✿ Kimbo’s 10 step plan to safe buying on eBid ✿

[bykimbo]

Just going to give a few threads a bump, in the hopes something in my list will be of use to somebody. Cheers.

[bykimbo]

Doesn't exactly need a bump as it's a sticky message, but waving it about on the new updates list for any new buyers just joining.

[BreakingRetail]

very informative!

Thanks =]

[CopperLocker]

Good advise. Nice of you to put it down for others to read!

[JadeDuck]

Step 11: Don't leave your seller hanging. If you are not going to be paying instantly after making the commitment to buy (such as if you are going to be paying by money order, check, or cash for example), let the seller know and let them know when the payment is sent.

[madelaine]

How I wish reading this were compulsory!

[olivia8143]

I miss Kimbo

[madelaine]

I miss Kimbo

She's still around on Facebook

[buyafricacoins]

8.Pay using a method you know and trust
If you’re venturing into a new site and using a new seller, it’s nice to have something you feel you can rely on! Choose a method you know you can reverse if anything goes wrong.

_____________________________________________
This is not good advice. In fact, this type of advice is killing the sales of cheaply priced items.

I sell coins. I sold coins over there for 8 years. Bad feedbacks stole my power selling and killed my sales. But the joke was on them because I defaulted on their credit card and they never got a penny.

Over here, there are no coin sales. Absolutely none. I have hundreds of coins that would sell quickly over there... but nothing over here.

I don't have on-line payment. It would be nice if somebody started an on-line payment that only uses cash or debit cards and didn't allow buyers to reverse their payments. Some day it will happen that this type of on-line payment system will become viable.

Nobody needs to use on-line payment for a $20 transaction (or less). Nobody needs to have 7 day (or less) shipping for a $20 transaction.

Let me tell you a funny story that is the nightmare of every seller. Over there, a buyer bought a $2 coin, used PP to pay. I sent the buyer a free coin. The buyer, without asking, spent $16- $18 to return the free coin by overnight delivery. That free coin was listed in bulk in my store for sale at $1 each. Coin cost me 25 cents.

So I emailed her and relatively politely told her that she should have just set me the $16- $18 and kept the coin.

Naturally, she left me negative feedback and filed a claim and got her $2 back. This made sense to her.

If buyers didn't have the option to reverse payments, this COULDN'T happen and the sellers of cheap items like me could sell more items and actually turn a small profit.

....................So NO! you shouldn't worry about reversing the payment on a $20 sale because it serves no legitimate purpose and kills he market.

I prefer banknotes sent in the mail. On the other site, from 2004 until 2009 that was one of my most popular options, along with money orders and cashier's checks. Then the other site started to kill off the non-power sellers. Just recently, I received a $20 banknote from a buyer in Hungary. He sent it by regular air mail hidden between two pieces of lightweight cardboard - the letter looked exactly like a regular letter.

Small transactions and international transactions are done by trust. Some banknotes will get stolen. Some coins will get stolen. The cheapest methods facilitate the continuation of the market. Everybody gets caught once in a while -- it is the cost to do business.

.................Related to this is the FREE SHIPPING non-sense. A $20 sale typically results in a $10 or less gross profit. So, you want the seller to pay almost $5 for domestic tracking within the USA just so you can turn around and reverse the payment and leave negative feedback because you are unhappy? Free shipping is killing the cheap coin market too. Imagine if in my story above I had given free shipping? And the woman had still done her monkey business.

New #5. Anyway... if you buy on eBid and you are buying less than $20 of merchandise, PLEASE don't use an on-line payment unless the seller won't agree to take banknotes, money orders or cashier's checks.

I know it's not politically popular to say this:

There is no profit in committing the theft of payment for $1 items.

Nobody is committing fraud over $1 items.

And nobody needs to receive a $1 item in 7 days or less because $1 is only 1/7th of an hour's pay at the minimum wage. If it only costs $1... it doesn't have much value!!!

OK, I'll go back now to watching my 3,300 coins not sell for the rest of the year. Knowing that they'd sell on that other site. The one that banned me for being a good top seller of $1 coins.

[cornishmaid1961]

For once I'm speechless !