Pet peeves about ebay auction formats

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mbstuff

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I was wondering what kind of pet peeves people have about ebay auction formats, styles, etc.

Mine is that I refuse to bid for anything where the photo of the item has been made on a bed, where the seller lays out an item on top of a bed and takes a photo of it. I can give passes to all caps, grammar, etc., but I will not even read the auction description if I see that the picture has been made using a bed (or anything resembling a bedsheet, or a towel, for that matter). Make your own conclusions about my OCD reasons for doing so. :) Stupid, yes, but I can't help it.
 
:lol: I have a Zelda Collector's Edition game on ebay right now, and I took the picture while it was sitting on the bed! It was the closest flat space to my computer, and I had my digital camera hooked to the PC. Didn't know people hated it though! :D
 
Lol, as far as I know, I'm probably the only one who's against beds as the background. Two words: bed stains. Like I said, OCD. :wink:
 
I hate when sellers make it almost impossible to locate the shipping cost for their item. I also never bid on an item that has a shipping calculator. Seems shady to me.
 
I hate reserve price auctions that have the reserve set .50 below the BIN price - they might as well eliminate the whole auction format and just sell the damn thing.
 
Well now I know why some of my stuff never got sold on ebay, damn bed! :lol:

I guess one of my pet peeves is I get a negative initial feeling of an auction when the price is set at a $xx.99 price. Since I buy a lot of japanese rock CD's on ebay, I've learned to almost ignore any $xx.99 listings cause they are almost 90% of the time bootlegs. Not ALWAYS, but i just assume that (with games too, like GBA games that are from Hong Kong n stuff).
 
[quote name='Legolas813']^ Why is that? I always price my items at $xx.99[/quote]

yeah, after thinking about it for a bit (i was typin an english paper when i posted 1st), i think what i meant was i hate the obviously bootlegged items on ebay. And those are always like $9.99 BIN for what is normally a $35 item if bought legit and new. sorry for the confusion

EDIT: oh, and i share your distrust with the shipping calculators, but i think theyre fun too! this one guy was selling a DVD, lived maybe 3 hours away from me by car, and shipping was $8. I mean dude, stick it in with media mail and I'll be fine... :roll:
 
Bad grammar, and lazy data entry. I also hate it when I paid for a DVD on the 26th and still don't have it in my mitts and the seller says it shipped 10 days ago.
 
I always wondered if the shipping calculator turned off some buyers. I've been using it for anything I sell that weighs over a pound since the rates are different depending on where the buyer lives.

My pet peeve would be listings with crazy high shippng. ($8 or more for a single game/DVD for example). I certainly do take the S+H into account for my bid as the total cost, but those silly S+H listings end up just wasting my time as the high S+H means they are already out of my price range when I first check them out.

This was a bigger problem several months ago, but now they let you add the shipping cost as one of the data points displayed in a search. (Click the 'customize display' link after doing a search to add this on.)
 
As a buyer I don't mind the shipping calculator. I'll never buy if shipping cost/calculator is not posted, if there are no pictures, if the picture has a background that looks like it was taken run-down home, and if any of the info about the product doesn't match up (even if it's slightly off).
 
[quote name='zionoverfire']Pictures! I want pictures and it had damn well better be of your copy.[/quote]

Agreed. I almost never bid on items that only have stock photos. I understand that not everyone has a digital camera, but come on there were too many times I bid on a video game with stock photo then the actual thing came and it had stickers and old glue/dirt/etc. all over it.
I always take my own pictures for this reason, I think it's probably earned me a few bucks here and there.
 
Like some of the other posters, I can't stand ridiculous shipping prices, (i.e. > $6 for Priority Mail). I don't like when people bid the low starting bid just to take away the buy it now option. The shipping calculator is ok, but a lot of people use it to hide their ridiculous shipping prices, see above.

I've also been seeing a lot of games lately listed as "brand new," but not sealed. How is a game brand new but unsealed?? I think they mean LIKE NEW. Oh, and "like new" means no scratches. MINT means perfect, flawless condition! Didn't anybody collect baseball cards? People really abuse the condition grading scales on ebay. I've been had a lot of times. I won't even buy a game unless it specifically says "no scratches on disc," and even then, I usually receive a game with a beat up case... Bleh.
 
[quote name='Legolas813']I hate when sellers make it almost impossible to locate the shipping cost for their item. I also never bid on an item that has a shipping calculator. Seems shady to me.[/quote]

What's wrong with a shipping calculator? There's no god way t get the cost on heavier items without it, unless you charge way too much and just screw everyone.
 
My favorite is the claim "new, only used once," especially when the same seller has 10 different items listed, and all of them were "only used once."
 
[quote name='brutus']My favorite is the claim "new, only used once," especially when the same seller has 10 different items listed, and all of them were "only used once."[/quote]

Well it's possible that he could have the attention span of a flea, therefore he may have only really played them once. But I understand what you mean, you can just tell some people have it in every single one of their auctions. Too often those once played games came to me with 7 or 8 huge scratches and a cracked case. That's one reason I don't like to buy used off of Ebay, I'd at least rather by it from ebgames.com and be able to take it back in store if it's scratched. It's only a matter of time until Ebay is a victim of it's own success.
 
I hate it when people use stock photos. i know that it cannot be helped sometimes.
But I like to see the actual product that I am bidding on.
But that is pretty picky.
 
[quote name='ddockery']What's wrong with a shipping calculator? There's no god way t get the cost on heavier items without it, unless you charge way too much and just screw everyone.[/quote]

For heavy items, fine. But for a game or movie, set a damn shipping cost and be done with it.

On that note, people who are obviously trying to skim off shipping prices only get my business if they are offering an incredible deal. If I pay $6 for shipping, then get the item with a postage label that says $1.80, you just lost my business. I don't care how you justify it ("I had to pay for the envelope, gas to the post office, wear and tear on my car, time I took to pack it, lunch I took during this arduous three hour process, etc").

Also, I've lately noticed a lot of inconsistent descriptions. I read a description of one game, I think it was one of the PSX Breath of Fire games, where the seller said 'only played 1 or 2 times.' Later on he says it's his favorite game of the BoF series. This implies that either he doesn't think much of the series, or the '1 or 2 times' bit is incorrect.
 
[quote name='PsyClerk']
On that note, people who are obviously trying to skim off shipping prices only get my business if they are offering an incredible deal. If I pay $6 for shipping, then get the item with a postage label that says $1.80, you just lost my business. I don't care how you justify it ("I had to pay for the envelope, gas to the post office, wear and tear on my car, time I took to pack it, lunch I took during this arduous three hour process, etc").
[/quote]

I'm in partial agreement with that, but a quick formula is to take the price on the label, add approx. .50-.80 depending on what kind of mailing envelope, and that should give you a fair guess as to what he actually spent. I will be honest though when I sell anything I usually add .30 to shipping to offset my listing fee. I always start at .99 so it's fine and I just eat the loss on final value. I think that's fair.
 
[quote name='Graystone']I hate the people that say BIN for one cent and they have shipping for 19.98 or higher.[/quote]

That's against eBay policy, AFAIK.
 
[quote name='shrike4242'][quote name='Graystone']I hate the people that say BIN for one cent and they have shipping for 19.98 or higher.[/quote]

That's against eBay policy, AFAIK.[/quote]

Is certainly is, because that's an attempt to avoid Ebay fees. You can report people like that an Ebay does actually take a pretty hard stance against auction like that they are reported. The problem is Ebay cannot monitor everything themselves so someone needs to report those things.
 
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