@*tippy*toes* wrote:I got a warning because I removed a listing that accidentally got broken. Someone had asked a question about it. When I got it out to have a look to answer their question I dropped and broke it. As far as eBay were concerned, I sold it off eBay. No, the broken bits went in the bin! What I should have done was change the listing to something else rather than end the listing.
If eBay is going to suspend accounts because a buyer sends a message, then they really need to remove the messaging option full stop. Otherwise, stay the hell away from my stuff!
No, what you should have done was replace the original pictures with pictures of the broken item. 
I hope they never do away with messages because I get quite a few from my buyers, like one last night, "I want to buy your item but I can't pay for a few days and it's due to end soon. Will you be relisting it, etc, etc." What did get through was "do you have a store where I can contact you" or words to that effect - because they were worried about missing out on buying it.
I often have people asking do I have more of a particular item. Recently I withdrew one item so nobody else could buy it before I checked how much more I had. I must have been lucky because she gave me her mobile number and asked me to text her when I'd done the new listing. I was surprised the phone number got through.
Personally, I've found private sales can be a real pain and have deliberately avoided them in the past, but I really can't understand why ebay would prefer to close down a good seller for one possible sale off ebay when they may be putting a few thousand dollars into ebay's coffers every year on their other items. That's called killing the goose that laid the golden egg, or shooting yourself in the foot both feet.
