Sometimes I wonder if Ebay is worth the "savings"

[airplanemechanic]

I have been an Ebay member for 18 years. I have almost 500 feedbacks, almost all as a buyer, all 100% positive. I've had a few issues with sellers in the past but thats to be expected. Overall, it hasn't been bad.

Now it sucks.

I'm a long haul truck driver and so I'm only home ever so often. When I need something for the truck, if I don't want to pay ridiculous truck stop prices, I order it online and get it when I get back home. Well I happened to have ordered a 3 dollar audio cable that I needed to hook my phone up to my radio so I can stream music while I drive. I knew I hadn't seen it when I was home and so I checked the tracking, it actually showed as delivered to my front door on a day I was home!! So I knew this wasn't right for a few reasons:

1. I live out in the boonies. My mail lady is a woman who rides around in an unmarked Jeep Liberty. I know for a fact that she doesn't leave anything at my front door because it's open to the street and she always puts "left under carport" because that's where she leaves things for me.

2. Being home that day, I know that nobody showed up at my door because I would have known. Being out in the country, I never get anyone at my door so I know if anyone is there.

3. I had this problem before. I had ordered something (don't remember what it was, it was a few years ago) and it showed as delivered to my house when you tracked it. I knew I didn't receive it and they wanted to close the case because the tracking showed delivered to my house. I had to call UPS and initiate a route track on this package, and come to find out, I was delivered to a home in Michigan (I live in south Louisiana) yet showed delivered to my house.

So based on the tracking info, Ebay has closed the case. It's not the money, it's the fact that I will go another month without the audio cable I need because now I need to order another one and it won't be here in time before I return home and leave out again. Either that, or buy the same cable from a brick and mortar store for about 12 dollars plus tax.

I guess Ebay is stuck, I say I didn't get it, the tracking says I did, but with 100% positive feedback in almost 20 years on Ebay and this being one of the cheapest things I ever purchased, why would I go through all this trouble if I really received the stupid audio cable? I mean, c'mon.

 

[DarkFury]

Wal-Mart now ships most items to your home for free. I expect them to be taking a chunk out of eBay soon.

 

[airplanemechanic]

Not yet, you have to spend so much to get free shipping to the home.

And my experience with UPS recently was not much better.

I needed a new laptop (new to me anyway) for the truck to do my routing on. I ordered it, and saw it was coming to my local sort facility the day before I would be gone for this weeks long trip. I drive all the way there and the lady tells me some bull crap about it was not a real scan showing that it arrived. Well, I call UPS and she tells me that it's there, but it's still in the shipping palette and it was not broken down yet so they can't get to it. I was IN THE SAME BUILDING as my laptop and they would not let me have it. I have had to fight an old laptop I have for weeks. It was delivered the day I had to leave. About 5 hours after I was gone.

 

[Kat]

I do not trust EBay. I have been burned by them more than once.

 

[JustAnotherNut]

Wal-Mart now ships most items to your home for free. I expect them to be taking a chunk out of eBay soon.

Be careful about ordering from Walmart site......much of the stuff is not theirs. They sell on behalf of other companies.....similar to Amazon. They don't have the stuff in their own warehouse.

I had ordered some items that I had thought were a bulk purchase, but come to find out it was each. Walmart wouldn't do anything about it because it wasn't their product, even though I had bought it from their site. I did get it straightened out with the other company, but I won't buy online from Walmart again.

 

[strollingbones]

first word of advice...use paypal....to pay for this stuff....then you can recover money lost on bad deals...at one time i sold/purchased on ebay...then they changed the prices...you had to sell a product for over 10 bucks to even start to make money...then they changed the rules so buyers could leave negative feedback but sellers cant? wtf? i have gotten excellent deals off ebay and outta over 500 transactions....i have gotten flat out ripped off maybe twice...now with facebook setting up local yard sales sites...i rarely use ebay...i am very careful on amazon read all the reviews

 

[Fueri]

I used to eBay a lot, but had the same issues. Customer service ucks, claims process sucks. PayPal isn't any better.

