I get the impression that a lot of people don't read the advert content and just look at the pictures. Indeed, breathing on their own does seem like something of an achievement for them.
Selling a watch on ebay,christ its hard work
As i cant sell on sc yet im selling a watch on ebay and so far have had to field more questions and stupid offers than you would believe.
For example I put on its year of manufacture is 2008,i get the first question "what year was it made ?"
Im surprised some of these cretins can even work a mouse...
And breathe
I get the impression that a lot of people don't read the advert content and just look at the pictures. Indeed, breathing on their own does seem like something of an achievement for them.
I always end up getting into a slanging match with eBay idiots! I always try and avoid it these days but sometimes it is the best option!
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However sometimes it's no better on SC.
In recent months the SC police have really been to town and derailed a number of sales.
Will you take £6.50 for the watch? What year was it made? How many hands does it have?
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eBay is a total waste of time, we use it commercially for work and the questions were asked are unbelievable
Assuming most traffic goes via the mobile app, that actively goes out of its way to hide most of the description! I bet most people who don't use the web site don't even know it's there.
It's a deal yes 1 hand 2045
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We sell a lot on eBay
My favourite question which I get daily...does it have box and papers...despite the description saying box only or describing exactly what's supplied with the watch
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Ive sold quite a few watches on there, I don't mind the daft questions really and depending on my mood occasionally add them to the listing along with an equally daft reply.
What's the lowest price you'll accept?
Does it have a buy it now?
I'll buy it if we do the transaction outside of eBay. It'll save you in fees.
I'm looking for such and such a model, do you know of a seller?
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Been there; I feel your pain.
A favourite from one my recent listings is:
Description:
There is no 'buy it now' and I intend to let this auction run to the end
UK bidders only - I will not post outside of the UK
Question:
Hi
Nice CD player. What is your best price for a buy it now? How much would postage be to Spain?
I know! Sold one last year and dealt with more than my fair share of time wasters on eBay. On top of stupid questions and ridiculous offers, one #%^*+ bought it at the "buy it now" price but never paid or responded to my messages. Given the price of the watch was almost equal to my selling limit, I couldn't even re-list it until the waiting threshold elapsed. Had to wait for eBay to reinstate my limit.
Then another one insisted on handing over cash to me but I wanted him to pay the money into my account when we meet F2F. He eventually agreed but HALF AN HOUR before we were due to meet, he blocked my number to avoid me after I had prepared everything and taken time out of work for the transaction! Only then I realised he wanted to "teach me a lesson" for being safe and probably ruining his plans to use potentially dodgy money.
Third one was as genuine and nice as you could want and we did a pleasant and smooth transaction.
I had my BLNR on eBay a couple of weeks ago and a local'ish buyer messaged me saying he really wanted the watch. Messages went back and forth and then he wanted to come and inspect it / buy it on a Friday evening, he didn't show. Then he messaged me saying he would come on Saturday, no show again. Messaged me saying Sunday, you've guessed it he didn't show up. I then sold the watch on the Monday to a different buyer with no daft questions and all very straight forward. The first divvy still messages me every few days asking if I've still got the watch and can he come and buy it. I now take pleasure in not replying to him, especially now he is saying he is desperate for the watch !
If you think ebay is bad, I dare you to try Gumtree. It's like a holding pen for inbreds.
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I had something not dissimilar selling one of my classic cars last week , he faffed about like a good un so second in the que turned up and bought it and he still faffed about whinging he had missed out so I said yes ! You are not got yourself to blame !
So much traffic is mobile / tablet but it's genuinely really hard for users to see the detail you are asked to include as a seller.
If you lot think eBay and gumtree are bad the new place for pond life is Facebook marketplace
Must admit the postage thing drives me potty. The amount of times I've specifically said I will not post overseas and then had to answer overseas post enquiries......
Mind you the lack of interest in my orange 7548 on sc means I may have to mix with some of the idiots again!!
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The royal "we", or majestic plural (pluralis majestatis in Latin, literally, "the plural of majesty"), is the use of a plural pronoun (or corresponding plural-inflected verb forms) to refer to a single person holding a high office, such as a sovereign (e.g., a monarch) or religious leader (e.g., the Pope).
Or the classic. Ebayer has skim read the description:
"Er, it says the watch is new in the title, but in the description it says it's second hand?"
I've had it on here!
-I'll buy your watch
- Can you take PayPal?
Me: Wot?
-Well I can use credit card that way.
Me: OK then
-Slow contact followed by asking how to pay by PayPal
Me: Here's what to do.
-I'll pay tomorrow for deffo...
-Actually, I'm going to pull out!
All as expected, tbh.
Was it a Monaco or a monaco??
To be fair sometimes sales on SC can be a bit like dealing on ebay :)
There are plenty of tyre kickers everywhere.
I think the asking of the silly questions is part of the course
I've had a few here too, I'll take your watch, reply back with payment details and you never hear from them again!
The other questions I like is when people try to unilaterally justify lowballing your price for an item
This happened to me here where a member was using the example of one new item sold about a year ago and would offer that price - the fact the other seller wanted a quick sale and prices have gone up in the meantime, seemed to wasted on him!!!
I recently sold four watches on Ebay and I have to say it was better than I remember, I hadn't sold for a while on there and don't have great memories of it.
