eBay buyers... *sigh*
 

So I'm running a pre-Black Friday sale. Everything in my store is 15% off.
I just got an e-mail from a customer who purchased two days ago, asking me to refund her the difference between the sale price and what she paid.

I sent a nice apology explaining that the sale started today. She made her purchase two days ago. My apologies, but just like any other business I can't make a sale retroactive.

Honestly... What are people thinking?? How far back should I apply this refund? Two days ago, obviously. What about three? The whole week, maybe? :confused:

I have to wonder if she buys a widget at WalMart for $20, then sees it on sale two days later and goes in and asks for a refund to meet the sale price...?

She doesn't ask for a refund. What she does is return the Widget to WM, gets her money and then buys it at the sale price. Duh. Odds are very few customers will ask for a "refund" from you; if you're willing to sell it now at 15% off then you should cut her some slack.

Seriously??

So how far back do you think this should this apply?
(people actually do this??)

I don't know, but I work in a grocery store that has weekly adds. If you couldn't make it during the week of a sale on a certain item, we don't say, "Oh, that's too bad, here, have it now for last weeks price." Get real. You don't see JC Penny's giving the sale price on last month's sale, do you? WalMart doesn't have sales. They have price rollbacks, there is a difference.

I couldnt survive if I had to keep selling bananas at .39lb to everyone that "missed" the sale, when I pay .41lb for them.

You started a sale on a specific day. Those that purchased before that day are out of luck. They will just have to catch the next sale. Business is business.

Does she have a right to ask for this ? No. Would I want to make a customer happy over a small thing? Yes. A compromise refund of some part might just make her a repeat customer. And a number of big retailers would certainly do this.
On her behalf, it doesn't hurt to ask. It does not make her anything bad to have tried.

Actually I was being generous when I said "ask."
It was more along the lines of an expected demand...

I think that's it, actually.
If it had been a "Hey, I see this is on sale today... Would you maybe...?" I might have been inclined to do it. But telling me this is now on sale and she'd like her total adjusted kind of irks me. (especially since she paid two days ago!)

Many, many retailers will adjust the price for you if you buy something and it goes on sale within 10 days- 2 weeks of purchase if you bring in your receipt and ask.
Target, Macys, Nordstrom, Best Buy, Old Navy, Gap are some that do. WalMart does not.

So does that mean if you increased the price instead of lowering it she should pay you extra since now the price is more?


katlupe

she's a little ticked that she bought the thing and then a day or two later you lowered the price. I get it. However... offer and acceptance. The deal is complete. If you decide to give her 15% back, that's a customer service issue and is not mandatory in any way.

R

Yeah I agree that the way something is asked is very important. If she had been polite about it, she would have stood a better chance of getting what she wanted. Makes it so much harder to overcome the bad feelings she generated.

I hope you don't think I believe you owe her anything because I don't. But she's obviously following your store/items; most people buy and move on. (Okay, some people have way too much time on their hands and just like to "pick"; she could be one of them.) My only thought was, despite what was probably a demanding "request", that you have the chance to gain a valued customer as others have suggested.

As a retailer, I agree with this statement. However, if you do it for one, you will have to do it for many more.

Macy's, Gap and the others mentioned are huge chains that can afford to "go back" 2 weeks on pricing. Small timers can't. Unfortunately, that's how the big guys get bigger.

Stores that offer retroactive sale pricing state the terms in their ads or in the store. I have gone back with receipts and asked for refunds because of the posted store policies.

But would I expect a refund on a private purchase? No.

LisaInIdaho is correct.

May large retailers will refund the difference if the item is going on sale.

My wife watches this very carefully with our large purchases.

We bought a garage door opener at Sears for $159. Two weeks later that exact same unit was $99

Yep... We got the difference.

I actually think it is a law in Maine but not sure where to look it up.

L

What is a private purchase?

The buyer isn't right, but I can sort of understand the position of the buyer and why they might be upset. Many people don't associate an Ebay Store as being a business, just as if you had a store front. They tend to think of you as just a private seller.

They tend to look at it that if you planned to put something on sale in 2 weeks, you should have either let them know prior, or be willing to issue a refund for the difference. Some people view it as taking advantage of your buyers by getting all you can now at the full price. Since you're not a large business that is handed down sales orders from the home office, you knew ahead of time you intended to sell it for less in a only a very short amount of time.