Now it's amazon for most of my stuff.

Their customer service has been very good. I've also had them eat charges on items without blinking at 100+ dollar items and not even want them back.

Bundle your buys and delivery is free or pay for prime and it's always free.


Amazon also has a Dropbox/locker system of some kind, whereby you can have have your items delivered to these sites and then pick them up. I havent used it, but maybe for someone on the road it might be handy....

 

[strollingbones]

always check the prices when you buy from amazon.....i can find pretty much the same or lower prices elsewhere and most places have free shipping with a low amount of purchase...if i need it fast however i go to amazon

 

[Fueri]

always check the prices when you buy from amazon.....i can find pretty much the same or lower prices elsewhere and most places have free shipping with a low amount of purchase...if i need it fast however i go to amazon

True. There's a widget/app that will do some of that automatically for you also. If I remember when I get on my laptop I'll post it.

 

[Fueri]

here it is. sometimes it finds stuff, sometimes it doesn't and obviously I don't expect it to be a comprehensive search tool that finds every deal available out there, but it's quick and easy for a fast price check/comparison.

PriceJump | Amazon Price Check & Comparison Tool

 

[Ringel05]

Wal-Mart now ships most items to your home for free. I expect them to be taking a chunk out of eBay soon.

Be careful about ordering from Walmart site......much of the stuff is not theirs. They sell on behalf of other companies.....similar to Amazon. They don't have the stuff in their own warehouse.

I had ordered some items that I had thought were a bulk purchase, but come to find out it was each. Walmart wouldn't do anything about it because it wasn't their product, even though I had bought it from their site. I did get it straightened out with the other company, but I won't buy online from Walmart again.

When you order, if you actually read the item/order pages it will tel you whether it's from Walmart or a vendor and that you have to deal with the vendor if there's a problem. It's not hard to figure out if you actually read, if you want to see who's to blame for that screw up you only need look in the closest mirror.

 

[Moonglow]

Ebay was okay until they allowed the stores to take over..

 

[danielpalos]

I have been an Ebay member for 18 years. I have almost 500 feedbacks, almost all as a buyer, all 100% positive. I've had a few issues with sellers in the past but thats to be expected. Overall, it hasn't been bad.

Now it sucks.

I'm a long haul truck driver and so I'm only home ever so often. When I need something for the truck, if I don't want to pay ridiculous truck stop prices, I order it online and get it when I get back home. Well I happened to have ordered a 3 dollar audio cable that I needed to hook my phone up to my radio so I can stream music while I drive. I knew I hadn't seen it when I was home and so I checked the tracking, it actually showed as delivered to my front door on a day I was home!! So I knew this wasn't right for a few reasons:

1. I live out in the boonies. My mail lady is a woman who rides around in an unmarked Jeep Liberty. I know for a fact that she doesn't leave anything at my front door because it's open to the street and she always puts "left under carport" because that's where she leaves things for me.

2. Being home that day, I know that nobody showed up at my door because I would have known. Being out in the country, I never get anyone at my door so I know if anyone is there.

3. I had this problem before. I had ordered something (don't remember what it was, it was a few years ago) and it showed as delivered to my house when you tracked it. I knew I didn't receive it and they wanted to close the case because the tracking showed delivered to my house. I had to call UPS and initiate a route track on this package, and come to find out, I was delivered to a home in Michigan (I live in south Louisiana) yet showed delivered to my house.

So based on the tracking info, Ebay has closed the case. It's not the money, it's the fact that I will go another month without the audio cable I need because now I need to order another one and it won't be here in time before I return home and leave out again. Either that, or buy the same cable from a brick and mortar store for about 12 dollars plus tax.

I guess Ebay is stuck, I say I didn't get it, the tracking says I did, but with 100% positive feedback in almost 20 years on Ebay and this being one of the cheapest things I ever purchased, why would I go through all this trouble if I really received the stupid audio cable? I mean, c'mon.

how about JC Whitney? Automotive specialty may be better.

