How would you deal with this?

[th0mas]

Apparently a lot of users on this board have used ebay.  Like (assumably) most of you, I've had a good amount of success.  Until my last deal.  In March I bought a little electronic device called a 'zipit'.. basically it's an IM self-contained device that runs linux and can be converted to be a cool little wifi-enabled device.

That I probably will never see.

I sent the person a money order.. they didn't want to use paypal due to the fees and  I've had success operating with MO's so I didn't care.  So I sent the money, hadn't heard back for a long time.  Emailed a number of times, no response.  Started doing some digging and found a person's Xanga site.  Seems the family is a little messed up - daughter in juvenile detention centre, friend of the family shot and killed a police officer (it's amazing what blogs + google turn up).  Anyways, I post a message on one of their blogs and the daughter emails me claiming the mother was _killed in a car accident a month and a half ago_.. approximately a week or two after the deal was finished.  However the (as far as I can tell) Mom's blog has new posts as of a few days ago.  I went along with the charade however, since pissing the people off will just result in them blocking me completely.  Alledgely the daughter is now going to look through the mom's things and find the device and send it to me.

Here's my question:  What would YOU do?

Oh, and my biggest mistake:  I seem to have lost the receipt for the MO I sent :(.

[Tanstaafl]

Bud, I hope you didn't pay too much for the gizmo.

as with all things Ebay.....

Caveat Emptor.

On another note.... you might check with the people you bought the money order from, and see if they are willing to give you a legal copy of the purchase transaction.  I would think they would, if you used some sort of trackable money path.... credit/debit card.  If it was in cash.. you might have to provide identification of your persona, but that should not be too difficult.

good luck,

gb

[stryd_one]

Damn ebay bastards :(

No point reporting them to eBay for the standard insurance because you've paid with money order, so yeh, all you can really do is keep pushing for the daughter to send it, and live and learn....

I had a few successful payments with western union and honestly, I had started to wonder what the fuss was about... Until the seller ripped me off on a Waldorf RackAttack that I paid $700 US for. I thought I was safe because I had his personal bank account details and even his home address in Europe, but the feds here wouldn't chase it up because it was too small an amount of money to be worthwhile starting an international arrest process. I was pissed, but hey, live and learn.... Now I ONLY buy stuff with paypal insurance, and I'll pay a bit more to buy locally if it's at all possible.... I recommend everyone do the same.

[Twin-X]

Me 2 only buy paypal secured!!!

As for your deal report it to ebay. But i think you can say goodby to your thingie. :( sad that people do this stuff.

[smashtv]

wow don't rely on the PayPal insurance thing, if you read the fine print on that there are a million hoops to jump through for it.....and if you do succeed in doing that dance you only have about a month to get the transaction reversed.....and to do that you must get PayPal on the phone, which is a nightmare.....

Don't get me wrong I love PayPal, they have opened up international commerce to everyone, but doing that makes them very busy, and hard to get on the phone.  :)  Can you imagine running a bank with 80 million plus accounts?  I get 30 orders and I'm behind!  :)

Read the fine print and be aware.  ;)

Best

Smash

[Twin-X]

I had a scam and paypal refunded my money very in a day after the complaint. I followed their rule of conduct and i did not had to call them even.

[audiocommander]

I only buy items on eBay if I'm sure I can deal with loosing that money and not seeing the delivery. It's a risk one has to take, so I'm only buying for a real good price so that it's worth the risk.

You also have to keep in mind that maybe you get a bad rating, too. ("get 1 bad rating when buying 1 non-delivered product for free!" ;D )

But, hey, this unbelieveable story seems to be worth the money; this sounds like a movie plot ;D

Regards,

Michael

[smashtv]

I had a scam and paypal refunded my money very in a day after the complaint. I followed their rule of conduct and i did not had to call them even.

Very cool....The last management-human there told me they were working hard on this....Looks like it's working. :)

I can't believe they have done as well as they have considering the growth rate....Google is ramping up to compete with them now, will be interesting to see real competition in that arena.

Best

Smash

[moebius]

Thanks for the laughs!

Although this time this topic is somewhat around the right place, where it belongs.. I'd be rather see these eBay matters discussed somewhere else than in the Midibox forum.

