If eBay are fair dinkum then the sellers I mentioned would not be around based on buyer disatisfaction and selling items not in stock.

 

Makes a good current affair story. I think time has come that this sort of thing is highlighted in the media.

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@am*3 wrote:

Apart from the fact you shouldn't list stock you don't have. What harm did the OP's buyers suffer?Seller contacted them and gave them a choice. Some requested and received a refund, others were OK with waiting until the DVD was back in stock. 

 

Same punishment for OP -a permanent ban - as other sellers would get, who might have fleeced/scammed several buyers out of $1000's.

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What harm did the buyers suffer?  How do we know how many hours of research the buyers did before they decided who to purchase from?  How many wanted the item to give as a present by a certain date?  How many only went ahead with the sale because it was too much bother to do all their buying research over again?

 

Are you saying it's okay to advertise that you post within one business day of receiving payment but not post for a week or two?  When he listed the 100 he knew there was a good chance he'd sell a lot more than he had in stock and that they wouldn't get posted within a day.  What if he hadn't been able to get more stock, for whatever reason?  False advertising has severe penalties from the ACCC in the 'real world' and shouldn't be allowed here either.

 

No, not everyone gets that he did the wrong thing.  The OP certainly doesn't get that he did the wrong thing!  He still maintains his honesty and integrity, even though he was a serial offender and regularly listed stock he didn't have.

 

If I bought something when there were 50 showing in stock and the seller informed me they'd run out, I'd ask for my money back simply because I knew they hadn't been honest when they did the listing.  If I can't trust them to be honest about one thing, how can I trust them in anything else.

 

Whether I agree with the punishment is irrelevant.  The fact is all sellers have had plenty of warning about defects and they should conduct their business in a way that minimises them as much as possible.  If we want to flout the rules we have to be prepared to accept the penalty.  We can't complain about the severity of the penalty if we had a chance to avoid it but chose not to.  Short selling is always a risky business, whether it be on the stock market or on ebay.  

 

Ebay shouldn't have to spend hours sifting through a seller's history to see who can be an exception to the rule.

I am really hoping the petition takes off because taking that to the media would help I'm sure. Don't know whether you watch ACA, but they have helped several people reach positive outcomes with petitions for change recently

Even if the OP is a serial offender and I don't know, why aren't eBay applying the rules to those I mentioned?

Yes, it's speculation, but it's based on my experience as a buyer and a seller. You can bet that a lot of them were just being polite.

Taking it to the media will give ebay sellers a bad name, especially those who support other sellers who've done the wrong thing.

Basically, a petition to do away with the defect system is saying that sellers think they shouldn't have to be responsible for their actions - not a good advertisement for the site.

How do we know that ebay aren't applying the rules to the big sellers? It's all based on percentages so the more transactions you have, the more defects you're allowed - and these are high-volume sellers.

It's clear they haven't, the first think they do is restrict your ability to list new items, if you take a look at Dick Smith for example, they have created fresh listings today.

For anyone contemplating listing stock they don't physically have, my understanding is you can do so as long as you make it very clear that the item is currently out of stock, and will be available within a maximum of 21 days after payment is received.

 

I haven't read all the posts however surely he should have taken the listings down if he was repeatedly out of stock; he would have known how high his defect rating was if he bothered to look and read up on the defect policy.

 

Whilst I do sympathise with his plight:( it was avoidable, imo.