to keep things changing! Ebay is still the only real game in town and I will use them as needed, but they have room to be much better if they wanted to do so.

 

[greyminis]

I've never heard of ebay suspending anyone...less money in their pocket. The fact that sellers cannot leave negative feedback is ridiculous. Fortunately sellers can open these unpaid item cases which result in a strike against the buyer and reimbursement of seller fees. That is sufficient recourse I guess. Ebay is still the biggest game in town, but they're losing some ground. Checkoutmycards.com has gotten more interesting to me, especially since they consolidated their shipping fees and have a flat $3 rate for whatever you purchase. There are also more listings of cards I'm interested in, so that's what I'm basing this comment on. I also noticed ebay recently changed their rules where they allow sellers to open an unpaid item case in two days. That happened to me recently on a Monday morning after I won a card Friday night. Talk about ridiculous. You can't even take a weekend off these days.

 

[mrmopar]

The draw to ebay for me is the auction format and a chance to get something for a deal. The more I see stores and fixed price items, the less appealing ebay is to me, but it is still where sellers get the best exposure for their items. COMC has a ways to come with a much narrower selection and so many items are overpriced still. We need a similar auction style location where people will bring good stuff and let it ride. Not sure that can happen unless ebay completely screws up and everyone starts to exit to a different format. Ebay took advantage of a new thing (outside of those magazine/phone auctions and those card shops with the bid boards) and it may have started slow for sellers, it caught on fast and nobody looked back.

 

[markmulder20]

Next step: Block the person from bidding on your items in the future.

 

[Dilferules]

As mrmopar said you can't leave a negative feedback as a seller anymore, so that's out of the equation. It makes no sense, but so many sellers were retaliating by leaving the buyer a neg when the seller got a deserved neg that buyers were afraid of leaving negative feedback because then their feedback rating would be tarnished. Now that sellers cannot leave a negative, I think the feedback for sellers is more accurate.

The only thing you can do is go through the non-paying bidder process and block them from bidding on your auctions in the future. After they get enough NPB's they will get kicked off eBay. Not sure what number constitutes "enough", but it does happen.

Richard

 

[chief wahoo]

I see that now that I've closed out both cases and therefore received final value fee credit, that I'm unable to leave feedback. However, I see several other sellers that left POSITIVE feedback with this same buyer but with scathing comments about him not paying. I guess that means they felt it was worth leaving some feedback, though not a neg, as opposed to getting a final fee credit (?)

 

[jaderock]

I see that now that I've closed out both cases and therefore received final value fee credit, that I'm unable to leave feedback. However, I see several other sellers that left POSITIVE feedback with this same buyer but with scathing comments about him not paying. I guess that means they felt it was worth leaving some feedback, though not a neg, as opposed to getting a final fee credit (?)

Leave the "positive" feedback (ie: "buyer did not pay") BEFORE closing out the non paying case. I keep forgetting to do that as well. It helps just a bit when you realise the buyer has a history of non paying.