eBay

neatjerseys · ‎07-15-2015

Some good read about Ebay finally acknowledging that they have treat us sellers like **bleep**. He is making some good promises but seeing is believing.

www.yahoo.com/tech/s/ebay-bids-chance-success-paypal-123954214.html

rose-dee · ‎07-15-2015

Funny, I recall theorizing on a number of occasions after 2013 that eBay might rue the day it began to turn its back on its traditional sellers and court the big retailers. It's strange to hear it now coming out of the mouth of a CEO. Whether it's just words or has some clout behind it remains to be seen I suppose. That is, if I and many others in my situation can manage to hang on here for another few months.

Big retailers can afford to experiment on eBay then move on, but if eBay makes listing and selling here better and easier for small businesses and individuals, those people will stay for years. Unfortunately I think eBay has already missed the boat on that score -- as this article points out, many of its "core" sellers have given up on it and left for more "comfortable" places to sell.

It was interesting to see an email in my personal inbox (not eBay Messages) this week from Paypal, with the subject line "We love eBay!", complete with an encouragement to shop on eBay, but also including prominent links to other shop-sites. I read this as Paypal's attempt to lure eBay shoppers away from buying on eBay exclusively onto various other venues that use Paypal payment services. Rather transparent I thought.

recped · ‎07-15-2015

I don't think they are trying to lure people away from eBay but it's absolutely critical to PayPal's future that they greatly expand the number of other retailers/etailers they can sign up and retain.

"What else could I do? I had no trade so I became a peddler" - Lazarus Greenberg 1915
- answering Trolls is voluntary, my policy is not to participate.

cumos55 · ‎07-16-2015

eBay has to do a major cleanup in the book category..

Not so much with small sellers.... but with sellers that have 10,000, and over 100,000 listings right up to 1.5 million listings and more.... One does not have to go far to find the one seller with a total disregard for rules... and then the others

- No gallery photo

- A generic gallery photo... does not show the book being sold...

- duplicate listings.... the basics... price... condition as... Good versus Very Good.. differ between duplicates... but that difference is not shown if they use the same photo, a stock photo for both listings...

How about a triplicate? Three listings.... differing for condition of the book ... very good... good... acceptable... but with the same stock photo for all three listings..... No difference among listings as shown in the stock photo

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Some sellers of books play with what they show as a gallery photo

The gallery photo states..... Photo not available......

The gallery photo for many books has a pile of 10 books with the seller's store name..... the book being listed is not shown.

The gallery photo states.... photo to come.

The gallery photo shows the cover of what appears to be a book.... the title of the book is indicated..... but at the bottom of the photo it is stated.... This is not the cover of the book.... It is a "fake"

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Many book sellers put a very minimum of information about the book in a listing....

The rule for stock photos... use with brand new items only.... is overlooked

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Book sellers with thousands, and thousand more listings have a total disregard for rules

and the rules do not appear to be enforced....

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Some small sellers ... including those not selling books...have had a listing removed for a lack of photo.

This lack of enforcement with the large sellers makes it difficult for eBay..... to the point that no rule can be enforced.... The legality of any enforcement is negated by the lack of enforcement with these large booksellers...

eBay cannot afford ....not ....to enforce the rules with these booksellers...

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Some of these seller have a total disregard for customer service..... They sell so much defects are inconsequential..

But if you read their feedback... negatives... neutrals..... the actions of these large booksellers is totally unacceptable...

Currently there is no accountability... defects are ignored....

Bookseller need a new... and unique set of rules..... More so with the large booksellers... as opposed to the smaller booksellers.... Current rules work with the smaller sellers...

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If one was paid $1.00 for each listing reported to eBay......booksellers total disregard for rules... one would be a millionaire very quickly... lack of gallery photo, lack of proper gallery photo, duplicates, triplicates

rose-dee · ‎07-16-2015

@cumos55 wrote:

If one was paid $1.00 for each listing reported to eBay......booksellers total disregard for rules... one would be a millionaire very quickly... lack of gallery photo, lack of proper gallery photo, duplicates, triplicates

I sympathize, and believe me, it isn't just booksellers either. EBay has not been focusing enough attention on its own policies and rules. If they're going to institute stringent rules for sellers, they need to spend more time figuring out how to actually enforce those rules. If not, many sellers with integrity are going to give up and go elsewhere.

I know I'm getting fed up seeing constant infractions in my categories -- there's a whole litany I could list:

duplicate listings, "verboten" words in titles, photos with captions all over them, flagrant copyright violations, and last but not least (one of the ones that upsets me the most) website links on sellers' store banner sub-text.

I tried to report one such bold infraction one day and discovered there is really no mechanism within eBay to do so (aside perhaps from telephoning Indonesia, and what good will that do?).

All these infractions do one thing -- they give the perpetrator an unfair leg up on the competition. eBay needs to invest more time, effort (and probably money) into seeing that the policies are enforced evenly and fairly, rather than constantly re-arranging the décor on this site. At the moment, policy compliance is a mess.

tobyshitzu · ‎07-16-2015

None of the things you mentioned are a violation of ebay rules. Stock photos are allowed for used books. Different condition of the same sku are allowed. The only problem is the lack of image altogehter, but the "Coming soon" image being there is an ebay glitch when relisting

Anonymous · ‎07-16-2015

I disagree very strongly that stock photos are allowed for used books as we prefer to see the real conditions of the used books. I have see many negative feedback about "item not as described" with the sellers who sell books.

I once bought a book and received only to find it damaged and a rental which was not mentioned in the listing.

