The Ebay Buyer's FAQ

A guest article by Kirsten Hawkins

So you have a question? Has something gone very wrong and you don't know what to do? Well, fair enough. Here are the questions that I hear all the time from buyers.
Does eBay have a Customer Service Department I Can Phone?
eBay are notoriously hard to contact, should you ever need to - it sometimes seems like they expect the site to run itself. You can email them, as long as you don't have your heart set on a coherent response: go to http://pages.ebay.com/help/contact_us/_base/index.html. You might have better luck in a 'live help' webchat here: http://pages.ebay.com/help/basics/n-livehelp.html.
Only eBay Power Sellers (sellers with a very high feedback rating) get to phone customer service. If you really want to try your luck, type 'ebay [your country] phone number' into a search engine and you'll probably find something. Unfortunately, the chances are you'll have gone to all that trouble for the privilege of leaving an answerphone message.
It might seem cruel, but imagine the number of people who would call eBay every day with the silliest questions if they gave out their phone number everywhere. Its Wild West nature is, in a way, part of its charm.
eBay Sent Me an Email Saying They're Going to Close My Account. What Should I Do?
This email asks for your password, right? It's a scam, an attempt to frighten you, make you give up your details and then steal your account. eBay will never ask for your password or any other account details by email. eBay say that you should only ever enter your password on pages that whose addresses start with http://signin.ebay.com/. They even offer a special 'Account Guard' as part of their toolbar, which lets you check that you're not giving your password to a dodgy fake site. You can read more here: http://pages.ebay.com/toolbar/accountguard_1.html.
It Seems Too Good to be True. How Does eBay Make Money?
For you, the buyer, eBay is free. Sellers, though, pay all sorts of fees: a listing fee for each item they list, a final value fee (a percentage of what the item sold for). They can they pay optional fees for extra services, including Buy it Now, extra pictures, reserve prices, highlighting the auction, putting it in bold, listing it first in search results or even putting it on the front page. You can see a full list of fees at http://pages.ebay.com/help/sell/fees.html.
It's obviously worth it to the sellers, though, or they wouldn't carry on using eBay. The system is quite efficient, and basically forces both eBay and the sellers to keep their profit margins as low as possible - otherwise prices will simply go too high and the buyers will stop buying.
How Safe is eBay?
Well, as it happens, that's the subject of our next email! All of eBay's safety services for buyers and sellers are in one place, called 'SafeHarbor'. SafeHarbor handles fraud prevention and investigation, helps with dispute resolution and keeps rule-breakers in check. Read all about it next time, and be safe.

About the Author
Kirsten Hawkins is an Ebay and internet auction enthusiast from Nashville, TN. Visit http://www.auctionseller411.com/ for more great tips on how to make the most from Ebay and other online auctions.

eBay removes kidney for sale auction

eBay Australia has cancelled the sale of a human kidney after it attracted bids up to $US800,000 ($1.05 million) in just a single day.
The kidney was being sold by a 54-year-old US citizen from Missoula in Montana who wanted to use the proceeds to support his family.
The internet site does not permit the sale of human organs and the auction was deleted as soon as it came to the notice of eBay management, the company said.
Another eBay seller tried to sell a kidney in 1999. That sale brought in bids of more than $US5.7 million before the company intervened to block the auction.

Man admits guilt in eBay auction scam

As reported:

A San Leandro man has pleaded guilty to charges that he defrauded eBay users in online auctions for rare Mickey Mantle and Michael Jordan sports cards.
In pleading guilty Monday to one count of mail fraud, Michael Gouveia, 40, admitted that he accepted money from the winning bidders in 2002 and 2003 with no intention of delivering the cards as promised.
Gouveia admitted that he had defrauded eBay users of more than $34,000, including a Michigan resident who sent him $7,199 for a 1951 Mickey Mantle baseball card that was never delivered. U.S. District Judge James Ware will sentence Gouveia in San Jose on Dec. 19.

eBay Buying Tip: My eBay Page

My eBay page
Looking for a way to keep track of all your eBay activity? The My eBay page is a great way to keep track of items you're bidding, buying, watching, and have won in one convenient location.

Each eBay member has his or her own personal My eBay section. Just click on the My eBay link at the top of any eBay page. Enter your User ID and password to enter your private My eBay page.

My eBay is divided into several sections to help keep you organized.

