EBAY !?!

[ozimax]

HI all, just back from north of the border, copped an absolute hammering from the banana benders after last night's SOO debacle, but hey, Greg Inglis is from Macksville NSW so that was some consolation... Now, onto my post.

I had an item up for sale on ebay. The sale was terminated with ebay citing my circumvention of fees. All I did was put this line into my sale description:

"Please note that if the winning bidder uses Paypal, the extra (exhorbitant) Paypal fees will be added onto the cost."

Ebay then replied:

"Users may not use systems or techniques to circumvent, or avoid, eBay fees. Listings or content that circumvent (avoid) fees may provide a poor buying experience and create an unlevel playing field by penalising sellers who pay all of their eBay fees. Further, these listings and content undermine the trust of eBay's marketplace. Payment surcharges are a form of fee circumvention. Sellers may not charge buyers an additional fee for their use of ordinary forms of payment, including acceptance of checks, money orders, electronic transfers or credit cards. Such costs should be built into the price of the item." (How do you build these costs into an auction may I ask?)

Interesting then to read in todays SMH the following story:

"The competition watchdog has flagged its intention to scuttle a plan by online auctioneer eBay to force its Australian users on to a PayPal-only payments system. Citing concerns about the "anti-competitive effect" of the proposal, the chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, Graeme Samuel, has issued a statement calling on eBay to delay implementation of the plan, which was supposed to take effect from next Tuesday.

eBay's proposal would have required items bought and sold on the site to be paid for using PayPal, which eBay owns.

Although cash on delivery or pick-up would still be acceptable, direct bank deposits, cheques and money orders would all be barred. The move would have lumbered sellers with extra costs as PayPal charges a fee to accept payments via the service. This would be in addition to auction charges."

I hope ebay gets taken to task over this anti-competitive nonsense and is fined as a result.

Ozi

[Glen]

Sorry to read about your experience Ozi. It might be worth passing your email on to the ACCC to point out that they consider Paypal an Ebay fee. Also you can see how much they care about Australia, they cant even be bothered to speak in Australian or English (check).

I can't believe in this age of Anti Money Laundering and Counter Terrorism where banks have been put on a stringent security regime and made reporting entities, that some would make it mandatory to use a system which has no controls at all, thereby forcing people to accept funds (yes force) from mickeymouse@hotmail.com or osamabinladen@gmail.com. Would you like to know someone is selling a 5 ton truck with the 400 litre diesel fuel tank to osamabinladen@gmail.com? Or Mickey mouse is buying 20kg bags of fertiliser one at a time but no one realises?

[shakey]

Ozi,

For as long as I can remember...well my memory is generally shot, but at least a couple of years... Ebay have stated in their conditions that sellers cannot charge buyers an extra fee for paying via PayPal. Possibly never enforced until now.

An alternative strategy may be to offer buyers a discount if they don't use Paypal....well until ACCC thing gets sorted out.

[ozimax]

Good points Glen and Simon, yes it is a concern. Oh well, that's big business.

Reminds me of Qantas - if you use telephone sales, there is a fee imposed. If you book online, there is a credit card service fee of $6.60 regardless of the cost of the fare. Qantas imposed fuel surcharges, even when their fuel costs were hedged well in advance! Every decision is determined by it's effect on shareholder profit eg let the customer rot. The balance between customer concerns and shareholder profit has is no longer considered.

Ozi.

[Oneputt]

Ozi I could not agree with you more. These days the sole drive is for higher and higher returns to shareholders. With the big companies it is just a way of justifying the outrageous senior execs salary packages.

[jamesw]

This has been a point of contention for quite some time.

It is against paypal and ebay T&C to pass on fees related to payment. I am not sure if this is legal or not, but it has been in place (and enforced) for quite some time.

I think you will find that someone reported you for it, rather than ebay going through and hand picking your particular item. Buyers don't want to pay the fee, and there are quite a few savvy buyers around who know whats up and what is down when it comes to purchasing using ebay.