Now this isn't what you're doing at all and, you're totally within your rights to ask any price you set. It's just some buyer's perception that they're being taken advantage of -- based solely on how they see it. They don't understand what all is going on behind the scenes. I think so many people are getting so tired of being taken advantage of by people who actually intend to be greedy, that they just get overly paranoid about it and can't recognize a reputable sale when they see it any more.

Even though the buyer did not ask appropriately for the refund, I think that any seller who wishes to insure their reputation and customer satisfaction, should be the bigger person, take the high road, and just issue the refund in order to make a customer happy.

In business, it isn't a who's-right or who's wrong. You need to do whatever you can feasibly do to make your buyers happy so your business continues with the utmost integrity and reputation. Sometimes that means that, even if you're dead right and and customer is dead wrong, you let them think they are the ones who are right and you yielded to them out of respect, in order to protect your business reputation.

Think of it as only a couple of dollars invested in assuring yourself a happy customer that could generate future sales -- not only for yourself, but for others too. As an Ebay seller myself, I feel all sellers have a responsibility of coming as close as possible to that 100% positive feedback as we can. It only benefits each other since it shows trustworthiness and a future for sales for many more years to come.

We can never make 100% of the people happy, but we do have the ability to come pretty close just by giving the grace them be wrong. For every pain-in-the-behind, we do have a 100 more that go out of their way to make a transaction as pleasant as possible.

I already have 100% positive feedback. :) I also usually have the 20% FVF discount, too, because my DSRs are so high.

So far as this particular issue, I'm pretty sure this is not a precedent that I want to set. Because then I do have to decide not only how far back I'm willing to make a sale price retroactive, but what about customers who didn't ask? It should be a secret from them? I can't do that.

My profit margin is almost nil with the sale price, I really don't want to have to give up the profit that I have made...

People pull that crap all the time. Stick to your guns. She bought it for the price she bought it at 2 days ago. It's not your fault that she missed the sale. Tough luck.

As therunbunch said, stick to your guns. I used to sell bakery stuff at the farmers market. It surprised me how often people seemed to assume I was doing it just for fun & not for money. And some thought I should meet the prices of mass-produced bread. Gee, whole-grain, hand-made, small-batch bread for $2? Right. :grump:

Someone trying to get you to change your pricing to match dissimilar goods is a bit different than someone missing a sale by a couple of days and asking for a price adjustment. Of course, it's Erin's business and the decision is hers and anm internet business is a little different than a local kind of store, but I, personally use good customer service as a huge indicator of whether I'm a return shopper. Whether or not it's a small, independent business or a huge merchant. I can tell you that the businesses I patronize make far more money from my purchases than they lose by doing a price adjustment a couple of times.

in the economy that we are in everyone is looking for the best deal. i dont know that i would be bent out of shape for somone asking politely, demanding now thats another thing. after having been in customer service for as long as i have i can tell you the person who asks politely always got the better deal from me. people who demanded anything got a polite professional Sorry we cant do that. I saw the comments about return customers and return customers are great but if you are taking a loss everytime on someone you many not want them to come back. We had a department that saved customers when they called to cancel and they had to figure out real fast who was trying to save a few bucks and who was trying to get a freebie. and they got freebie seekers cancelled and off the phone.

The only way I could do this would be to come up with some fixed number of days that I would price back to, and then alert every customer who'd been in since then.

(Then I'd have to risk the fall-out from anyone who might hear about this who missed that arbitrary cutoff by just one more day...)

Otherwise, I can not grant this to one customer and not every customer. Beyond cost or annoyance, that's just not ethical...

I agree you should stick to your guns. Prices go up and down all the time due to demand. Obviously you are lowering your price in order to get rid of inventory. Your decision, her bad luck.

I would not ask an ebay seller for a discount. It's their business and I must take the risk that I didn't get the best deal when I hit the purchase button.

"Give someone an inch and they will always want a mile"-dad

This is definately a tough one.

To me, and this is just me thinking, that selling on E-Bay is an individual sale.

Even if you have 500 items in your "Store" you are doing it as an individual.

Wal*Mart, on the other hand is not an individual but is a corporation and therefore has more wiggle room, just by sheer volume, to work with.

I think of E-Bay'rs as people trying to make a buck and not support an enterprise with employees, distribution and the like.

I do know some people that earn their living via E-bay. If they have something for sale I wouldn't ask then to discount what the price was "advertised". I would just figure that's the price and that's what they want.

Don't worry, I'm always getting the dicker thing with my services. Sorry dude, this is what I charge, if you can get it cheaper good enough, but this is what I charge.

