[hintonlady]

I sold a few things on ebay *grumble*. As a whole I had a mixed experience. I liked having customers I wouldn't have otherwise had access to. I didn't like the sneaky way ebay and paypal tag team fees and coerce you into accounts with higer fees with no way to opt out. I would have been happier for them to just HONESTLY state the fees from the get go. I don't feel they are too high for me as much as I dislike feeling lied to.

Anyway, more to my actual point......... I was worried about paypal because I have heard LOTS of horror stories from people both here and elsewhere. It seems that if you find a scammer instead of a buyer you could land in lots of worries.

I had a scammer try to rip me off and paypal actually backed me "the seller" up. I was pleasantly surprised. Sold an item for .99 cents due to only one bid. Okay fine, no big deal. Item closed SEPT 23. I bought shipping through paypal, mostly for convenience, thank goodness for that. Item was shown to arrive as of SEPT 26. YES, that is amazingly fast shipping TYVM.

On NOV 4 I get an email saying the buyer has a dispute that he never got the item. When I logged into paypal he stated that he contacted me TWICE about it. I NEVER got a single message from this creep. Rather than try to resolve it informally I escalated it to a full paypal claim. I guess my frustration over rode my desire to protect my feedback. *cringe* This loser was trying to take me for like 5 whole darned bucks and some change for an item he practically stole at .99 cents plus shipping. How pathetic is that????? It's not like it was a laptop or something.

Paypal made an almost instant decision in my favor. Apparently their customer service bots can cross reference my shipping info. and know that the item was sent and delivered. Just wanted to let you guys know that paypal isn't always biased against the seller. Also, beware apparently sleazy scammers have no minimum amount with which they like to troll over. :shrug:

 

[shelleydar]

I buy & sell quite a bit on Ebay - some really inexpensive and some expensive (thousands of dollars) stuff. Anymore I ONLY use PayPal. I've never had problems with them. However, to cover myself I always buy through PP with my credit card. If PayPal is dragging their feet getting something resolved my CC company steps in. I don't have that option if I have it taken out of my bank account.

When I sell on EB I don't stiff my customers on S&H. However, I do make sure my costs are covered. I also put in bold letters at the bottom of my listings what the handleing charges are - some folks go into detail about what it covers, not a bad idea. I've been using EB for several years and so far 100% feedback (I protect my feedback like it's gold - which it kinda is).

 

[hintonlady]

I never upcharge for shipping, in fact I even drive it to town to the post office for free. It's only 2.2 miles away and I appreciate an excuse to get out. I always state my profits come from sales NOT shipping.

I always hate it when I see something I want and the person has shipping twice the going rate............


My only gripe is mostly paypal. I had a regular account which they made me upgrade, to include higher fees. I made sure to mark my listings so ONLY paypal accounts were accepted. Somehow someone paid by credit card which required me to get a paypal account upgrade. I could not decline payment as it stated their policy would not allow it.

I didn't realize until I made a deal here on barter board how they got around my choice to accept ONLY paypal ACCOUNTS. I tried to pay with my paypal and it instructed me to re enter my CC info. Would not allow me to get around it yet it was the same credit card I have always used. They then processed the payment directly from credit card instead of my already existing paypal account. The seller, from this forum was then forced into the same higher fee account upgrade I had been.

That made me pretty mad. I never wanted the upgrade but was forced into it as was a fellow forum meber. I also ONLY wanted to pay via paypal account like I always have not directly from CC. That left me pretty darned mad. Not sure if I ever want to sell on ebay again. All they had to do was be HONEST from the get go. *grrr*