eBay

musicyouneed · ‎01-15-2017

I check a lot of my CD's prior to listing but with so many can't do them all before they are listed so as they are sold I run them through EAC to ensure there are no errors. The CD looks perfect and this is the first one out of the thousands that I have sold has a problem with 2 songs. There are no scratches on the CD it looks perfect but the last 2 songs skip or just stop. The CD itself is faulty and someone bought it today. I don't want to send it out because of that.

What do you think I should do?

i.am.vivian · ‎01-15-2017

@musicyouneed wrote:

What do you think I should do?

Tell the truth. Explain to the buyer that on your machine (or whatever you use to test them) this one seems to skip at the end. Apologize sincerely. Tell them how sorry you are that you missed it, especially since you don't have another. Ask the buyer if they would prefer to cancel the sale or would they rather go ahead with it and if it skips for them too, to let you know and you will just refund and they can use it for a coaster. Put the ball in their court and be really nice.

westernstargifts · ‎01-15-2017

What I do, if I find a product to be defective before it is shipped, is just be honest with the buyer and tell him/her that the item he purchased is defective and that I will not knowingly send my customers a defective product. Then I offer him the choice of a full refund or a percentage off another item of equal value if there is something else in my store that he might want as an alternative.

I find the buyers appreciate the honesty and frequently take me up on the discount.. Even if they don't see anything else that they want they are much more likely to leave positive feedback. I think offering a customer something in compensation helps to defuse any anger he might experience when he finds out he can't get the product he purchased.

I sell jewellery, not cd's, but this works for me.

musicyouneed · ‎01-15-2017

Thanks for your responses. I have composed an email below that I was thinking of sending, what do you think? Is there a better way of wording it?

"Dear ------, I would like to thank you for your purchase. I take pride in the CD’s that I sell and check them all to ensure they are in top quality. With the thousands of CD’s I have, I check ones for track errors that have scratches on them prior to listing. If a CD looks perfect I don’t usually check it until it sells. I have sold thousands of CD’s without any issues. The CD that you purchased looks fantastic but when I ran it against a program (EAC) which checks for track errors, 2 of the songs would not play or even finish the program. I tried 2 other programs and they too identified the errors. This is a defective CD and I don’t want to sell it to you knowing that.

I would like to know what you would like me to do, cancel the transaction? Is there another CD, you may be interested in as an alternative? Or I can send the CD like it is, 18 of the 20 songs are perfect, only the last 2 have a problem and refund 50% of the price to you.

Let me know and again, I am very sorry about this CD."

pocomocomputing · ‎01-15-2017

What version of EAC do you have? Version 1.2 came out in Aug 2016 and was revised with V 1.3 in Sep 2016 because of some issues with 1.2.

I post this just in case you do not have the latest version for some reason.

musicyouneed · ‎01-15-2017

Hi Poco, I have an old version from 2015 as I only use it to test tracks on CD's that may have scratches or marks on them. I am now updating my version of EAC. But I don't think that would help much as I tried to play the last 2 tracks on another machine and it skipped and just stopped playing. There are absolutely no marks on this CD or holes where there may be missing data. I am going to try the CD in my car tomorrow, just to be absolutely sure. But I think this CD is defective and that updating the program won't help it.

But thanks for letting me know about EAC update.

ricarmic · ‎01-15-2017

@musicyouneed wrote:
Thanks for your responses. I have composed an email below that I was thinking of sending, what do you think? Is there a better way of wording it?

"Dear ------, I would like to thank you for your purchase. I take pride in the CD’s that I sell and check them all to ensure they are in top quality. With the thousands of CD’s I have, I check ones for track errors that have scratches on them prior to listing. If a CD looks perfect I don’t usually check it until it sells. I have sold thousands of CD’s without any issues. The CD that you purchased looks fantastic but when I ran it against a program (EAC) which checks for track errors, 2 of the songs would not play or even finish the program. I tried 2 other programs and they too identified the errors. This is a defective CD and I don’t want to sell it to you knowing that.
I would like to know what you would like me to do, cancel the transaction? Is there another CD, you may be interested in as an alternative? Or I can send the CD like it is, 18 of the 20 songs are perfect, only the last 2 have a problem and refund 50% of the price to you.
Let me know and again, I am very sorry about this CD."

What I do in similar situations is leave the % of the refund up to the buyer. This puts the decision making in their court and it seems to make things go easier as you aren't telling them what to do.

However if they pick a stupidly high refund amount, I still smile and refund but I block them. Having said this it has been many years since I've blocked someone for this reason.

My thoughts.

pjcdn2005 · ‎01-15-2017

I like ric's suggestion of letting them suggest the discount. I would probably suggest a discount first..before mentioning cancelling.

Something else I have also done in similar situations is to offer to send them the item for the cost of shipping only since the defective product would be a pain for me to resell anyway. That isn't ideal though as you still have to pay a percentage to eBay.

ricarmic · ‎01-15-2017

I think it bears mentioning again (I put this in another thread a few months ago).

I had a buyer a few months ago that came very close to my "line" of suggesting almost too much of a partial refund when I left it up to him. However I chose not to block him.

He was very happy with how things were resolved and he subsequently bought a couple thousand dollars more stuff!!!!

Thank goodness I didn't block him......and I think it supports the concept that putting the resolution "power" in the buyers hands can be very beneficial sometimes....

musicyouneed · ‎01-15-2017

Thanks everyone for your replies. I emailed the buyer and he chose to cancel as he was collecting the set and really needed a perfect copy. I cancelled the transaction and he got his money back.