After purchasing an item I've received an email from a third party associated with the seller, indicating that they've divulged my information to a third party. Surely this is a major violation of eBay seller policies. If not then it is a violation of laws in various countries as I'm sure you're aware... so who do I report this issue to? The police? Because the guy lives not more than an hours drive away; I can have him legally charged for spam if I like...
The manner of your posting seems supercilious and hostile. Possibly you don't mean to portray superciliousness and hostility; it can sometimes be the case when one's in a bit of a rage or feeling outraged if one's real target is (temporarily at least) out of range. I am going to assume that this is the case, unless you bludgeon me with aggravated condescension in the second degree, particularly as I'm genuinely trying to give some helpful information.
If you have a real target, it's the seller who you think passed on your details to a third party, and the (presumed) third party who contacted you by email.
As I understand it, you are of the opinion that the party who emailed you is not the seller. Are you certain that this is the case? As has been mentioned, sometimes eBay sellers have multiple trading names, and an eBay account name may be different again.
If you've identified the emailer and have the ABN of that business, you can certainly contact that business by phone and calmly and politely explain that you are perturbed at having been contacted by them by email on such-and-such a date, that it's unsolicited and that you feel this may be spam which under the Spam Act 2003 does render a business liable to quite significant fines. Make sure that you mention that you did not give express consent to be contacted via email, and that you are unaware of any inferred consent to that effect. (Double-check, though, before you call, that there was no inferred consent.)
The first step is always to contact the business (that is, as long as the email looks legitimate and is from an Australian business) and make a politely worded complaint. Rather than being enraged by it, it is better to find a peaceful solution (in my view). If the business politely accept that they erred and takes you off the mailing list, you've achieved the main purpose... well, unless you want the perpetrators to boil in oil, which I suppose is possible.
I imagine you are fully au fait with how to deal with dodgy-looking spam. Never click on an unsubscribe link if the communication doesn't seem legitimate, as by so doing you may be downloading keyloggers, malware or other nasties... At the very least, one would be very likely to communicate to the spammer that the email link is "live", thus resulting in further spam.
You're within your rights to lodge a complaint with the ACMA. I don't think your vision of the seller/s being imprisoned is a possible scenario. To quote, "The main remedies for breaches of this Act are civil penalties and injunctions." Furthermore, S.27 (under Part 4) of the Act explicitly states that criminal proceedings are not to be brought in relation to contraventions of these civil penalty provisions.
This also stops any suggestion of your receiving victims of crime compensation. You haven't been the victim of a crime.
You could contact eBay to make a complaint against the seller, but you may have to demonstrate a clear chain of evidence between the email you received and the seller who you believe is responsible. You're right in quoting the eBay policy in respect of spam and contact outside eBay, but in my view (to which you may pay no heed whatsoever) the Member-to-member contact policy is one of the stupidest and least helpful policies that eBay ever conceived. That is not to be taken to mean I approve of spam or profanity or threats. I don't. If eBay had a policy that simply stated members are not permitted to send spam and are also not permitted to send hate-filled or profanity-ridden threats or communications, I'd be delighted. Bundling that up with simple member-to-member contact is where it all becomes ludicrous.
However, that's by way of segue. Yes, you can report spam to eBay. Were I you, and were I as upset by one such spam email, I'd contact the eBay seller first - for preference, by phone (if I were able to get the seller's phone). I'd politely say that I had received a spam email which appeared to be connected to the seller. I'd refer to the eBay policy and politely suggest that the seller not send such communications to buyers (as it's a policy breach), and finish by asking that my name and details be removed from their mailing list. I'd also say that I explicitly do not give permission for my details to be passed on to any third party. I'd either record this conversation (having asked for and been given permission by the person to whom I was speaking at the beginning of the call), or I'd take notes detailing what was said and what was agreed on.
At all times, I'd be pleasant and polite, not just because I am inclined that way anyway, but because one achieves so much more, so very much more easily, with that approach.
If you are not inclined to take that approach, you can simply call eBay and make a complaint.
P.S. Yes, I already tried calling the VOIP number associated with the seller. I'm not braindead; you should assume people can read until they provide proof to the contrary, you know..?
P.P.S. You might get further with your social compass if you refrain from stating what will/won't upset people... because you never know. None of us can read minds. I appreciate the attempt at sensitivity nonetheless, but there are better ways... just saying.
Thank you for your reply. I can now confirm that you are a charming and charismatic individual. It would be my utter delight to share with you the secrets of eBay's telephone number.
However - not for the world would I wish to imply that you cannot see this number for yourself... Not when it is so very easy to locate.
Are you certain that you require assistance with this? It is hard to believe, but if you assure me that it is the case, I will strive to believe it, and give you the information, beautifully presented upon a golden plate.
A TINY PRINT: My question is very simple... either you know how to contact eBay officials so that I can notify them of breaches to their legal codes (in which case I want to hear from you) or you don't (in which case, go and watch TV or something... stop wasting all of our time)
Every member who has posted on your two threads knows how to contact ebay.
If you had asked that question before you started with the abuse you might have had an answer.
As you consider yourself so superior to all of us you should be able to find out for yourself.
Victim of crime compensation? BAWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! That would have to be THE most hilarious thing I've heard all year. I've had a really carpy week. Thanks for making it better for me. Really, thank you. I needed that good laugh. Life looks bright again. I no longer have the urge to kill myself.
To be clear, this marketting company has my information which I've not given them, a privacy policy and terms of use which I've not agreed to yet I was non-consentually subscribed to this mailing list and thus entered into their system, with a lovely introductory email identifying the scumbag who subscribed me. A contract signed on my behalf, essentially. They were either sold or given my personal information, which ought to be a massive privacy faux paux, yet this is so apparently controversial, it has to become a twenty-comment thread with people trying to down-play the seriousness?
Let's go down that rabbit hole: It's only a matter of time before this kind of privacy invasion is abused by a stalker to track down that long lost ex who went into witness protection or some **bleep**... those are the people who privacy policies protect the most. There's no point even having a privacy policy if sellers can give your information away to whoever the hell they want, whenever the hell they want.
Haha, I don't buy that staff don't come here... because if I mention the name of the seller, you know what will happen, I know what will happen... we've probably all seen it happen, right? It's no coincidence that I agree with your opinion of eBay phone support, just as they'd likely agree that you're all just a bunch of trolls with nothing better to do with your time. It all seems too well organised, like the dictators who suppress opposition or the corrupt politicians who layer incompetence upon scandalous behaviour ad nauseam. The forum description says that the "eBay team" frequently visits here, so if that does turn out to be false then it's icing on the cake...
> As I understand it, you are of the opinion that the party who emailed you is not the seller. Are you certain that this is the case?
If I look at the paypal receipt, I can see the seller uses gmail, where-as the spam emails are not sent from gmail but are instead sent from the domain of a marketting company. The message still bears the name of the seller, however.
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That proves nothing. I choose to use a different email address for paypal to what I use for my ebay account and other sites. Your seller probably does the same, and would be incredibly stupid not to as they'd be exposing themselves to a very high risk of having their paypal account hacked if they used a marketing domain email address for it.
While it may be against ebay's policies for a seller to spam you, I can tell you from experience that there's very little likelihood that they'll actually enforce their policy on this. I tried and got nowhere. Many of us have learnt from long, sad experience that ebay doesn't do a lot of what it says, including read the forum. They possibly read them to get a laugh over our frustration at all the technical problems they can't be bothered fixing.
