eBay

zee-chan-jpn-books · ‎10-25-2014

Hi, I had a buyer messaging me to back out of a bid (because I can't offer her the discount she wanted). The auction only has a few hours left. Should I cancel the bid or let the auction finish and then send mutual cancellation request? Would either method lead to a defect? I have zero defects right now and I'd hate to ruin that...

Thanks for any input! 🙂

cumos55 · ‎10-25-2014

Link to

http://pages.ebay.ca/help/buy/bid-retract.html

and make note of

What if I can’t retract a bid?

If you can’t retract a bid, you can contact the seller to request that your bid be canceled. The decision to cancel a bid is up to the seller.

zee-chan-jpn-books · ‎10-25-2014

Hi, I'm not the buyer though, I'm the seller. I don't mind canceling the bid for the buyer but I need to know if it would result in a defect on my end, because if that's the case it wouldn't be worth it for me to do the buyer this favour.

recped · ‎10-25-2014

You wouldn't be doing the buyer a favour you would be doing YOURSELF a favour.

Forcing someone to buy something they don't want rarely ends well.

"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.

zee-chan-jpn-books · ‎10-26-2014

@recped wrote:
You wouldn't be doing the buyer a favour you would be doing YOURSELF a favour.

Forcing someone to buy something they don't want rarely ends well.

I'm not forcing her to buy anything. Please don't make that assumption. She placed two bids on two items, then asked me for a discount. I can only give her a small discount because she's located in Asia (read: outrageous shipping), it appears she didn't like that the discount is too small and didn't respond, then 5 days later told me she only wanted to buy one item, paid for that one (since it ended earlier), and then asked me to cancel the other one that's still running.

It is already not ending well for me because she can still give me a negative feedback (that would make it my very first) on that item she paid for, and that I will be shipping. I'm actually debating about refunding that item so that I don't have to ship it to her and worry about potential headache.

Anyhow, my main question since the beginning was: is it better to cancel a bid, or send a mutual cancelation request? I would like to know which solution would not lead to a defect. If anyone has experience in either aspect, please let me know. Thank you very much.

recped · ‎10-26-2014

neither automatically creates a defect but one is more likely to turn out that way.

"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.

zee-chan-jpn-books · ‎10-26-2014

Which one is more likely to turn out that way? I have read the help page on "what are defects?" and it says defects is caused by "Seller-cancelled transactions". If I cancel her bid and manually inputted that buyer changed her mind, would that result in a defect?

cumos55 · ‎10-26-2014

If I cancel her bid and manually inputted that buyer changed her mind, would that result in a defect?

No defect

rose-dee · ‎10-26-2014

@zee-chan-jpn-books wrote:
Which one is more likely to turn out that way? I have read the help page on "what are defects?" and it says defects is caused by "Seller-cancelled transactions". If I cancel her bid and manually inputted that buyer changed her mind, would that result in a defect?

If she has messaged you asking to cancel and you use the reason that "buyer made a mistake or changed their mind", you shouldn't get a defect.

Remember though that the buyer will still be able to leave FB/DSRs on that transaction (I don't agree with this eBay policy, but that's another story). For that reason, keep any communications with the buyer very friendly, courteous and professional, and hope that she just forgets to leave FB entirely once the transaction is cancelled (which I find is usually the case).

recped · ‎10-26-2014

If the OP had simply cancelled the bid as requested by the bidder there would be no transaction and therefore no feedback or any other concerns.

"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.

zee-chan-jpn-books · ‎10-26-2014

The buyer did buy another item from me, so if she really wants to leave me a negative feedback, she can do so on the item she bought and paid anyway regardless of whether I cancelled her bid or mutual cancellation.

I wasn't sure if cancelling bid would result in a defect then, and by the time cumos responded that it's no defect, the auction already ended so mutual cancellation was the only thing I could do. I did select buyer changed her mind and I checked my seller dashboard, which shows no defect at the moment. The buyer did accept the mutual cancellation.

I'll just ship the book the buyer paid for and see how it goes. Nothing much I can do about it other than remaining polite (which I always do), though I probably should consider blocking that entire country since I rarely get buyers there anyway (about 5 buyers from there over the years).

Thank you to all who responded 🙂

femmefan1946 · ‎10-27-2014

Block the flake.

And cancel her bid.

zee-chan-jpn-books · ‎10-27-2014

@femmefan1946 wrote:
Block the flake.
And cancel her bid.

She asked for a discount on auction #2 that she already placed a bid on, after winning auction #1. I replied with a small discount offer (because that's all I could afford with CP prices). And then after 5 days of no response from her, she asked to cancel when there was less than 16 hours left on auction #2, and I didn't see her message until when it was 4 hours left because I have work aka life. She asked me to cancel auction #2 AND at the same time paid for auction #1, thus completing that transaction. Since she paid already, blocking her wouldn't solve anything unfortunately. No one here gave me a definite "cancel bids = no defects" response until after auction #2 ended, so I had to go with the mutual cancellation route because I was really worried about getting a defect (this new dumb defect concept is still too new to me).

I'll just have to keep my fingers crossed that she either gives me a positive, or give me no feedback for auction #1. Since this is a 1 feedback score buyer, after I ship the book I'll gently remind her not to give me a feedback on the cancelled auction #2 even if eBay prompts her to.

rose-dee · ‎10-27-2014

@zee-chan-jpn-books wrote:
Since this is a 1 feedback score buyer, after I ship the book I'll gently remind her not to give me a feedback on the cancelled auction #2 even if eBay prompts her to.

I'm not sure that's a good idea. It might get her thinking about what she could say. It's hard to know for sure, but with a "1" FB buyer, saying nothing might be the better choice. She may assume she can't leave FB on the cancelled transaction, or may just not leave any FB at all, which is more the norm these days.