Who Are The Buyers Giving Defects? My Experience Only.

[the-fab-gift-shop]

This is only from my own personal experience as a seller and may not be the general rule. Our bad buyers are only around 5%, so it would not matter to us in the greater scheme of things, but it certainly does matter to Ebay, so that is why we now have to BLOCK every BUYER who DEFECTS us,even if they do leave POSITIVE feedback. Why keep buying ... and keep defecting us?

Sad to say, ... these are our problem buyers: 

1. People receiving carer's pensions for looking after someone else who is disabled.

2. Disabled or very ill [not the aged] people who are on pensions.

3. Those on pensions for 'mental illness.' [Ebay staff are known to have particular empathy with these buyers. :)]

4. Unemployed.

5. Buyers 1-4 who take revenge using multiple accounts, usually because we refused to allow them to scam us.

6. Sellers who feel that we may be competing with them and feel annoyed. Usually spend 1.25.

In regards to 1-5, they've got time on their hands. They may or may not end up leaving Neg. or even defecting us, but even if they do not do that, they can still be a nuisance. They will usually spend an average of 1.25 and then whine for days about when the item will be arriving, sending "I Haven't Recieved My Item' emails after a couple of days. They will nearly always try to get a refund outside of the Paypal or Ebay system, so their multiple scams, are not left on record, except through their emails to the seller.

And Ebay supports this activity, because sellers are now defected when cases are opened at Paypal by buyers. Am I correct?

Not much we can do about who shops with us, and we would not want to discriminate against the above buyers either because there are good buyers who are in the 1-4 category. But our BLOCKED list grows longer by the day. My experiemce also shows that DEFECTS don't mean anything to other buyers, since our sales are still doing fine. BUT once Ebay hides our inventory again, the DEFECTS will mean something, because our sales will drop. Sometimes we do make mistakes [which we try to rectify], but mostly DEFECTS have nothing to do with who we are as a seller, and everything to do with our REFUSING liars and scammers.

We also now immediately BLOCK BUYERS who send rude, aggressive or idiotic emails when asking a question about an item.

The GOOD NEWS is that 95% of our BUYERS are AWESOME, but Ebay's SYSTEM, means that the 5% can IMPACT our selling.

[the-fab-gift-shop]

See my previous email before continuing to make a fool of yourself.

[the-fab-gift-shop]

Yes, they always tell us they are on carers or disability support pensions, ?! .... which is how I was able to write this post.

I'm not sure why. Perhaps to gain sympathy, a discount ... trying to get me to understand their situation. Stressed out. Lonely etc. Some will use it to try and emotionally blackmail. Others are depressed ... have numerous medical problems. No one to listen.

Okay, ... I can see that ... But when I tell them about the situation of my own family as well, usually after they have done the wrong thing ... stolen from us/ left unwarranted Neg. ... there is not much sympathy shown towards us at the end of the day ...

When I buy from a seller, I would never dream of telling them all about my personal situation. I like to keep it simple. Cheers,

[digital*ghost]

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@digital*ghost wrote:

I would rather block 50 such buyers and still continue to sell to thousands, than risk selling another $5, $50 or $500 worth of product to someone who doesn't know or care about the damage they're doing, which has the potential to ultimately mean I can't sell to anyone.

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You know... I've realised how sad this is, and think it's a pretty good indication of the effect of what eBay are doing.

The damage isn't being done by buyers, it's being done by eBay, and it's going deeper than affecting a seller's ability to sell. 😞

[the-fab-gift-shop]

I would prefer not to BLOCK anyone. But Ebay's DEFECT system, means that we have to BLOCK problem buyers [sometimes in advance, such as in receiving rude or aggresive emails, questions etc] in order to protect our livelihood.

Just for the record, I do not block buyers because they are on pensions or carers pensions etc  lol ... only when they pose a threat to our ability to look after our own family and animals that we care for. Or when they do the wrong thing by us for no good reason.

If anything, we keep our prices as low as we can, so people on low incomes, can have a good shopping experience and our repeat buyers and the feedback they leave can testify to that. 

Would love to delete our BLOCK LIST altogether. Let me know when it's SAFE to do so. Cheers,

[i-love-my-sheep]

I didn't feel the need to block my buyer who insisted on telling me she was on a carers pension, because ultimately, it was my error.  She probably wouldn't buy from me again anyway. Anyone else though, NPB, low DSR's, abusive, straight onto the list without hesitation.

[robinsonmarineparts]

Without being disrespectful to you or the group of people metioned in you posts, but the product you sell and the price will / does attract the group of folk you have mentioned, so it's not rocket science to work out you cilentele.

So IMO some of your posts are unfair.

[springyzone]

This is just a general reply, to no one in particular.

But I was curious about the comment about pensioners and such. How would a seller even know what most people did for a living, or even what age/sex they were? Even in a dispute, you might not know those things about the buyer?

As for the comment about blocking people who give low D something or other (the star ratings, I think they would be?), maybe the focus should be on getting ebay to smarten up their game.

I doubt-I VERY much doubt, if 90% of buyers would have a clue the stars rate for all that much to sellers, except obviously a seller would like to have lots of stars.

But I doubt many buyers know it affects sellers and their selling position or whatever it does.

Most people in life don't award 5 stars to anything unless it is really top notch and I bet many buyers who give 4 stars think they are doing the right thing.

A lot probably feel a 3 means a happy transaction. Nothing out of the ordinary but a satisfactory experience.

So.. ebay needs to have something that comes up as buyers are ticking the star rating. perhaps a sign that comes up if only 3 stars are ticked that says wait-this rating may damage your seller's ability to sell. If you are generally happy with this level, give them 4 stars to avoid penalties.

A while back, I used to have trouble with the communication star rating if I had had no communication with the seller. If they hadn't marked the item as sent, then I used that to judge and put them at a 3 star. It was the only 'communication' available if no messages had been necessary. I certainly never meant to ding their account though.

In short, why block buyers if the buyers don't understand how the system works now. Or if you do, at least send them a PM and tell them why.

[digital*ghost]

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@springyzone wrote:

In short, why block buyers if the buyers don't understand how the system works now. Or if you do, at least send them a PM and tell them why.

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For all the reasons I explained in an earlier post.

A seller is not allowed to contact buyers about the ratings they left, and eBay have apparently confirmed they will be making no effort to educate buyers. For the majority of sellers, for as long as eBay makes their businesses vulnerable to being shut down permanently due to defects, sellers will take every reasonable measure to reduce the risk of getting one.

Trying to ensure as much as possible that none are deserved is only going to get you so far, and in business there is what is known as "acceptable risk" and "unacceptable risk". Sending an expensive item without tracking is generally an unacceptable risk. I deem it an unacceptable risk to continue to expose my business to buyers whose feedback results in a defect for no apparent reason. It doesn't matter that it's unfair, or some might think it's unreasonable or silly, what matters to me is that my business survives.

[bsal6160]

And kazam there is a blocked sellers list. Its called EXCLUDED SELLERS.  A preference you can set to exclude certain sellers items from showing up in your searches.

[cq_tech]

How so? There is no reference to such a function anywhere that I can find.