An eBay Story

Last month I mentioned my experience with a fraudulent eBay bidder who "purchased" one of the items I had for sale but neglected to pay for it. Since then I've been more wary of the offers that buyers have submitted, and have looked at their feedback information before responding.

A couple of weekends back I got an offer on a suit that I have for sale. It was for only 40% of my asking price so I rejected it, but I also noticed that the bidder had zero feedback and his eBay user account had just been created a week or so earlier.

A couple of days later he made another offer, higher but still lower than what I was hoping for. I contacted him through eBay and told him that as a seller I was looking to protect myself, and that to be blunt, I was suspicious of him. I said that I would feel somewhat more reassured if he could confirm to me that he had a vaild Paypal account with a confirmed address.

His response was more or less "oh yes I have a paypal account," which was not at all what I had meant; I was looking for him to provide information that I could use to confirm the existence of an account. So I came up with an idea: I asked him to send me $1 via Paypal, so that I would have a transaction connected to him, with the associated verifiable details. I would then deduct the dollar from the amount I wanted for the suit, which was still higher than his second offer.

Imagine my lack of surprise when I heard nothing from him, which served to confirm my suspicions. Interestingly, he tried again this past weekend, making another offer for the same amount as his second offer. Buyers get three offers per item per auction, and as a seller I can reject any offer without having to provide an explanation, so I was able to deal with that nuisance with a click of my mouse.

eBay does protect sellers from fraud, as happened with my earlier experience, but heading off a fraud before being victimized is certainly preferable.