Stock photos are FOR brand new items NOT for used items, period!! Anyone who use stock photos for used items are LAZYl not wanting having to take pictures of them!

tobyshitzu · ‎07-16-2015

Doesn't make much difference when ebay specifically says they are allowed. The same was every other site uses stock photos for used media, amzn, ebgames, bestbuy and many others.

tobyshitzu · ‎07-16-2015

ebay policy "Stock photos may no longer be used as the primary photo for a used item listing. Catalog images are acceptable, but not as the primary photo for used items; exceptions are the Books, Movies, Music, and Video Game categories. "

cumos55 · ‎07-16-2015

Using the same stock photo on two listings of the same book but in different condition.

How does a potential buyer "see" the difference in condition?

Missing gallery photos.... thousands....

misuse of the principle of a gallery photo...lots of booksellers

and ... It is the sellers with a high ... very high ...number of listings that ignore the basic rules in preparing a listing...

For booksellers. clarification is required... lots of clarification...

These booksellers list the minimum, and get away with doing something .... wrong.... because defects do not "count" at their level of sales.

tobyshitzu · ‎07-16-2015

The condition field is what differentiates the condition. If they have that set as new for a used item then that would be a violation. Nothing at all wrong with using stock photos.

Ebay should defitnitely do something about whatever they have recently done to the catalog images. Just relisting some now, ones that were fine a month ago now no longer have the image. Relist a quantity in bulk and there is no way to even tell it has happened since the system coundn't ebay's "coming soon" as an acceptable image, unelss you look through your own listings as a buyer. Its annoying with 200 listings, if i had thousands or hundreds of thousands I wouldn't even consider trying to fix them. Granted if you have competitors that has happened to, then its to your advantage if your lsitings still have an image and theirs don't

femmefan1946 · ‎07-16-2015

I disagree very strongly that stock photos are allowed for used books as we prefer to see the real conditions of the used books.

Well. to be fussy about the language used.

EBay not only does ALLOW the use of stock photos for used books, they PROVIDE the stock photos.

And since there does not appear to be a way to add a title or an edition to their catalogue, a problem with scarce or with books printed outside the USA, some sellers have item specifics that are completely wrong. Perhaps even down to the stock photo used.

cumos55 · ‎07-16-2015

A personal view...

eBay's Catalogue for books.... A mess looking for a place to happen.

If the catalogue entry does not describe the book being listed.... it should not be used... as stated by eBay.

Many times I have had a book to list.... checked on eBay to see if it is listed....

and then the photo does not agree with the catalogue entry... and then this does not agree with what the seller says...

Many sellers of books.... especially those with 100's of thousands do not care... They sell and defects cannot have an effect on them....

rose-dee · ‎07-17-2015

@toby**bleep**zu wrote:
None of the things you mentioned are a violation of ebay rules. Stock photos are allowed for used books. Different condition of the same sku are allowed. The only problem is the lack of image altogehter, but the "Coming soon" image being there is an ebay glitch when relisting

I wasn't referring to stock photos, but to pictures with text splattered all over them advertising the seller's name, website, etc. etc. Those aren't stock photos.

And I wasn't speaking of listings that appear to be duplicates but have some difference, which are allowed. No, I know my categories and products well, and these are identical items listed at fixed price at the same time. How they don't get taken down, I have no idea.

All of the issues I mentioned in my post above are violations of eBay rules in my categories, and I see them all the time.

ironchachi · ‎07-17-2015

I hope he does have some significant changes in store...I just read he lost Toys R Us who fled after a decade. They are going stand alone and I'm sure some others may follow. I'd like to think it's a small bandage but could become a full blown issue if something isn't addressed soon.

pjcdn2005 · ‎07-17-2015

@rose-dee wrote:
@toby**bleep**zu wrote:
None of the things you mentioned are a violation of ebay rules. Stock photos are allowed for used books. Different condition of the same sku are allowed. The only problem is the lack of image altogehter, but the "Coming soon" image being there is an ebay glitch when relisting
I wasn't referring to stock photos, but to pictures with text splattered all over them advertising the seller's name, website, etc. etc. Those aren't stock photos.

And I wasn't speaking of listings that appear to be duplicates but have some difference, which are allowed. No, I know my categories and products well, and these are identical items listed at fixed price at the same time. How they don't get taken down, I have no idea.

All of the issues I mentioned in my post above are violations of eBay rules in my categories, and I see them all the time.

toby was replying to cumos post so I don't think that those comments were about anything in your post.

tobyshitzu · ‎07-17-2015

The are getting good with duplicates. I had 1 accidently on different ids that got taken down a couple weeks ago. Someone on .com ps board got suspended from listing for a week for a claimed 6th liftetime dupe. Don't know if that is right or not but looked like a very good seller with a lot of listings

Toyrus announced they are leaving using ebay enterprise, which ebay is about to announce they've sold at a large loss from what they bought it for a couple years ago. Unknown if they are leaving listing on ebay. Ebay enterprise ran all toysrus eccomerce including toys own website

recped · ‎07-17-2015

@ironchachi wrote:
I hope he does have some significant changes in store...I just read he lost Toys R Us who fled after a decade. They are going stand alone and I'm sure some others may follow. I'd like to think it's a small bandage but could become a full blown issue if something isn't addressed soon.

TRU hasn't "fled", they will be dropping eBay Enterprises (GSI/Magneto) who have been handling their logistics for a long time (long before eBay bought GSI).

eBay Enterprises in not eBay the Marketplace. eBay has also just signed a deal to sell the sell eBay Enterprises division.

"What else could I do? I had no trade so I became a peddler" - Lazarus Greenberg 1915
- answering Trolls is voluntary, my policy is not to participate.