eBay

aosmotorsportseast · ‎08-30-2023

I've been an ebay member since the beginning and just recently I have notice an increase in fraudulent returns. I Sell used powersoprts parts for the last fourteen years. And always build my listings with the year make, and models of machines, that the part will fit as well as the manufactures oem part number. I also use high quality pictures. I've had an increase of buyers returning parts stating that they don't fit their machine. when I ask them what year make and model of machine they are working 95% of the time it's a totally different machine and their machine is no where listed in my listing. Or I simply get guys opening a returning stating that it does fit or not described, but when I get the return back the part was never unpackage. I have already contacted ebay support over the course of these returns and I get a different answer everytime. They suggested to report the buyer and I have under the buyer made false claims. I've also have had guys return their old broken parts or my part after they used it for 3 weeks. For those returns I used the % of feature that we are able to use. I thought I was following ebay's seller protection guidelines ,but ebay has suspended my Seller protections for 90 day? anybody have any suggestions

gurlcat · ‎08-30-2023

It appears that only some of your items are Free Returns; others just say Returns Accepted (which I believe means the buyer would have to pay return shipping if it was their own fault for picking the wrong size/model etc.) -correct?
Ebay Seller Protection applies only to items with absolutely Free Returns regardless of reason.
What's troubling is, looking at your listings, your most expensive items are the ones without Free Returns, and I get why that seems logical (the more you have to refund, the more painful it is). But it's actually the biggest losses that you want that protection for.
Consider this item. If I wanted to right now I could buy it, receive it, then file a chargeback with my credit card, saying you sent me rusted junk ..... and they would almost certainly side with me. Then Ebay would take the funds from your account to pay the CC, to put back on my card as available funds. And BAM, I would have me the post bearing and seal for my Monte Carlo ... or have one to sell to someone else.
BUT if you had offered Free Returns for it ..... I would still likely win my dispute and get this item for free, but EBAY would pay my credit card, not you. That is what you get for doing exactly what Ebay recommends.

aosmotorsportseast · ‎08-30-2023

LOL thanks for pointing out a misprint on my price in one listing it's being fixed as we speak. As for the return policy, all my listings had free returns until today when Ebay suspended my seller protections for 90 days. Lost total faith in it and slowly change them to just regular 30 day returns. But hey thanks for your criticism! and not really following the discussion topic of "anybody else seeing an up tick in buyer return fraud".

Anonymous · ‎08-30-2023

Sure do and I also seen increase in buyers demanding money back and threatened to open a case if I say no. Seems more and more buyers are unethical and Ebay encourages these actions

gurlcat · ‎08-30-2023

@aosmotorsportseast wrote:
LOL thanks for pointing out a misprint on my price in one listing it's being fixed as we speak. As for the return policy, all my listings had free returns until today when Ebay suspended my seller protections for 90 days. Lost total faith in it and slowly change them to just regular 30 day returns. But hey thanks for your criticism! and not really following the discussion topic of "anybody else seeing an up tick in buyer return fraud".

I was not criticizing you -I was trying to help because SO MANY sellers don't know how risky it is not to accept returns or make buyers pay for them. Lo and behold, you're one of the few who actually 'gets' it, but you've changed your policy on some listings for a specific reason (which I'm not sure is logical, but regardless, I had no way of knowing before you explained that).

So to strictly answer your question, no I haven't had an "up tick" in buyer return fraud. But I can just about predict the array of other replies you're going to get, "YES! EBAY IS ALL ONE BIG SCAM, TOTALLY OUT OF CONTROL NOWADAYS, NOT LIKE 2000 WHEN I STARTED HERE" etc etc. etc.

If that's what you want to see, I'm sure you'll be very happy with what you'll get.

aosmotorsportseast · ‎08-30-2023

Yeah It's been nuts it just seems like the last two years have started to get real bad. I thought I was going crazy, thinking I was doing something wrong. I just change my return policy back to buyers pay for the return hoping that my curb some of the low quality buyers from buying from me.

aosmotorsportseast · ‎08-30-2023

Yes I 've had my fare share of chargebacks from buyers and yes ebay covered them under the seller protection and it's great, but when ebay slams us sellers for trying to protect our business's and feed our families and strips us of those protections because some Algorithm flags your account and suspends the seller protections without investigating the circumstances of the use of said seller protection, there is something fundamentally wrong. As for the logic of My return policy being changed to "Buyer Pays for the Return vs Free Returns" I'v lost the only protection I had. So why would I want to be a target for the scammers and pay return shipping without any benefits? Beside tread of Free returns is actually reverting back to the buyer pays for return shipping within the retail community, because of the huge loses the retailers have been seeing of the free return policies.

gurlcat · ‎08-30-2023

How many times (lets say in the past year) have you used the protection of refunding less than 100% of the sale amount? -No, I'm not poised to pounce on you with "A-HA! You shouldn't have done it so much!" I'm just curious to know how much usage of that perk it takes to lose the protection.