I can see there are enthusiastic eBay shoppers here, but the recent flood of topics surrounding eBay findings simply pisses me off. Looks like it's a plague that spreads around forums. But hey, aren't we reading this forum thru internet access? It's as easy for me or anybody else to type http://www.ebay.com to my browsers address bar - I can find these things too, If I CARED!

Now I can see such arguments coming as: "The others don't seem to mind", "Why are you so pissed?", "We are just helping other people".

NO. You're unintentionally cluttering the forum probably in the name of free speech.

So much of the recent discussion here has been meaningless and uninformative. For the small core crew of this movement who likes to babble and read others babbling: Get a proper blog - Link it here in the Misc and talk whatever You like. Those who like that will read blogs. Those who don't - Well, don't.

Moebius

[Screaming_Rabbit]

Why are you so pissed?  ;D  ;D  ;D  :-*

Greets, Roger

[stryd_one]

:o Get over it Moebius!

I've been very glad for three occasions where people have posted about eBay listings which I didn't notice which have saved me hundreds... One man's clutter is another man's $400.

The problem is the signal to noise ratio, and this is a tricky subject, because for some people, links to eBay listings are noise, and for some it's a strong signal with close relevance to their MIDIBox project.

I think it is an excellent idea to start the eBay thread, so that the eBay posts have a good home to go to, and that way you can ignore that thread and everyone will be happy. But understand that sometimes a link to an eBay listing will be relevent outside of that thread...And just like you suggest that everyone else start a blog or search ebay for themselves, you might just have to close the window for yourself.

And hey man, when people are talking about losing a lot of their hard earned money and you're saying "thanks for the laughs", well that's just plain rude. I know that you're mostly just joking (and that's only because I've known you so long), but it's not really all that funny when you work hard and save up for years and years and someone steals it all from you. Joking about such a thing is just insensitive... But I think that was your intention :(

[th0mas]

To all who have replied: thanks.  I've had time to read but not write as I'm out of town atm.

To moebius:

Get over it.  I'll post as I see relevant.  I don't agree with "the official ebay thread" because it is an unneccesary linearizing unsuitable for contemporary online forums.  Forums are threaded for a reason, to keep seperate ideas seperate.  Every forum I've seen that's had a "official x thread" turns it into an 80 page monster that is completely useless since it's the home to multiple simultaneous seperate threads of conversation that should all be, well, created as seperate threads.  You want to ask for an ebay forum?  That'd make sense.  You can ignore it, or just read it for the laughs you get from people's unnecessary loss. 

As for your reasoning that a post to an ebay item is an "unintentional cluttering" of the forum, that's really stupid.  They're easy to ignore.  At least whenever I do it, I usually have the word ebay in the title.  Plus, although you've discounted the common reasons people give you for posting ebay topics, they're all true, so deal with it.

A much more annoying cluttering of the forum is when people decide it necessary to try to enact rules like "don't post x here, it belongs here" and post it in threads.  The moderators of this forum do a good job of moving and deleting things as they see fit.

[audiocommander]

..and there are also sometimes threads like "High quality 3 axis trackball assemblys with TTL output on ebay", started with an ebay link only - but now contain informations of a lot more value than a temporary link.

(although I must admit that an info "Chap 2x16 LCD on eBay" is really quite useless  ;D )

Michael

[moebius]

I sent even more "IDIOT PROOF" reply I hope.

/edit

[moebius]

Ok, I have to be positive.

th0mas, Would this all has been avoided IF YOU had followed the rules given by eBay?

Moebius

p.s. For the others: A: - these things happen. B: - these happen for the careless (or IDIOTs as I call 'em)  C: -know Your market and don't fool around.

[TK.]

From my side it's ok when you open new threads for ebay findings, or when you are discussing about things in this forum which are not related to MIDIbox topics so long it's done in this Misc. section - it can be easily masked out in the search function of this forum, so that the postings don't appear in the result list.

Moebius: ok, now we know your oppinion, but please avoid this offensive articulation in future. This should stay a friendly forum, and I guess that you know the netiquette very well, so that I don't need to repeat it!

Best Regards, Thorsten.

[moebius]

Moebius: ok, now we know your oppinion, but please avoid this offensive articulation in future. This should stay a friendly forum, and I guess that you know the netiquette very well, so that I don't need to repeat it!