I did get a couple of questions and a couple of end-early offers but nothing too out there and I just replied politely and let the auction run.
The biggest PITA was posting one of them first class signed for, the tracking didn't even appear for a couple of days, saying it didn't recognise the code, and then that finally appeared but just told me it was "progressing through the network". Eventually I had to message the buyer, luckily he was an honest man and told me the package had arrived. Even to this day, a couple of weeks later, the tracking still doesn't show it's been delivered!
I think anyone with even half a brain must have cottoned on by now that ebay is not that keen on dealing with small private sellers.
Private sellers attract too many idiots (both buyers and sellers) and ebay are often stuck in the middle trying to resolve issues on a transaction that generates a small profit.
ebay is now aiming at commercial sellers where the items are professionally packed and tracked with a decent warranty etc.
The days of private selling are coming to a close.
Interesting assessment - hope you are wrong, though.
If correct - someone else (Ebay 'lite') will just enter the market, though.
I've sold a couple of motorbikes on eBay (Classified ad only) - you still get the texts with: "Will you take £3k for it, mate - for a quick sale?" (on a £6k bike).....
They probably text that to every bike, in the slight chance that they can 'steal' the bike and laugh down the pub. Grrrrrrrrr. !
I refuse all offers from low rated buyers. Too much hassle.
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Most infuriating experiences ever have stemmed from ebay.
Once sold a watch where I specifically said it's running 1 minute fast a day.
couple of weeks later, buyer demanded a refund since the watch was running about a minute fast a day.
omfg.
First item I sold on ebay years ago:
ski boots, size 9
Someone bought them and messaged the following week "these don't fit my size 10 feet"
Sometimes the gene pool could do with a little extra chlorine.
My biggest gripe is to do with foreign buyers complaining that they would like to buy the item but the postage price is too high. I use the eBay global shipping programme and eBay sets the price and collects the money. I state this clearly in every listing and still they ask, even allowing for language difficulties there are so many of them.
In the interests of balance, I sold a guitar on ebay last week.
Buyer came to my house to collect and was a completely normal, decent chap. I was more than relieved at this turn of events.
I sold three cars over ebay and all went fairly well. One chap and his wife were a bit anal thinking they can bid to view and then try to knock the price down but once told that they had a choice of either going back where they came from or buying the car they did the latter.
On the international shipping and customs charges that is a racket and if I buy something from the US for example I always ask the seller if they would consider not using ebay for shipping since it almost always works out cheaper.
I think Mick is right on that. The barriers that eBay is putting up to private sellers of general stuff are always increasing.
There are already plenty of competitors, just nothing with such a large, single, global market.
Some competitors (in no particular order): Specialist forums of all sorts, Facebook groups, eBid.com (been running for many, many years), Shpock.com, Amazon Marketplace (for some purposes), Ziffit.com, Etsy, Bonanza, Craigslist, Gumteee (yes, I know this is owned by eBay), niche websites (e.g. Chrono24, Autotrader), Music Magpie, Preloved.co.uk, Asos Marketplace, Zapper, conventional auctioneers (for certain items), Auctionata.com, Catawiki.
Yes it is a racket, eBay makes a bomb from it. But as a seller all I have to do is post the item to Derbyshire and that is the end of my responsibility. If it goes missing or gets damaged after that eBay has to deal with it. This is very good for selling to dodgy countries where post regularly goes "astray".
What never ceases to amaze me is the amount of people I get asking questions on obscure old watches. I tend to imagine the buyers would know what they're looking at when they're bidding on a 60's Seiko or something. Yet you still get questions from people who obviously don't have any interest or knowledge on these old watches and ask questions like it should be in the Argos catalogue (which is where I normally direct them)
I usually sell everything with no Reserve starting at £1 as I feel if it's listed correctly it will go for what it's worth. But I also feel this is why I get so many stupid questions, probably the same people that are bidding £1.25p on a £400 watch. But people just don't like buy it now unless it's silly cheap. I can put something on buy it now and it'll end without selling, I'll auction it with NR and it'll go for more than I had it up for.
On the subject of bidders, who are these people that are bidding £1.25p then the next bidding £2 on a £400 watch? When I'm watching a watch that will go for hundreds of pounds I'd never be bidding silly amounts like that. I guess there's people that think they'll get them for a quid or something. Mind you, the friends & family that say to me "what if it goes for £1 though?" Yeeeeah okey dokey.
eBay is not perfect but it does provide a platform that would be missed if it were not there.
I don't get this constant criticism of eBay.
I sold my car in 3 hours via Facebook!
I did have one bloke asking silly questions, but the buyer was knowledgeable and reasonable.
I had a further 4 people expressing interest before I marked it as sold.
A very good experience!
M
When I moved house last year I bought the contents (was a divorce thing with the vendors) and I listed all I didn't want on gum tree. Only one time waster amongst all the items that I sold. And it is amazing what some people will buy. I could have sold an Ikea double mattress 20 times.....
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I haven't sold anything for ages but I used to sell quite a few bits and bobs always starting at 99p. I was amazed at the number of people who asked: 'why are you selling for 99p this must be a scam Etc' and I replied 'errr this is an AUCTION and that is the STARTING PRICE'. It wasn't a couple of people either - loads. Baffling.