Webuser Forums: Screwed over by eBay

Usually we read posts about buyers being screwed by sellers on eBay, however I have a recent story concerning myself, as a seller (a powerseller), being screwed over by eBay. I’m not here to moan for moanings sake. I’m here to share my experience and obtain any advice you guys can offer.

I have been a powerseller on eBay for 5 years. I sell approx 500 items per month. They are relatively small value items. Around £3 each on average. I see eBay as a hobby but also as a source of income for my uni tuition fees so that I do not have to rely on a loan. My profit is small, but enough to pay for my uni fees. My feedback is over 11,000 and 99.7%.

I had a brake from selling in December 2006. That is when I sold my last items. The Christmas postal service, being as shoddy and unreliable as it sometimes can be, meant that a few international buyers did not receive their items (about 1% of my customers). This was beyond my control. I ship all items. However because I sell 500 items per month, I do not have the time to fill in tracking forms for each and every item. While it would make good sense to do so, I’m a full time law student and it would be impossible within my time constraints. So I send the items by first class airmail in good faith, and 99% of the time they arrive with no problem, the buyers are pleased and leave positive feedback. As you know, some international buyers did not receive their items. They left negative feedback without contacting me. I was frustrated, as can be expected, but I put the experience down to the risks of trading on eBay. After all, 99.7% of my buyers were still satisfied with my service and the quality of my items. I then ceased selling on eBay because I had law examinations coming up. I planned to resume selling after the examination period.

Last month, completely out of the blue, I received an email from eBay saying that my account has been restricted due to “seller non-performance” and that I had 30 days to “bring my account back to standing, or else I would be permanently banned from eBay”. My first instinct was to assume this was a spoof email. After all I have not done any selling activity for 6 months. After checking with eBay, via their spoof email check and also via contacting eBay directly it was confirmed that the email was valid!

Obviously at this stage I’m shocked, confused and a little scared. I’m also in the middle of my law exams. I log into eBay and find that I cannot perform any activity (no bidding, buying or selling). And yet, eBay are still taking shop fees from me. I contact them immediately via email (the only method that they provide. There is no phone number) and wait a few days for their response. When it arrives, it is an automatic computer-generated response. The response tells me that I have had some negative feedbacks and that they must be removed within 30 days or I will be suspended permanently.

As I have 99.7% positive feedback, I find the emphasis on the 0.3% negative feedback quite baffling; Nonetheless I follow eBay’s instructions. I scan through my feedback until I find the negatives. I contact all the buyers immediately offering full refunds and file “mutual feedback withdrawl” forms for each. In a few days I receive 2 responses from buyers agreeing to withdraw feedback but the other buyers do not respond. This may have been because the transactions were carried out 6 months ago and they no longer use eBay (their accounts appeared dormant for some time). After a few days of waiting for the remaining buyers without luck I email eBay telling explaining the situation. I await eBays response.

In the meantime, the buyers who did agree to withdraw feedback have discovered that they cannot use eBay’s “mutual feedback withdrawl” form because the auctions ended over 2 months ago. Everyone is frustrated at this point. I send another email to eBay about this matter.

The first response I receive from eBay is about the non-responsive buyers and it is an automatic templated response. The response tells me that in order to remove feedback for old auctions, I must use Square Trade. This will cost $20 per feedback. I’m disappointed and frustrated but follow the email’s instructions. I sign up with Square Trade and file cases for the cooperative buyers. I pay with my credit card. The buyers continue to cooperate and after a week eBay remove their negatives from my profile. Finally I think progress is being made.

But what about the non-responsive buyers? I wait upon an email from eBay. When it arrives (you guessed it, an automatic computer-generated email that was obviously made using a template), I am told that I can use Square Trade for those buyers also. So I file Square Trade cases for the non-responsive buyers, but, there is a problem. A week later, Square Trade tell me that they require the email addresses that the buyers had registered with eBay at the time of the transactions. Because the buyers are not responding to my attempts at contact, I cannot obtain their email addresses! Also, because the auctions finished 6 months ago, I could not obtain their email addresses from eBay! I start to panic at this point because I recognize that my time is running out. The 30 days will be over soon. So I email eBay again explaining the situation and anxiously await a reply.

After 5 days I receive a reply. And yes, it’s an automatic computer-generated response using a template. The reply says:

Hello,

You contacted us again about the restriction of your eBay account.

In our previous responses we provided you with the necessary information
to help you to resolve outstanding issues with your buyers who left you
negative feedback.

You have 30 days from the date you received your restriction notice to
improve your account standing. When this time has elapsed we will review
your account again. If your account standing has not improved and you
have not made an effort to resolve all buyer complaints, your account
will be suspended.

Please be aware that within these 30 days, future emails to us will be
read, however, we may not reply.

Thank you for your efforts to resolve this matter with your buyers. We
will contact you in due course.

Kind regards,

Richard Dunne
eBay Trust & Safety

I have absolutely NO idea what to do at this point. So I concentrate on my law exams and hope that the feedbacks I have successfully been able to remove via paying Square Trade, will be enough to reinstate my account.

Yesterday I received an email from eBay informing me:

Access to your eBay account has been indefinitely restricted for repeated breaches of our Seller Non-Performance policy.

Our top priority is to ensure that eBay remains a safe and reputable place to buy and sell. We cannot permit further use of this account due to the nature of the policy breaches and the number of issues you have outstanding with your buyers.

We sent you a notice advising you of this restriction and allowed you a 30-day period of limited access to conclude any outstanding transactions and resolve issues with your buyers.

As these 30 days have now elapsed, we have reviewed your account standing and access to your account has been fully and indefinitely restricted.

So there you have it. Despite all my efforts, I have no idea what I have done wrong. I can quite confidently say I did everything within my power to rectify the situation. I relied on eBay as my income and I am left with a large storage room full of stock. I was a powerseller with a large percentage of positive feedback and I was also an eBay top 100 reviewer. This suspension has come as a complete and utter shock to me.

I have racked my brains for some possible ways to rectify the situation. I feel helpless because eBay has the monopoly over buyers and sellers alike, and we, the people who are lining eBay’s pocket, have no rights. As I said at the start of this post, I am not on my soapbox just to moan like an emo; I am posting here because I know many of you guys are eBay users. Perhaps you can think of a solution that I have not yet considered? Perhaps you have experienced this or something similar yourself?

So far, I have only been able to come up with the following list of possible avenues to sort out this mess. I would greatly appreciate it if you could help me figure out some more.

• Send a letter via recorded delivery to their UK head office in Northern Ireland (this would get around the ‘automated response’ syndrome)
• Solicitor (disproportionality/slander/Sale of Goods Act/more research to be done here)
• Watchdog (the desperate mans choice

)
• UK consumer organization? (Trading Standards for example, http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk)