Duplicate listings at eBay to be banned

ErinP · #21 09/22/10, 08:57 PM

If I remember right, I read somewhere that this did NOT apply to auctions. Only fixed price items (ie, items with a BuyItNow only)

**clovis** · #22 09/22/10, 09:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nevada

You can change it to Ending Soonest, or a number of other options, but I don't think you can change the default.

IIRC, someone on HT told me how to change the personal setting to whatever you preferred.

ErinP...was that you?

**clovis** · #23 09/22/10, 09:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nevada

The wording of the email is "duplicate items", not "duplicate auctions", so your competitors will be combing auctions to turn you in. It never pays to break the rules at eBay.

So what is going to keep sellers from creating listings of 40 or 50 of the exact same item, but doing them all as auctions?

Nevada · #24 09/23/10, 09:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by clovis

So what is going to keep sellers from creating listings of 40 or 50 of the exact same item, but doing them all as auctions?

Sure, that would be within the rules, but a lot of buyers look for buy-it-now because they want to execute a deal right away. The fact is that sales volume is a lot higher with buy-it-now auctions.

**clovis** · #25 09/23/10, 09:47 AM

I'll bet that is what my competition does.

They'll have 8 auction listings of the same item ending every day.

SquashNut · #26 09/23/10, 04:24 PM

When I hit 100 feed back points they sent me an e-mail with a download of free soft ware that would enable me to mass post auctions, now they are complaining because people do it. makes no sense. But i guess it doesn't have to.

Nevada · #27 10/04/10, 06:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SquashNut

When I hit 100 feed back points they sent me an e-mail with a download of free soft ware that would enable me to mass post auctions, now they are complaining because people do it. makes no sense. But i guess it doesn't have to.

I've been thinking a lot about this lately, then this weekend I got my eBay bill. I spend well over $100 for listing & final value fees, and that doesn't count what PayPal takes. I have a suspicion that they're going to miss that $100 and reverse the rule later. Unfortunately I probably won't be back. For obvious reasons I'm launching a new project. I suspect that I'll be too busy with the new project to do eBay at the same time.

I've seen this before. EBay was a good thing, but the employees in the trenches got too much power. At the same time, upper management is no longer in touch with the operation. It's a recipe for disaster. I don't know why, but the employees in the trenches will always run a business into the ground when given half a chance.

**clovis** · #28 10/04/10, 09:46 PM

On the flip side of this...

Once again, I found myself shopping for post war Lionel trains. There are two replacement bulb sellers duking it out on ebay. In three pages, there were 59 listings for the exact same bulb. It gets really old having to look at page after page of those stupid bulbs. One of those sellers currently has 38,000 listings on ebay. It is so much easier just to buy them at a train show for 45 cents each, and generally, the parts guys at train shows really know their stuff, and can help me fix whatever I'm working on.

As well, ever want to look up what a kevlar army helmet is selling for these days? Ever want to try to find one of those? Last time I looked, one seller was selling a reproduction helmet for paintball, IIUC, and it is made out of plastic or something. About a gatrillion of the same listing, over and over and over and over. So many identical listings, and they all say "kevlar" in the title. Trying to find a real military issue kevlar helmet is plain old fatiguing!!!!!

Look up "3.0 gasket". Last time I was there, a Chinese outfit had over 400 identical listings. I was specifically looking for a Fel-Pro brand, and had to wade through all those listings, just to find that no one on ebay had the set I needed.

In the end, even though I'm a power seller, it has left such a bad taste in my mouth that I won't be shopping on ebay for any of the afore mentioned items....maybe forever.

How many buyers have walked away from ebay in disgust?????

**clovis** · #29 10/04/10, 11:26 PM

One question I have:

Let's say you are selling a book that is entitled "Repairing Chrysler Air Conditioning Systems". (The book covers all Chrysler models.)

Let's say that you have this listed under the following titles:

Chrysler Imperial AC Manual
Chrysler/Dodge AC Manual
Chrysler 300M AC Manual
Chrysler Plymouth Neon AC Manual
Dodge Truck AC Repair Manual
Chrysler Sebring AC Repair Manual

All of these listings would be for the exact same book.

Will this be allowed?

SquashNut · #30 10/05/10, 01:02 AM

If you only have 1 book then can only have one auction for each item you have for sale.
I don't see how they can police this.
I know I have stopped buying coupons.
i went through put a bunch in my watch list and they sold. Ok I understand they were buy it now, But some where in my mind i really did think they had 27 days till they would end. Had to research them over again. it gets old.

sunflower-n-ks · #31 10/05/10, 06:34 AM

And then there are the sellers that buy a base product in bulk and package it in multiple brand packaging. At a surface look, it would appear that there are several sellers listing their products, but the sellers name is the same and the company web site in the information section is the same. They use different size packages and some are auctions and some "buy it now" and some have "free shipping" and some not. They are covering all bases, it would seem. But still. it is all just one seller.

**clovis** · #32 10/05/10, 08:41 AM

Good point, sunflower. I hadn't thought about that.

Nevada · #33 10/05/10, 10:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by clovis

One question I have:

Let's say you are selling a book that is entitled "Repairing Chrysler Air Conditioning Systems". (The book covers all Chrysler models.)

Let's say that you have this listed under the following titles:

Chrysler Imperial AC Manual
Chrysler/Dodge AC Manual
Chrysler 300M AC Manual
Chrysler Plymouth Neon AC Manual
Dodge Truck AC Repair Manual
Chrysler Sebring AC Repair Manual

All of these listings would be for the exact same book.

Will this be allowed?

Yeah, you'll get away with it, as long as you don't include a photo of the product.

**clovis** · #34 10/05/10, 10:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nevada

Yeah, you'll get away with it, as long as you don't include a photo of the product.

That is really going to hurt me.

I, in fact, have a repair book that covers about 15 different models. Since I can fit about 3 of the model numbers in each title, I have 4 different listings for that same repair book.

Now my competition has 10 of the above listings for the same thing. Very irritating, IMO. I have 4 listings in 4 different categories, and he has 40!!! Actually, that guy has more like 20 listings for the same thing in 4 categories, meaning that he has 80 listings total for each book.

I can't believe this is really going to work out for ebay or for the seller.

I can no longer list the same book with different titles; Cordoba, Imperial, K-Car, Dodge trucks, Sebring, Neon, etc.

It will hurt revenues and sales for both ebay and me.

**clovis** · #35 10/05/10, 10:43 PM

On further research, I found this information:

"If you have items made to fit specific products, models, or brands—such as connector cables, phone chargers, or auto parts—you can have up to 5 fixed price listings per item. Please see the examples below for additional information. Note: This exception does not apply to generic or universal items that fit all/most products (for example, AA batteries)."

Looks like I will fit into the 5 fixed priced listings per item with my example of the Chrysler AC repair book.

Here is a link:

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/listing-multi.html

SquashNut · #36 10/05/10, 11:27 PM

Do You have only 1 book? Then I thought you could only have 1 listing per item. Then if you have 5 of them, you could list them 5 different ways, at least for now.

**clovis** · #37 10/06/10, 12:00 AM

No, I have several boxes of the same book, and can order more at wholesale.

The way I read the new rules, I could list the same Chrysler Corporation AC repair book with 5 separate listings:

1. Chrysler Cordoba AC repair manual
2. Chrysler K-cars AC repair manual
3. Chrysler Sebring AC repair manual
4. Chrysler Horizon AC repair manual
5. Chrysler Imperial AC repair manual

Any more listings than those 5 mentioned above, if I understand this correctly, I would then be in violation of their Duplicate Listings policy.

Anyone else read it the same way?

gottahaveagoat · #38 10/11/10, 08:24 PM

As a buyer, I hate going through the same seller identical listings. I tend to stop looking. I really don't use ebay much for selling anymore and pretty much only buy cheap books to read. Not worth it anymore.