ebay buyer brand new today ?

DG_1234

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 29, 2015
Messages
6,211
Reaction score
1,931
Handicap
2
One of my ebay listings sold to a buyer who created his/her account today, including a strange ebay user name (for example 12xYzvwu0).
I cancelled the sale because my instinct tells me to be suspicious of the buyer. And, I've read comments here and at other forums that ebay/Paypal , in a dispute,tend to usually side with the buyer.
By cancelling the sale, am I being overly cautious here ?
 
I don't think so. I believe thats a really weird combination. New buyer with seemingly randomly generated user name makes me think its also a bad deal for you. I try to only sell to buyers who have feedback ratings. I mean who hasn't purchased something on ebay at least once in their life?
 
to me, the random character username is a clear indicator

it's too bad the system is set up for the scammers, whether they're buying or selling

i can't remember the last time i bought something on ebay
 
I don't think so. I believe thats a really weird combination. New buyer with seemingly randomly generated user name makes me think its also a bad deal for you. I try to only sell to buyers who have feedback ratings. I mean who hasn't purchased something on ebay at least once in their life?

I looked at ebay's "seller preferences" (or whatever it's named) options, and the company offers the option of refusing bids/buys from buyers with a negative feedback rating, but I saw no available option for refusing bids/buys from brand new ebay account holders.
This same situation happened to me last month, a brand new same day registration buyer bought a set of irons from me, and I cancelled that sale as well.
So today makes two sales I've cancelled within the past 6 weeks. Hopefully ebay will not punish/expel me for cancelling listing sales.
 
I looked at ebay's "seller preferences" (or whatever it's named) options, and the company offers the option of refusing bids/buys from buyers with a negative feedback rating, but I saw no available option for refusing bids/buys from brand new ebay account holders.
This same situation happened to me last month, a brand new same day registration buyer bought a set of irons from me, and I cancelled that sale as well.
So today makes two sales I've cancelled within the past 6 weeks. Hopefully ebay will not punish/expel me for cancelling listing sales.

To me, this almost reads like someone/something has followed your account and is trying to potentially pull a targeted fast one on you. I hope that's not the case, but the similarities strike me as something to be cautious about.

Did you send them a message before cancelling or had they paid already in either case?
 
I looked at ebay's "seller preferences" (or whatever it's named) options, and the company offers the option of refusing bids/buys from buyers with a negative feedback rating, but I saw no available option for refusing bids/buys from brand new ebay account holders.
This same situation happened to me last month, a brand new same day registration buyer bought a set of irons from me, and I cancelled that sale as well.
So today makes two sales I've cancelled within the past 6 weeks. Hopefully ebay will not punish/expel me for cancelling listing sales.

everybody starts at 0 though
 
I don't think so. I believe thats a really weird combination. New buyer with seemingly randomly generated user name makes me think its also a bad deal for you. I try to only sell to buyers who have feedback ratings. I mean who hasn't purchased something on ebay at least once in their life?

If this is there first purchase then that haven't. You have to start somewhere. My first purchase on Ebay was a set of irons. The person didn't cancel because I was a new first time buyer.
No maybe with a weird user name I would be hesitant, but everyone starts somewhere.
 
Did you even give the buyer a chance to communicate or pay? I understand being cautious in this day and age. You could put in your listing that no or low feedback buyers must contact you first prior to auction end or the sale will be cancelled. That will keep you clear in the eyes of Ebay. Cancelling sales without giving the buyer a chance to complete a sale doesnt sound very fair to me.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
 
To me, this almost reads like someone/something has followed your account and is trying to potentially pull a targeted fast one on you. I hope that's not the case, but the similarities strike me as something to be cautious about.

For sellers, ebay does offer a "block bidder/buyer" option, which I use. This means a particular name is not permitted to bid/buy my listings or contact me through ebay's platform.
 
I can see why you are being cautious. But can't you protect against fraud by waiting until the payment comes in? Maybe you are concerned they will reject the goods and send you something else back that isn't the item you were selling and then ask for a refund? That would be a crappy deal, but the chances of that seem pretty remote.
 
Did you even give the buyer a chance to communicate or pay? I understand being cautious in this day and age. You could put in your listing that no or low feedback buyers must contact you first prior to auction end or the sale will be cancelled. That will keep you clear in the eyes of Ebay. Cancelling sales without giving the buyer a chance to complete a sale doesnt sound very fair to me.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

You're right, my cancelling these sales may not have been "fair". I agree.
But, if there are suspicious signs (such as same day registration, strange user name etc...) then I have a right to protect myself. Also, here on the golf forums I've read several stories claiming that in a dispute ebay/Paypal nearly always sides with the buyer. I don't know if that's a fact or not, but it's what I've read, and makes me leery of entering into any sort of questionable sale.
 
For sellers, ebay does offer a "block bidder/buyer" option, which I use. This means a particular name is not permitted to bid/buy my listings or contact me through ebay's platform.

I'm not sure how this would effect your situation except for promoting exactly what is happening to you. So in that case I would have to think my theory might have some merit.

Edit: read follow up.

If the buyer paid immediately, I would at least try and message them to confirm the address on the payment or something and maybe do a little google search. You risk getting your account shut down if you do this too many times, in which case you might end up right in the shoes of the person you are protecting yourself against.
 
I can see why you are being cautious. But can't you protect against fraud by waiting until the payment comes in? Maybe you are concerned they will reject the goods and send you something else back that isn't the item you were selling and then ask for a refund? That would be a crappy deal, but the chances of that seem pretty remote.

