Experiences with Ebay
 

Hi - How great have your experiences been with Ebay? I've heard only good things but there must be some people who have gotten screwed or been dissapointed.

Ferret

I'm both a seller and buyer (mostly DVDs) on Ebay and have had 100% success.

I never bid on someone who has less than 99% positive feedback.

The key is to just be patient and be thorough when looking at auctions. I waited a few days when looking through Band of Brothers Tin set auctions and was lucky to find it at $59.99 BIN (authentic USA).

I avoid sellers with a lot of auctions going on -- to me, it's more of a chance they'll miss the auction or screw the transaction up somehow.

S&H: Don't get screwed. Know that with the usual DVD, First class is less than $2.50 usually and Priority is $3.85.

All in all I'm happy with it -- just have to be careful about auctions: if it's too good to be true, it probably is! :)

I've had nothing but great experiences....well, one bad experience. I have done over 2300 transactions as a powerseller, but my bad experience came as a buyer.

Basically, i got screwed out of $200 because i made a serious error in judgment and made a large purchase from someone with only 6 feedbacks...a couple days after i paid through paypal, it became clear that the seller was never going to ship my items, since they were already NARU'ed from ebay and getting negs for non-shipment. I waited the required 7 days to file the paypal complaint, but was unable to get any money back (another idiot error, used paypal balance to pay). :(

I would say though the ebay is a great venue for making money and finding great bargains and cool stuff...just watch who you deal with on there.

Unfortuantely, the problems seem to get the attention, but by far the vast majority of transactions run smoothly. Use some smarts and you'll be ok.

I will reiterate what the others have said. I almost got burned recently by bidding on an Infocus projector, it was much less than retail price. After I bid I looked carefully at the sellers 100% positive 32 feedbacks and realized the guy had bought several cheap things and sold several cheap things. I was getting paniced that I might actually have won the item but then Ebay cancelled the auction and suspended the seller.

Just be real careful, and if the deal is TOO good to be true take the time to carefully look at the seller's feedback. Selling a ice cream recipe for 0.01 doesnt really count for positive feedback.