A. Summary
From this page, buying and selling reminders help you stay on top of all your current bidding, buying and selling activities along with the most recent eBay announcements to keep you informed.

B. All Buying
This section displays all the items you are currently bidding on, have won, and are currently watching. Items in green mean that you are currently the highest bidder while items in red mean that someone else has outbid you. The Watching section is a great way to keep a close eye on items of interest so you don't miss out on any last minute bidding!


C. All Selling
My eBay can also be used to track all your selling activity on eBay. Items listed in green mean there is a winning bidder, while items listed in red mean there currently is no winning bidder. From this page you can send an invoice to your buyer, send a payment reminder, and leave feedback.

D. All Favorites
This is a great feature that lets you bookmark your favorite categories, sellers, and searches so you can access them quickly and easily. To save a search, click on the 'Add to Favorites' link on the search results page. You can even choose to have eBay email you whenever there are new items matching your search.

E. My Account
From this section, update your personal information such as: User ID/Password and shipping address. Customize your eBay experience from the Preferences page, and leave feedback for sellers.

Geldof angry; eBay scraps Live8 ticket sales

LONDON (AFP) - The Internet auction site eBay bowed to pressure and stopped selling tickets for the London Live8 concert to increase awareness of African poverty due to be held on July 2.

More than two million mobile phone text messages were sent in a lottery to win the 150,000 free tickets to the show, starring Paul McCartney, Elton John and REM, among others.

But no sooner had the first tickets been allocated than some began appearing Tuesday for sale on eBay.

Irish pop star-turned aid activist Bob Geldof, who is organising the event, described the sales as "sick" and threatened to launch a court case to force eBay to end them.

Geldof told Tuesday's Daily Mirror newspaper that he was furious at eBay for allowing the sales, labelling the firm "an electronic pimp".

eBay to Buy Shopping.com for $620 million

San Francisco (InfoWorld) - eBay continued its acquisition spree by agreeing to buy comparison shopping site Shopping.com for about $620 million in cash. The move should benefit eBay's sellers by giving them access to a new sales channel and a new set of buyers, while Shopping.com will be improved by the addition of eBay's listings on its site. eBay had annual revenue of $3.3 billion in 2004, and net income of $778.2 million. In the same year Shopping.com made $99 million in revenue and net income of $12.2 million. But Shopping.com has been adding customers at a faster clip, according to research company comScore Media Metrix. It attracted 22.6 million unique visitors in April, up 15 percent from the same month a year earlier, compared with 63.8 million for eBay, an increase of 6 percent over the same period. In December eBay agreed to buy property listings site Rent.com for $415 million, and a month before that it bought Holland's top classifieds site, Marktplaats.nl, for $290 million. Earlier last year it acquired a 25-percent stake in Craigslist of San Francisco, beefing up its classifieds business.

eBay Selling Tip # 1: Relisting Your Item

Normally, Insertion Fees are non-refundable. However, if your listing ends without a winning buyer or results in an Unpaid Item (UPI), you may qualify for a credit by relisting the item. If the item sells the second time, eBay will refund the Insertion Fee for the relisting.

To relist an item, sign in to eBay, go to the item page for the ended listing, and click on "relist your item". You can also go to other places, such as the Unsold Items view of My eBay, and click on the "Relist" link for the item. (Source: eBay Help)

Stolen PaceMaker sold on eBay

This surely should push eBay to be more strict with medical devices.

It was reported by Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune that Medtronic Inc., based in Minneapolis, recently discovered that one of its pacemakers was stolen from a California hospital, sold on eBay and then implanted in an Arizona man.

This surfaced when when police in Sacramento, Calif., arrested a 21-year-old woman early March on an embezzlement charge. Amber Bowen, a nurse's aide at Sutter Memorial Hospital in Sacramento, also ran an Internet medical supply business on the side called Body Fantasy Inc., according to Sacramento police.

Bowen allegedly stole two Medtronic pacemakers from the hospital in October 2004 and then posted them for sale on eBay. Typically, a pacemaker costs about $6,000, but Bowen sold them for $255 each, police said.

The report said the stolen pacemakers were bought by Greg Etts, a purchasing manager for a large cardiac practice based in the Phoenix area called Advanced Cardiac Specialists, according to a report issued by the Arizona Medical Board. Etts reportedly had admitted to board officials that he knew the pacemakers were stolen when he bought them and that he often purchased devices on eBay.