For both of my cancelled sales the buyer paid immediately and I immediately cancelled sale/refunded money.
 
Did you even give the buyer a chance to communicate or pay? I understand being cautious in this day and age. You could put in your listing that no or low feedback buyers must contact you first prior to auction end or the sale will be cancelled. That will keep you clear in the eyes of Ebay. Cancelling sales without giving the buyer a chance to complete a sale doesnt sound very fair to me.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

It's also a good way to get your seller account shut down.
 
For both of my cancelled sales the buyer paid immediately and I immediately cancelled sale/refunded money.

Right, but I mean, what is it that you are afraid of specifically? You got the money, so they are the ones at your mercy at that point. Just general leeriness?
 
I can see why you are being cautious. But can't you protect against fraud by waiting until the payment comes in? Maybe you are concerned they will reject the goods and send you something else back that isn't the item you were selling and then ask for a refund? That would be a crappy deal, but the chances of that seem pretty remote.

Idk the particulars of his sale but when I sell something I have to agree to ship it within a certain time point. The issue is that time point is usually a significantly shorter time period than it takes for the funds to be released. I sold something and shipped it next day and even shipped it expedited as it wasn’t that much of a difference. It still took almost 2 plus weeks for the funds to be released.

I think that’s my major issue with the set up. I think funds should be tied to a shipping/tracking number. The customer should have to log in and indicate they received said item or so many days past the tracking number indicating arrival the funds are released. For someone to receive something and use it for weeks without the shipper having access to funds is a major problem for me. Seems lopsided.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Right, but I mean, what is it that you are afraid of specifically? You got the money, so they are the ones at your mercy at that point. Just general leeriness?

the use of a throwaway account to run a refund scam
 
I would have trusted them. Paypal does a great job protecting both sides. Also, I have run into Ebay holding funds as well but I mostly ship using eBay's discount so that they are coordinated with the shipping and it tends to get me my funds quicker. Also if the person were to request a refund ebay tells you to wait until you receive the item back to issue a refund and you can decide not to issue it based upon what you receive back. I think in this scenario ebay would keep you from getting scammed
 
Did you even give the buyer a chance to communicate or pay? I understand being cautious in this day and age. You could put in your listing that no or low feedback buyers must contact you first prior to auction end or the sale will be cancelled. That will keep you clear in the eyes of Ebay. Cancelling sales without giving the buyer a chance to complete a sale doesnt sound very fair to me.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

Because everyone reads the entire description or follows the "rules", right? Look at some of the contests around here. People enter them and then it's pointed out that their entry doesn't follow the guidelines. Or there's a date in the first post and people enter the contest a week after it's been closed and "prize" awarded because they didn't read the first post that clearly stated the cutoff time for the contest.

I agree with others that said everyone starts with 0 buyer feedback, but how many of us opened an ebay account with 12ab34cd as our username and didn't take the time to make a unique username?
 
The line in the ad that says zero or few feedback buyers must contact is to protect yourself from Ebay fallout by cancelling a sale. If you keep cancelling an honestly won auction you're gonna get banned.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
 
One of the reasons I don’t like to use the auction style platform and will use fixed price or best offer. With that I can set it to force the person buying my items pay first to complete the transaction rather than having to wait on payment.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
everybody starts at 0 though

Exactly. I mean, if no one would sell to a buyer rated 0, then eBay would never have made it to what it is today.

I buy often from eBay. I think my rating is 350ish. I sell a bit here and there, too.
 
The line in the ad that says zero or few feedback buyers must contact is to protect yourself from Ebay fallout by cancelling a sale. If you keep cancelling an honestly won auction you're gonna get banned.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

I wish eBay would step up and do something about sellers cancelling sales. I've had two sales cancelled simply because the sellers were losers. One, I won a set of Club Glove iron covers for $0.99 + shipping. The other, I bought 4 dozen 2018 Callaway CSX balls for $11.99/dozen, free shipping. The first, it's not my fault that the seller didn't get any bids until the final seconds and I sniped it for <$1. The 2nd, it's not my fault that you (or your employee) mispriced something. If that happened in a store, they wouldn't have a leg to stand on. It sucks that eBay won't protect their buyers.
 
Idk the particulars of his sale but when I sell something I have to agree to ship it within a certain time point. The issue is that time point is usually a significantly shorter time period than it takes for the funds to be released. I sold something and shipped it next day and even shipped it expedited as it wasn’t that much of a difference. It still took almost 2 plus weeks for the funds to be released.

I think that’s my major issue with the set up. I think funds should be tied to a shipping/tracking number. The customer should have to log in and indicate they received said item or so many days past the tracking number indicating arrival the funds are released. For someone to receive something and use it for weeks without the shipper having access to funds is a major problem for me. Seems lopsided.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Are you seriously saying you shipped out an item sold on eBay before you got paid? I would never consider doing that. The problem is, if they paid with Paypal, then eBay owns Paypal (right?), and they'll just siphon the money out of Paypal to refund to the buyer if they want to later.
 
Are you seriously saying you shipped out an item sold on eBay before you got paid? I would never consider doing that. The problem is, if they paid with Paypal, then eBay owns Paypal (right?), and they'll just siphon the money out of Paypal to refund to the buyer if they want to later.

They paid immediately...the issue is that he received the item but PayPal didn’t release the the funds for several weeks. They were just sitting there in my account unable to be moved or used.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Back
Top