Fraudulent listing

[chappy1403]

Why do I feel like so many listing are fraudulent or at best misleading or mistakes, I regularly see items listed with exsadurated claims or photos of items showing features and even showing how to use those features,  only to receive items that at first glance look to be correct only to be inferior and the features advertised don't exist, from hot water heaters that won't reach advertised temperature, spotlights that measure 5W instead of 45W, dash cameras missing advertised sos save button and camping head lamps missing the wave your hand sensor to turn on/off to name a few. I know that I'll get my money back and that's great,  but eBay doesn't enforce that listing are corrected, I've followed up on listing in the past and found them unchanged.

[katistrophik]

All you can do is report the sellers and hope if enough people do so the accounts will be suspended

[imastawka]

Sounds a lot like the MO of Chinese sellers.

If so, no amount of reporting is gunna do anything.

[eburtonlab]

Do not rely on eBay to filter out all the poor sellers and bad deals; you must do that yourself.

There are a lot of drop shippers that do not understand what they are selling, that use stock photos and canned descriptions taken from other sites. By checking feedback and actually reading the comments you can get a good sense about whether those sellers are actually delivering what they are advertising.

There are also sellers that advertise deals that are too good to be true.

You can often avoid such sellers by choosing to only purchase from sellers that have a history of selling similar items and getting positive feedback for those sales from users with more than single digit feedback themselves, and by knowing how much those sorts of items are really worth and steering clear of deals that are too good to be true.

You might miss out on a good deal from a new seller from time to time by taking that approach, but you will avoid a lot of headaches.

[papermoon.lady]

Yes, probably from China.

I don't buy electronics from China any more (or from sellers registered in China, even if the listing says the item is in Australia).  I did years ago, but not any longer.

It is better to buy something that costs more and is what it is supposed to be (and lasts longer). And if something is good quality and lasts longer, at the end of the day it will also be cheaper than buying a cheap item again and again every time it dies.

[springyzone]

---

@chappy1403 wrote:

Why do I feel like so many listing are fraudulent or at best misleading or mistakes, I regularly see items listed with exsadurated claims or photos of items showing features and even showing how to use those features,  only to receive items that at first glance look to be correct only to be inferior and the features advertised don't exist, from hot water heaters that won't reach advertised temperature, spotlights that measure 5W instead of 45W, dash cameras missing advertised sos save button and camping head lamps missing the wave your hand sensor to turn on/off to name a few. I know that I'll get my money back and that's great,  but eBay doesn't enforce that listing are corrected, I've followed up on listing in the past and found them unchanged.

---

As others have said, you're looking at the wrong ads. All from China, I bet.

Those sellers over in China copy photos off official sites and use them in their own ads. It's very misleading as I'd be 100% sure that isn't what you'd get if you actually bought the things. I haven't looked at the sorts of things you have but years ago browsed their wedding frocks out of curiosity and I can tell you blatant copying was definitely a thing.

From what I was told here, it isn't against the law in China, whereas it would be here. They and some other countries seem to copy big name brands in watches, bags, you name it.

Ebay isn't going to enforce listings if the sellers are not breaking any laws in their own country. I guess you can report listings but an easier way is just avoid certain categories of things on ebay. Electricals, phones, anything that needs a guarantee basically or anything where the quality matters to you.

Buy from Australian sellers or buy from the shops.

I haven't struck any misleading or fraudulent listings on ebay in the last few years or not in the categories I buy in. On the contrary, I find items are much more honestly described by Australian sellers here than on other websites (think marketplace on FB for example). Australian sellers here, on the whole, know they can't get away with it, they don't want a claim opened against them so these days the items are mostly new, mostly fairly described and posted off extremely quickly compared to the old days.