[biggerry]

I feel for you ozi, ebay/paypal are not in my best books right now either, I recently made a ebay purchase and paid thru paypal only to find out that somehow (still pending response from ebay) paypal had debited my bank account twice for the same item. The funds were promptly returned to my account by the honest seller, however I may still get stung for a fee to get MY money back into my bank account (currently pending response) - note amount is less that $150.

To make things worse the paypal support say, "please contact eBay Customer Support as PayPal does not have access to your
eBay details" talk about palming off....needless to say ebay support are definitely taking more than their quoted 24-36 hours to respond to my emails. I love it how paypal can claim "not my problem" but have such a nice integrated payment system between ebay and paypal!!

I know i will do what ever possible to avoid paypal in the future especially if an adequate explanation is not forthcoming for my recent issues!

Its also no surprise that sellers will do whatever possible now to avoid getting stung twice, especially the little guys, selling a typical item ($50) on ebay thru paypal means you get insertion fees, final fees, paypal fee to recieve payment and finally a fee to withdraw the money to your account (don't let the door hit you on the way out!) that takes a fair chunk from your 50 bucks..

anyway thats my rant... again ozi.. i feel for you. PS. I would use gumtree but they are also owned by ebay

[Glen]

Biggery, Paypal as part of the financial services industry operating in Australia are required to have a telephone number and are also held to a higher standard than Ebay. The number is available under the contact us link after logging in, the last number I saw was 1800 073 263. I would point out that it is Paypal who have double dipped and if you don't get a resolution you will take it to the Financial Ombudsman Service whose number is 1300 780 808 or web http://www.fos.org.au/ They have double dipped and are now fobbing you off to the unregulated side of THEIR business. If you rang American Express with a similar problem, can you see them saying we don't have access to Myers records so take a flying leap?

[biggerry]

They have double dipped and are now fobbing you off to the unregulated side of THEIR business.

thats very very true and I did not look at it that way until now!

I am waiting for a response from ebay, but don't fear...I am definitely not letting go of this one!

Thanks for the info and links...

[jamesw]

I am waiting for a response from ebay, but don't fear...I am definitely not letting go of this one!

I dislike 'big business' pushing around the 'little guy' as much as the next person,

But let me get this straight, just humour me... you have got your back up because you have to pay a $1 fee to get said funds returned to your bank account.

That's what your getting your back up, about, isn't it?

I understand that some matters become worth fighting for, just because of the priciple, but is it worth your time, frustration, etc just for one measly dollar?

[andy]

$1 fee

I was under the impression that you had to pay every time you received funds. Something along the lines of x cents plus y% of funds? And then you also pay the $1 to transfer funds to a bank account.

Funny story actually, i recently sold an item but it only went for $1(+postage)... and in that case I paid 35 cents in ebay fees and 47 cents to paypal to receive the money. Made myself a tidy 18 cents profit.

[biggerry]

That's what your getting your back up, about, isn't it?

$1 i definitely don't care about, (that said the only way to get rich is to count every dollar - buts another story!) but i would be ashamed to say to someone that I got charged for someone else's f@#$ up!

what i am "getting my back up" about is the fact that I paid through paypal and had the amount debited from my bank account TWICE, now in this case the sum was relatively small (50 bucks) - nonetheless i do not take people/companies being able to dock my bank account without me knowing very lightly, this is the issue I have....

I understand that some matters become worth fighting for, just because of the priciple, but is it worth your time, frustration, etc just for one measly dollar?

I am sure there is some famous quote about fighting for principles in the face of little or no monetary reward but i can't think of one off the top of my head ...help me out....

[biggerry]

Made myself a tidy 18 cents profit.

that makes me look at my $1 fee differently now

[jamesw]

I guess I understand your point of view, and I honestly take my hat off to you because I would not be bothered giving any large organisation a hard time over a few bucks. The headaches you get dealing with them (inconsistencies in policy, being handballed around, etc) just do my head in and make me get mad.

Good luck mate.

[Glen]

James, I once employed a telephone salesperson who had previously worked for a large organisation. He had been employed because they had a computer glitch which erroneously overbilled customers about $5 a month. They couldn't easily fix it and were changing the whole system in 6 months, so employed this guy to deal with clients who noticed. I am guessing they made a lot from the ones who didn't.

[gstark]

but is it worth your time, frustration, etc just for one measly dollar?

Absolutely.

The principle is what it's all about, and I would even be inclined to threaten to start a class action suit, just to get their attention.

$1 to me is stuff-all, but how many $1 items, for other customers, do they get because of customer apathy? My approoach is that if they're not willing to come to the party and quickly and happily address the problem, then I'm certainly prepared to inflict, upon them, a hell of a lot more in terms of management costs (staff wages, etc) than the lousy $1 error on their part that they're unprepared to address.



[set rant on]
Right now I'm having a similar issue with a mob called Menulog. They home deliver restaurant meals to you. Sounds simple.

What they didn't tell me was that for Bondi, they use a different company, Cuisine Courier, to deliver the meals. They're an organisation that I had already chosen to not deal with, and the failure by Menulog to disclose this until after the order had been completed was a very serious omission on their part.

But it it gets worse: a whole lot worse.

When the meal turned up, the delivery driver was asking for quite a bit more than what the order was supposed to have been, according to our record of the transaction. There was a hitherto undisclosed surcharge that they wanted to hit me with. The hell with that, and I told the driver that the surcharge was not going to be paid. He didn't like that, and refused to accept the originally quoted price. I gave him back the food, and closed the door.

Several minutes later I git a call from Cuisine Courier, and they offered to waive the surcharge. Whoopee-doo - they're prepared to abide by the law; how big of them. I also told them that I needed the food to be freshly (re-)prepared, and was told "that's not going to happen".

I didn't feel like I wanted cold, stale Thai, so I told the Cuisine Courier Caller that the call was no longer productive and terminiated it. I then immediately called Menulog, to bring to their attention the dismal state of their business. Nobody there; left a message.

Same deal the next day, except by this time I'd had an opportunity to examine the order sheet for the delivery I recived, and compared that with what I had ordered. These guys are true professionals, really - the prices on every single item were greater than that upon which my order had been based!

Not only were they trying to rip me off in terms of the undisclosed surcharge, but they were also trying to, surreptitiously, overcharge me on the individual line items for the food I'd ordered. Not by a whole lot - just $0.60 per item - but on a whole order, that can add up, and it's unlikely to be noticed by the casual observer.

There's an underlying principle here, and I am not prepared to let things rest. Menulog's management - when I finally found a tepid body to speak with - is basically unrepentant, blaming everyone except themselves. Wrong. This worked out to an attempt to overcharge me by about 25% of the food cost, and that is a bloody significant amount.

It's unprofessional behaviour on their part, and I refuse to accept this second rate shit from anyone with whom I do business. Fail to call me back? Go to bloody hell!

But getting back to the point, the principle with PayPal/eBay is no different here, and I sincerely hope that the ACCC reams them another arsehole, not that they don't already seem to have an ample sufficiency of those.

So yes, it's a pain, it's problematic to deal with these piddling amounts. And don't you think that they're counting on us to feel that way and thus not take action? You betcha!

I refuse to give them that pleasure. Let them rot in hell.

Or Modesto. I care little.

[chrisk]

i remember starting a thread on this a while ago when it frist came to light. they are pricks.
incidentally, i got an email from hvstar today cos i have been buying direct from them rather than their ebay store. this is the sort of shit that can bring ebay to its knees cos there are lots of very unhappy customers AND sellers. One can only hope it does.

Our store price is 5% to 15% lower than our eBay price since eBay fee has been increased again since Feb. 22nd 2008. Buy more here will save you more!

[ozimax]

I refuse to give them that pleasure. Let them rot in hell.

Or Modesto. I care little.

San Bernardino.

[ozimax]

In keeping with the gist of this post, I received an Optus bill a little while back. I don't mind Optus as a company, and place them streets of Telstra. However, I (luckily) decided to read my phone bill and found a miscellaneous charge for about $16.

I rang their customer service, and went through several people until I got somehow a sufficiently authorised staff member to investigate the matter. The $16 charge was a mystery to all and sundry and was duly refunded with courtesy.

However, how many more Optus customers receive "miscellaneous" charges during the course of a year? Or Telstra? Or any multi-national company? It's only 16 bucks but times 50,000 means quite a bit more shareholder's dividend, or executive salary hike. Am I being cynical? I think not. It pays to be a tad cynical when dealing with big business.

