Disappointed with lack of item descriptions

[bettmilla_0]

Anyone else finding the descriptions of items to be less than helpful? 

Eg - looking at irrigation products, 50 pack of sprays/sprinklers has pictures of 3 different versions, no mention of difference in product !!! 

Cannot contact eBay to query this - very frustrating, easy, just go to mitre 10, home hardware or bunnings - what a waste of time eBay has become as more Chinese producers use the site and usually don't have the language skills to advertise without misleading potential customers...

[gutterpunkz05]

I found plenty from both China and Australia,  mostly variation listings with 3 spray patterns available, 90/180/360 Degree.  Most include measurements etc in pics, so don't know what else you expect or require.

[janeababe]

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@repentatleisure1952 wrote:

Late to the party... I hope you brought wine 😉

I looked & found  any amount from Australia with good descriptions...shrugs.    Yes, I don’t know why papermoon’s searches aren’t producing any Australian listings. 
*double shrugs* 

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[*sons_and_daughters*]

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@papermoon.lady wrote:

I searched for the item (including "50 pack") and I only found Chinese sellers. I added the filter "Australia only" and the result was "no exact matches found", so obviously a seller from China if the search was accurate.

Definitely don't buy from China if you are not satisfied with the description and that the item is what you are looking for, as it is a lot of trouble if the item is wrong (for example if you have to send it back to China).

If you are not satisfied with a description, you have to ask the seller, not eBay, but they often don't speak English. In the past I sent questions to sellers in China, and no matter what I asked, the reply was something like "it has been a pleasure dealing with you. I will ask my partner. I am sorry about the problem." I mean, I had not even bought from them yet (a pleasure dealing with you?)... No problem, I just needed more details sometimes, but I don't think they understood. In one case, I even wrote back to specify that I had not bought the item yet and there was no problem, then repeated the question... and I received the same reply! (Obviously I didn't buy the item, but unfortunately it was not available in Australia, so I had to give it up...)

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It can often be obvious if a Chinese seller has used a translator to type up their ads. Instead of "item", they use "project". e.g "if you aren't happy with the project, please contact before leaving negative feedback".

I have bought quite a bit over the years from reputable Chinese sellers (all high volume with 100% feedback). One I knew didn't speak English (and hey, that's OK, we don't speak Chinese!). I tried to send her a message letting her know that my item hadn't arrived, but happy to wait another week.

I got a garbled reply. I'm guessing she tried to use Google translate, but it failed. I decided to try and send her a message in both Cantonese and Mandarin (helps having native speakers as friends!), but ebay messaging rejected it. It wouldn't allow me to send it, regardless of how much I tried. It wanted English only. Thankfully my item arrived a few days later.

Had a similar thing happen when I tried to send a message to a Thai seller in Thai. Ebay messaging wouldn't allow it. Yet, I had no trouble sending a message in German to a German buyer. Go figure!

[papermoon.lady]

I got that reply I mentioned above from 2 different sellers... Well, at least they had two different usernames, although they might have been the same person.

To me, it looked like they didn't speak English but wanted to show they cared, so they sent the same reply to everyone because they didn't want to ignore customers even if they had no idea what they were talking about. It was almost like an automatic reply (but not really an automatic reply because in both cases it arrived hours later).

[springyzone]

You all got me curious so I did a search. I'm not a search guru, I just did what I think an average buyer might do. My search was for 50 irrigation sprinklers/any category/Australia only.

It came up with a lot. I only checked out the first 3 and in each case they were listed as in Australia but the seller was registered in China.

The feedback % for a lot of these sellers isn't anything to brag about either.

My conclusion is betmilla may be better off buying in Bunnings unless she knows how to check out the seller's country of registration as well as feedback. That particular category seems to have more than its fair share of misleading ads if you aren't very careful.

[papermoon.lady]

It can be frustrating, springy. Last week I was looking for something and could not find a single item really in Australia (I mean, with the seller registered in Australia). It was not an unusual item, but unfortunately not something you would find in a store... I am still not buying it from China because it takes too long at the moment. The estimated delivery was by the end of April...

As for searches, I think eBay search engines are a bit buggy at times.

Once I saw an item come up in my feed, and I didn't look at it immediately because I was doing something else. I tried to search for it half an hour later (for some reason it had disappeared from my feed) and used all possible terms that were in the title as it had come up in my feed... Nothing... It just didn't come up. I thought maybe it had been sold.

Then I searched for a similar item on eBay UK because I had seen such items before in the UK... and it first came up with UK items, and then THAT item located n Australia under international sellers. But that item still did not come up on eBay Australia. A bit weird. And yes, the seller was registered in Australia. A few days later though it was OK and it also came up on eBay AU.

[papermoon.lady]

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@janeababe wrote:

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@repentatleisure1952 wrote:

Late to the party... I hope you brought wine 😉

I looked & found  any amount from Australia with good descriptions...shrugs.    Yes, I don’t know why papermoon’s searches aren’t producing any Australian listings. 
*double shrugs* 

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I wonder if it is because I used an incognito browser? I really don't know though. I didn't want to search for it in my account because I did it before when people asked questions and then I got suggestions from eBay "based on my recent searches"...

[countessalmirena]

There are apparently some indexing issues occurring at the moment.

I'm looking forward to eBay's amazing and quickly responsive Technical Team getting on to this immediately.

[papermoon.lady]

Let's hope they will solve the problem by Thursday, or there may be additional glitches on Friday...

[*sons_and_daughters*]