Thank You, Thorsten for this opinion of Yours. I'll watch my mouth, but ban me as You find suitable.

For all the audience, this Forum IS friendly, lets keep it that way.

Moebius

[th0mas]

Ok, I have to be positive.

th0mas, Would this all has been avoided IF YOU had followed the rules given by eBay?

Moebius

p.s. For the others: A: - these things happen. B: - these happen for the careless (or IDIOTs as I call 'em)  C: -know Your market and don't fool around.

I made a stupid mistake when I lost the MO slip.  it might still be around but, yeah, I got careless.  Aside from that everything I did was proper. 

I don't know what having the MO slip would have saved me anyways, though.. I could have proven that they cashed the MO and tried to prove they never sent an item but for the item cost I don't think it'd have been very persuasive to illicit an action from ebay/nameities.

[audiocommander]

I don't know if it's different in other contries: in Germany you can do it the "hard way" only if you insisted on an insured and ID-tracked shipment. Only then you can go to lawyers or the police.

The risk is always on your side from that moment on, the item has been (or claimed it has been) given to the postal service agency.

If you own a tracking-ID, you can prove that it hasn't been delivered. That's the only chance. With expensive goods, it's best to quickly open the package, if the postman is still around ... he or she'll wait for a tip!  ;)

So for all bidders in Germany: don't try to spare 4 EUR on uninsured, untrackable items. If they get lost: no chance, no help, just gone forever...

(That also applies for every kind of online shoppings, not just ebay!)

Regards,

Michael

[dengel]

Audiocommander, it's no different in the US, for sure. always, always insist on a tracking number, and check that number within a few days of the supposed send date , not just when the item hasn't arrived. Some scammers are very good at running you through the "checks in the mail" game, and if they get you past that 30-day mark many of your safeharbor/ebay/credit card company protections can lapse.

Lastly, I'd avoid Money Orders and WU like bird flu. Paypal (with your Credit Card as the payment method) is often the best; you get 2 levels of protection in that case - once from Paypal, again from your card company.

[audiocommander]

allright, time has passed and hopefully everyone calmed down.

I feel it's time to tell moebius that I'm really sorry he became silent.

This forum is not the forum I learnt to know without moebius. I counted three occations in the past few weeks where we could have needed someone with a +10/-1 karma, if ya know what I mean ;)

I tend to be very sensible if one talks rough to me, but I always apreciated moebius' thoughts and inputs and there were lots of occations where I was absolutely one opinion with him.

Yeah. That's all.

I feel, this had to be spoken out.

:)

Cheers, Michael

[stryd_one]

I couldn't have said it better myself! Where'd you go Moebius?  :'(

Just because I had a problem with something you said, does not mean that I don't want you around. I do, and I'm not the only one, it seems :)

[smashtv]

I guess it is time for me to speak about this....after repeated fair warning about his provocative posts I banned him. 

The final straw was watching him tell Twin-x to "piss off".  Twin-x pays the hosting bill for this (forum and wiki) out of his own pocket.  Donations? Last time I asked T-x about this I could not believe the answer....not one in many months.  Sad show for such a good(?) community. 

Anyway......banning M was anti-fun, back when I could still get on IRC our daily chats were great.

I still consider him a good friend.  I miss that fellowship, and as soon as I get my IRC issues hammered out I'll be back (#midibox on efnet).

That said trolling is still trolling no matter how right your statement is.....after a few years of this I also see the flipside....seeing the same questions posted weekly by excited newbies can take its toll on your patience. 

He -was- a huge asset to this community, and hopefully someday could be again....but with people becoming afraid to post due to fear of a flaming, something had to be done. 

Community requires basic civilized conduct, else people quickly decide there are better uses for thier time than trying to help others.

Best

Smash

[audiocommander]

what a sad story  :'(

thank you for sharing this info. I do understand (and am thankful for not being a moderator having to bear such decisions...)

Community requires basic civilized conduct, else people quickly decide there are better uses for thier time than trying to help others.

that's very true.

thank you also for the informations on Twin-X and the webhosting donations. I considered donating anyway, you speeded up my decision :)

Best regards,

Michael

[stryd_one]

Yeh sorry but that is unacceptable :( a sad story indeed. It's a shame that m never found a way to express himself without resorting to anger :(