edit: Also how many chargebacks have they covered for you in the past year?

aosmotorsportseast · ‎08-30-2023

I have had 3 buyers send back their old parts and kept my good part and 2 empty boxers

aosmotorsportseast · ‎08-30-2023

sorry in the last month alone

gurlcat · ‎08-30-2023

@aosmotorsportseast wrote:
sorry in the last month alone

HOLY COW. So, I don't know what your rate of that was before the "up tick" but that's insane. Have you noticed any trends with the people doing this, like if they could possibly be just one or two people using multiple accounts (like if it's happening with parts for the same make/models, as in somebody figured out a way to fix up his daddy's old ______ "for free" or whatever)?

I know zilch about selling auto parts on Ebay so I don't know how unusual it is to get that kind of return scam, but @zamo-zuan might be able to shed some light on how common/uncommon it is with his store, and maybe has some tips on prophylactic measures you can take, beyond your return policy.

As for Ebay cutting off your protection, it doesn't sound like you're taking it personally, but just in case you kinda are, what it reminds me of is when insurance companies drop a customer for too many accidents even if none of them were their own fault, or drop thousands of homeowners overnight because of a decision that their region has become too prone to natural disasters. It sounds like Ebay has just decided that for whatever reason, your parts store has become too prone to scam buyers. But I get how the logic of that probably doesn't help the frustration and sudden sense of vulnerability with it.

Would you mind sharing a copy-paste of what their notification said?

aosmotorsportseast · ‎08-30-2023

This what they sent me today with no explanation of why my seller protection was suspended I called ebay support and they refused to tell why also. I've seen this tread slowly increase for the last three years. I have used the same format in my listing for the last 14 years the only thing that I had changed was going for buyers pay for return shipping to free returns within the last 5 years. and it really has been a nightmare. that it I I'm switching back to buyers pay for return shipping. Also I dropped the promoted listings this last month because aI did a comparison with one of my other stores with the same Items and found that there was really no benefits. running promoted listings. Yes I'm frustrated because I've spent 14 years building my reputation My feedback on this platform just to have it smeared Low quality ebay Buyers. It's all good because this is just on platform I use.

Activity on your account didn't follow our Seller protections abuse policy.

What activity didn't follow the policy

More specific details are provided below.

What you need to do next

Activity on your account indicates that you are misusing seller protections. In order to follow this policy, you must:
- Only report buyers who falsely claim that an item was not as described
- Give full refunds on all returns unless the buyer used or damaged the item
- When giving a partial refund, only deduct the value that was lost due to use or damage caused by the buyer

What is the policy

You may not misuse seller protections. Such misuse includes:
- Giving partial refunds in situations other than when a buyer returns an item after they have used or damaged it
- When giving a partial refund, deducting amounts in excess of the value lost due to use or damage caused by the buyer
- Requesting a credit for return shipping where the buyer has submitted a legitimate claim that the item was not as described

How this affects your account

We previously informed you that continually not following this policy could result in a loss of protections.

As a result, you are no longer eligible to receive seller protections for the next 90 days. This means that you will not be able to:
- Give partial refunds when items are returned used or damaged by the buyer
- Receive return shipping credits when buyers falsely claim an item was not as described

After 90 days have passed, your seller protections will be reinstated provided you follow the policy. If you continue to misuse seller protections in the future, you risk losing protections indefinitely.

Why we have this policy

Seller protections help maintain a fair and safe marketplace for all our members. When sellers misuse these protections, this creates bad experiences for buyers and limits our ability to provide protections.

aosmotorsportseast · ‎08-30-2023

Sorry should have edited before I posted. that's what I get for being over tired

blkrsx-s_az · ‎09-01-2023

I've been scammed recently by a return even when I had "no returns accepted" on. Ebay will rule in the favor of the buyer as long as they provide some proof of shipping. It can be an empty box and there's nothing you can do. Ebay did not help me and I was out $500. Really hate selling on ebay and wish there were alternatives to our current options

mrmacmania · ‎10-02-2023

We just received the same message. Again we also sell parts and we have been abused and stung sooo many times by fraudulent returns. eBay will never favour the seller and always favour the buyer and in these cases rather than taking a 50% hit like we have done in the past, we are now expected to take 100% hit when somebody next fraudulently decides to mess around with our returns. I have provided images and reasons with every single return and still they have removed our seller protection rights for 90 days. We pay 15% of all money earned to ebay and still there is no justification to why they aren't protecting us as sellers.

I am just so fed up of selling here, the amount of stress that eBay and eBay customers give you are unreal and when it comes to getting help from eBay, they are never ever able to actually help.

Just a thought, are we able to create secondary accounts to get around this? or has eBay also said that you aren't able to do this too.