Not directly related but a bit against Wal-Mart bashers. One day I left a bag of items behind at the register. Realized it when I got home and call the customer service desk. They said it hadn't been recorded as having been turned in yet, but to just come in with the receipt. When I did so several days later the items still weren't recorded in their log, but CS still said to go get the identical items and I wouldn't be charged for them.

Now, I'm not a Wal-Mart fan, and think anti-monoply rules should be applied to then, just like Standard Oil in the 1800s and AT&T in the 1900s. However, occasionally they do get it right.

Have you SHIPPED the item yet? If you haven't shipped it yet, and I was the buyer, I'd be inclined to cancel my order.

Also, like someone else pointed out, she's obviously watching your store, and could have been a valuable repeat customer. Not any longer. It'd be worth it to me to have a satisfied customer. 99% of the customer base is not going to ask for a refund and they are perfectly happy. What does it hurt to make 100% happy? If you'd have been happy selling it today for X-15%, why wouldn't you have been happy 2 days ago selling it for X-15%?

Just doesn't seem to make good business sense to me to alienate someone. Especially when 100 people are happy -- but don't mention it.... and one person gets ticked and tells all their friends. I'd make sure not to have the one ticked.

FWIW

Good heavens, of course I've shipped the item! If I posted on the 20th that she'd purchased on the 18th...
That would cost me far more business than anything, waiting a week to ship! ;)

Like I said, I can not keep it a secret from every other customer who did nothing more than not ask for a retroactive discount. That's just doesn't seem ethical.

Lisa, private sale to me is one individual to another. I guess my term is confusing, it's just something my grandma called it years ago. Private as compared to commercial sale maybe, commercial being any store.

ErinP, even if you stated on your site that sale prices do not apply to previously purchased items or layaways, someone would be there wanting you to bend the rules, just for them.

There is an answer. Figure the amount she would get back, and give her a coupon for her next purchase of over $X (The $X to be determined by you). Make sure the coupon only amounts to 1/2 your markup on that dollar amount. If she buys, you come out ahead and she comes out ahead.

Good idea. Just say that the sale is only for specific days and specific items so a refund is not possible, but you would be happy to give her a coupon for her next purchase... blah blah blah.
Makes her feel that you "care" but doesn't require a refund... refunds are difficult for sellers because that income may already be spent on bills by the time a refund is requested...

May I ask, how much IS the difference? Are we talking a couple bucks, or a LOT of money? That'd make the decision for me. Isn't it worth a couple bucks to save all this aggravation?

Give them a coupon towards a future purchase and then put them on your blocked buyers list.

I would guess that creating any second purchase on eBay is very difficult and that if you could measure lifetime value of a customer on the site that it would be very very close to single transaction purchase averages. It likely isn't going to hurt you not to give the discount. Chains that have customer lifetime values in the 3x, 5x, 10x single purchase range almost HAVE to give the discount to protect the future purchase potential.

R

How much are we talking about? Is this customer a repeat customer? I think Harry has a good idea.

Definitely not a repeat customer. As mentioned, very little eBay traffic is comprised of repeat customers.
Due to the nature of my store, I probably have more repeats than most, but even still, less than 25% of my business is a repeat.

What's ironic is that I did end up refunding part of her order. For whatever reason, it (and one other order) missed my shipment pile until she sent an email, a week after it should have gone out, asking when I'd shipped.

So, in addition to shipping immediately, I refunded her shipping cost because that was my fault. :rolleyes:

You're lucky she didn't just cancel the order when she found out that, not only had it NOT shipped yet, you wouldn't honor the current price. :grump:

What? :confused:
She paid the current price. (Isn't that what this entire thread was about?)
She did not purchase during the sale.

Her eCheck didn't clear until the last day of the sale, so even if I'd shipped as promptly as I usually do, I would have mailed it after the sale was over anyway. The sale does not figure in to this transaction in any way, shape or form, nor should it.
As mentioned previously, I think it's completely unethical to grant a special price to one customer and not every other.

I did screw up on her shipping. It should have gone out several days before it did. If only I were perfect... Life would be so much easier.
But, consequently, the cost was on me and I refunded her shipping.

So far as "lucky" I guess I'm not seeing that either. She either thinks she got a fair deal or she doesn't. My business practices won't change one way or the other.
99.9% of my customers are happy and my feedback and DSRs reflect i and, as has been mentioned, difficult customers are not worth the time and effort it takes to please.
If she does become difficult, I'll put her on my blocked list. No big deal.
But so far this customer has not been particularly difficult and hopefully will remain so. :)