Sellers pretending to be in Australia

[robszarka]

Sellers from overseas, mainly China are pretending that they are in Australia ..:it has become a real common problem. 
multiple times now I have ordered something believing I am ordering from an Australian vendor and it turns out that item is coming from china. Instead of days or a week for the item to arrive it’s takes a month or months. 
I would have never ordered it had I know it was from overseas!

it seems vendors can claim they are in Australia when they actually are not. Now I’m worried whenever I order an item I may wait months for it and it has led to me using Amazon more as at least I won’t be tricked. 
eBay you have a real problem here and it is happening a lot  causing your buyers to lose confidence in your website and feel scammed. Is there no penalty for people lying about where they are located as the items will be shipped from ?

if this happened once or twice sure things can slip through but it happens a lot! I spend more time nowadays trying to figure out where the buyer is from than anything else as who the hell wants to wait those kind of time frames for deliveries to begin with.
They are also stealing sales from Australian vendors as many people like myself prefer to buy Australian to support our people and instead get scammed into buying from others. It’s low and underhanded !

please look into this problem as if i keep getting tricked I will no longer shop here  buy go somewhere that the vendors can’t trick you. I’m sure I’m not alone here in being sick of this

[jellybirddesigns]

This issue has been a thorn in Aussie buyers side for years.

The best way to tell is by looking at the sellers feedback page, which will show you where they are registered. It can be in fairly small type, but it will be there.

The other thing is to look at their feedback before purchasing. If there are lots of negs and comments about China, then you'll know for sure.

[gutterpunkz05]

Unfortunately this problem is not confined to ebay

[sandypebbles]

Not much point addressing eBay on a member to member forum that nobody from eBay reads

checking feedback before buying would solve this quickly and easily

No need to be tricked

The good news is, the less buyers who don’t do this, and continue to support such sellers, the less support these sellers will have

You have been on eBay way more than long enough to have read up on the basics of buying 

[springyzone]

You have a feedback score of 294 so you've obviously been around ebay a while.

I know what you are talking about is a real problem on ebay, but I can't for the life of me figure out why, as a regular ebayer, you'd be putting up with waiting for 'months and months'.

On just about every ad you see on ebay, there's an estimated delivery date. Have a look at that. If the date is within acceptable limits for you eg within a week or two, by all means go ahead and order. 

But if the item doesn't arrive in that time, just open an ebay claim for item not received. Get your money back.

There's no need to haggle with sellers and wait months and months. Not acceptable.

Before I buy, I always have a quick look at feedback too. You don't have to read it all, just click on the negs or neutrals to see if there is any pattern of complaints. You can also check out where the seller is registered.

Maybe it depends on what sort of items you buy but I haven't had a problem finding or buying from Australian sellers in years.  If you've been caught out by sellers outright lying, you can report their listings to ebay but on the whole, making a claim for money back if an item is late is your best bet.

[lezned-toycollector]

Personally, I don't see the problem here. All I see is a bunch of people trying to make an issue out of nothing just so they've got something to whinge about. Not being racist at all, I couldn't give a rat's about the seller's nationality.

Recently, I purchased a mobile phone case from a seller registered in Hong Kong. The item location was given as Regents Park NSW. I made the purchase just before midnight on December 21, and the case arrived at the LPO at 6:49am on December 24. The entire transaction took 58 hours from purchase to receipt.

Now, if I was to believe even 10% of the tripe tossed around these boards on this subject, I wouldn't have made this purchase. I would have missed out on awesome service for a great product at a very cheap price.

I've made many, many, many purchases from sellers of various ethnic origins, and to date I have never encountered a problem with delivery times. The only thing that really matters in any transaction (both on and off eBay) is the item location - not the registered country of the seller.

Not all overseas sellers, mainly China (as per the OP) are dishonest, and one should never tar all of them with the same brush.

That's my opinion based on my own personal experience, and it's not open to debate.

[paper-jack]

One would probably be safe to assume a seller offering " free pick-up" as a postage option, is actually physically in Australia. But nothing would surprise me.