Ozi.

[sirhc55]

You think Ebay, Optus, Telstra and other big businesses (and I include banks) are rip off merchants

Try the down to earth ordinary restaurant in any town or city. I have, upon inspecting the bill, found that 90% of restaurants overcharge on their bills, not I note, undercharge.

I never really bothered until I had lunch with Jaycar’s MD, Gary Johnston, who told me about the rip off. Lo and behold when he got the bill it was $24 over the top.

[Matt. K]

ozimax
It's not enough that they refund your money. It should be classed as a crime when they over charge like that and there should be severe penalties when they do so. By law their accounting must be accurate otherwise why not add $16 to every bill?

[ozimax]

I think I've opened a can of worms here! Maybe I should spend a bit more time examining my bills etc before paying them. Thankfully there are still some good guys out there, usually small traders.

Ozi

[gstark]

What about the electricity and gas suppliers?

How do you evaluate the accuracy of their metering? If you want the meter checked, you need to pay for that "service", and, IIRC, there will only be action if it's found to be inaccurate beyond a certain tolerance point - 5 or 10%.

[ozimax]

What about the electricity and gas suppliers?

How do you evaluate the accuracy of their metering? If you want the meter checked, you need to pay for that "service", and, IIRC, there will only be action if it's found to be inaccurate beyond a certain tolerance point - 5 or 10%.

This is true. My household power usage went down significantly for the last quarter (compared to 2007); we had energy efficient light bulbs etc installed (and now we can't see anything, but that's another story), and in any case, you can see the usage statistics on the bill. However, the cost went up by approx 25%, in one year! Figure. Same for water usage - we have had incredible rain on the north coast this year, our tap usage is way down yet the bill is up over 10% Ask for a meter re-reading, pay a large fee.

Maybe if we started a wad of class actions, things would happen. Only problem is, then you're dealing with the courts...stop the world I want to get off!

Now, back to my Saturday morning Lavazza espresso...

[phillipb]

I can contribute another story to this thread.
My mother-in-law was sent a gift voucher for her birthday by the sports club that she is a member of. (Nevermind the grammar Greg )
The voucher was for $20 and could be used in the restaurant within the club. She went for dinner there the other night, and produced the voucher at the end of the meal expecting to just pay for the difference, instead she was told that only $8.00 was contributed by the voucher and she would have to pay the rest but they kept the whole voucher.
Work that one out.

[sirhc55]

Five minutes ago I completed a survey sent to me online with regard to PayPal - they won’t like my answers

[biggerry]

Five minutes ago I completed a survey sent to me online with regard to PayPal - they won’t like my answers

a bit like my "PayPal - Email Handling Opinion Needed" for my recent issue! since my issue is still outstanding and have been palmed off to ebay you can imagine my response....

[natskis]

eBay and Paypal are in my Sony books so I'm totally with you Ozi, Stick it up them!
When things work fine and don't veer away from the norm it works well. But when things go wrong it feels like you can't do anything to get your voice heard.




I was paying for a Spanish course for myself and 3 other friends through PayPal.
It told me something along the lines of: "if you don't have enough funds in your default account, PayPal will debit your alternative account"

Well this should have worked well because I didn't have enough money in my normal banking account (Primary account) for the entire fee but I had plenty in my CC (alternative account).

All of a sudden I found out next day that it had taken the money from my savings and left me in the Red on the account plus a $30 fee for being overdrawn AND 1 and a half weeks away from pay day. O.o

I was NOT happy about this and in my attempts to contact PayPal I got NOWHERE! I filled in a complaint online and it went the the cyber abyss. Not Happy!

