Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

amiwat0
Community Member
Offlate a lot of sellers try to get their products as cheapest by gaming the search. They club some cheap item as a variant and make their product appear cheap. For instance search for wireless keyboard and you will see some available for $2 but when you open the product you see something cheap like mouse pad for the $2 and the keyboard for a much higher price.

Any idea how to resolve this? As buyers it is becoming tougher to find cheaper products by such deceitful tactics by a lot of sellers. Why cannot ebay show results for only those products that we search for?
Message 1 of 9
Latest reply
8 REPLIES 8

Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

Yep, Asian sellers amongst others cheating the system. Ruining it for everyone.

 

I suggest to skip over any listing that has a large difference in prices or skip variants all together.

I often search with highest first then select about page 5 or until I find a page with a realistic low price for the item then going backwards.

It eliminates all the rubbish and peripheral items in the category.

image host
Message 2 of 9
Latest reply

Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

This has been a much complained about problem for a long time but Ebay seem reluctant to do anything about it so I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you.

The only way I deal with it is to never click on any listings that have two price amounts - they are sure to be listings like this.

__________________________________________________________
.
Education is what you get from reading the small print. Experience is what you get from not reading it.
Message 3 of 9
Latest reply

Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

In case Ebay is knowingly letting this happen then it shows that they do not care about the buyer expereince. It is a no brainer if I am looking for the cheepest product I want the actual product on my list. If the cheapest product is not the first product then whats the point of the sort?

Is there a place in ebay where this can be escalated?

Message 4 of 9
Latest reply

Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

As has been suggested, or as I do, skip past these listings to the first single price listing and go from there.

 

i don't know whether these smarty pants sellers realise or not, but they're losing sales. Their tactics, which do make it unpleasurable for everyone are a shiny beacon of their character and business ethos. I wouldn't buy from them even if they had something I wanted.

 

buyers soon wake up to them.

 

eBay? Pffrrrttttt!!

 

Melina.

Message 5 of 9
Latest reply

Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

If the item I want is going to be at least $5 or whatever then I set a minimum price of $1 less then all the listings for a couple of bucks are excluded.

____________________________________________________
It says in this book I am reading that by 2065 80% of women will be overweight.

See what a trendsetter I am?
Message 6 of 9
Latest reply

Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

I honestly don't think it'd be a simple fix for ebay so I don't think they're ignoring the problem altogether.  What would you suggest - that ebay set things automatically so that you can't have more than a certain discrepancy between item prices when the listing is made, eg. if one item is $10 then you can't have anothing item in the same listing for more than $5 less? 

 

This would help in some instances but there are some items that genuinely need to (or should be able to) have different quantities of an item available in the one listing.  For example, if you sell envelopes it's more efficient to offer packs of 5, 10, 100, 200 in the one listing instead of having them in separate listings and having to wade through a lot more listings.

 

The only way is for them to put something in the rules about it, but a lot of sellers could still get around it legitimately.  Ebay just don't have the resources to deal with every listing that's reported to them and this is basically why nothing is done about this.  I think it's just something we have to live with. Unfortunately, there are always going to be sellers who will try and get an unfair advantage over others.  

Message 7 of 9
Latest reply

Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

Yes Brer, fair enough.

 

Melina.

Message 8 of 9
Latest reply

Cheapest product Search trick used by sellers causing buyers problem in getting lowest prices

amiwat0
Community Member
They can add a rule that sellers canmot do this and if they do let buyers can report this. That way it wold reduce. Right now there is no rule in place by ebay it seems
.
Message 9 of 9
Latest reply