[biggerry]

left me in the Red on the account plus a $30 fee for being overdrawn

yeah talk about kicking a man/woman when they are down - this is by far the lowest act banks do nowadays imo, years ago if you did not have the money it just bounced every time....now you can overdraw a savings account and get a $30 or $40 dollar fee....  PS. this might be a complaint better suited for the bank? but what the hell... stick to paypal as well

[jdear_89]

Just a quick question - i have a lens still for sale - the sigma 24-70 f/2.8 on this forum and i am just about to put it on ebay... After reading this thread it has turned me off a bit. Do you think that i should try and sell it privately (i don't know how maybe newspaper or something) or just put it through ebay???
I value your advice.
Cheers - James

[Mr Darcy]

I have had misgivings about PayPal for some time & don't use it. They won't let me use it either, but that's another story:I didn't agree to their new terms and conditions when they changed them the day after I signed up.

Now that Ebay are effectively forcing people in this country to use PP, I will vote with my feet there too.
The only way to get them to stop their "maximise our profits by screwing the customer" approach is to prove to them, the only way they understand, that it is an approach that doesn't work. If I am the only person in the country/world that does this I will be pissing in the wind. If on the other hand, enough momentum builds, then they WILL change their tune.

After all, MacDonalds now provide healthy (at least by their previous standards) meals BTW, ore you aware that PP say that they are entitled to use YOUR money on the short term money market at YOUR risk and that they can keep your money for 6 months to do so.

Let me think $1 times say 1,000,000 users = Now why didn't I think of this scheme. Oh that's right. I have scruples.
At least the banks give you some of the interest back, and they guarantee your capital.

[ozimax]

After all, MacDonalds now provide healthy (at least by their previous standards) meals

I'm glad you qualified this statement...

[ozimax]

Now that Ebay are effectively forcing people in this country to use PP, I will vote with my feet there too.
The only way to get them to stop their "maximise our profits by screwing the customer" approach is to prove to them, the only way they understand, that it is an approach that doesn't work. If I am the only person in the country/world that does this I will be pissing in the wind. If on the other hand, enough momentum builds, then they WILL change their tune.

I believe our Kiwi brethren have an alternative online auction system. Maybe someone here needs to start some competition to ebay.

Ozi

[ozimax]

Just a quick question - i have a lens still for sale - the sigma 24-70 f/2.8 on this forum and i am just about to put it on ebay... After reading this thread it has turned me off a bit. Do you think that i should try and sell it privately (i don't know how maybe newspaper or something) or just put it through ebay???
I value your advice.
Cheers - James

Stuff still sells on ebay, you'll just have to wear the extra fees if that's the route you choose to go.

Ozi

[sirhc55]

Just received an email regarding the Ebay situation. You can read here:

http://www2.ebay.com/aw/au/200806131705542.html

Personally I still think they are full of crap - protection for their buyers and sellers (read more profits for them)

[ATJ]

Chris,

I got the email, too. It is funny that they think that reducing the payment methods (mainly to one they profits them) is good for consumers and the big bad ACCC is impacting consumers rights.

[sirhc55]

Chris,

I got the email, too. It is funny that they think that reducing the payment methods (mainly to one they profits them) is good for consumers and the big bad ACCC is impacting consumers rights.

Restrictive trading is what I call it - just imagine Myers saying that they would only sell to the their own card holders, they would go out of business

[kevinnugent]

Luckily, I don't think the ACCC will let them get away with this snow job.

Kevin

[carla_d]

Luckily, I don't think the ACCC will let them get away with this snow job.

Kevin

fingers crossed. today was when they were going to roll out their new payment policy...

[ATJ]

fingers crossed. today was when they were going to roll out their new payment policy...

Nah, that was delayed. They sent an email on 27 June.

Changes to eBay.com.au scheduled for 15 July are being postponed until the review process with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) regarding its recent draft notice is complete. As previously announced, eBay.com.au is continuing to work with the ACCC to achieve an outcome that benefits buyers and sellers.

[bittenyakka]

well i don't have an ebay horror stories to add but i fully support the ACCC in blocking this move to only have PP.

And secondly is there anyone who knows of the benefits to he seller of using PP? From the start of my ebay "life" it has always seemed like it was very biased to the buyer.

[sirhc55]

If PayPal is made mandatory for sellers on Ebay this is what happens

1) insertion fee to Ebay

2) If sold a % to Ebay

3) Paypal take a % too.

Ipso facto Ebay makes more profit as they own PayPal.

Lovely jubbly as Dell boy would say

[bittenyakka]

great

accc do your job