 

[airplanemechanic]

I've bought stuff from them, but usually their prices aren't the best.

And paypal won't help with this transaction. Ebay says I got it so it's done. Problem is, I never got it.

 

[edthecynic]

So based on the tracking info, Ebay has closed the case. It's not the money, it's the fact that I will go another month without the audio cable I need because now I need to order another one and it won't be here in time before I return home and leave out again. Either that, or buy the same cable from a brick and mortar store for about 12 dollars plus tax.

I guess Ebay is stuck, I say I didn't get it, the tracking says I did, but with 100% positive feedback in almost 20 years on Ebay and this being one of the cheapest things I ever purchased, why would I go through all this trouble if I really received the stupid audio cable? I mean, c'mon.

I had the same thing happen to me, but I used the time of delivery to show that the carrier delivered it to the wrong address. My mail is usually delivered before noon and the package was delivered after 4 PM. The PO tracks where the carriers are during the day and at 4 PM the carrier was in another part of town. When I gave eBay that extra info, they made the seller refund my money because the seller is responsible for the carrier they choose.

If eBay will not reopen it, PayPal might and as a last resort your credit card company can challenge it.

 

[JustAnotherNut]

Wal-Mart now ships most items to your home for free. I expect them to be taking a chunk out of eBay soon.

Be careful about ordering from Walmart site......much of the stuff is not theirs. They sell on behalf of other companies.....similar to Amazon. They don't have the stuff in their own warehouse.

I had ordered some items that I had thought were a bulk purchase, but come to find out it was each. Walmart wouldn't do anything about it because it wasn't their product, even though I had bought it from their site. I did get it straightened out with the other company, but I won't buy online from Walmart again.

When you order, if you actually read the item/order pages it will tel you whether it's from Walmart or a vendor and that you have to deal with the vendor if there's a problem. It's not hard to figure out if you actually read, if you want to see who's to blame for that screw up you only need look in the closest mirror.

Yes, thank you so very much for your assessment. Since I don't buy online very often, it's usually from the company site directly. This was the first time I had ordered from Walmart site.......lesson learned.

 

[IsaacNewton]

I have been an Ebay member for 18 years. I have almost 500 feedbacks, almost all as a buyer, all 100% positive. I've had a few issues with sellers in the past but thats to be expected. Overall, it hasn't been bad.

Now it sucks.

I'm a long haul truck driver and so I'm only home ever so often. When I need something for the truck, if I don't want to pay ridiculous truck stop prices, I order it online and get it when I get back home. Well I happened to have ordered a 3 dollar audio cable that I needed to hook my phone up to my radio so I can stream music while I drive. I knew I hadn't seen it when I was home and so I checked the tracking, it actually showed as delivered to my front door on a day I was home!! So I knew this wasn't right for a few reasons:

1. I live out in the boonies. My mail lady is a woman who rides around in an unmarked Jeep Liberty. I know for a fact that she doesn't leave anything at my front door because it's open to the street and she always puts "left under carport" because that's where she leaves things for me.

2. Being home that day, I know that nobody showed up at my door because I would have known. Being out in the country, I never get anyone at my door so I know if anyone is there.

3. I had this problem before. I had ordered something (don't remember what it was, it was a few years ago) and it showed as delivered to my house when you tracked it. I knew I didn't receive it and they wanted to close the case because the tracking showed delivered to my house. I had to call UPS and initiate a route track on this package, and come to find out, I was delivered to a home in Michigan (I live in south Louisiana) yet showed delivered to my house.

So based on the tracking info, Ebay has closed the case. It's not the money, it's the fact that I will go another month without the audio cable I need because now I need to order another one and it won't be here in time before I return home and leave out again. Either that, or buy the same cable from a brick and mortar store for about 12 dollars plus tax.

I guess Ebay is stuck, I say I didn't get it, the tracking says I did, but with 100% positive feedback in almost 20 years on Ebay and this being one of the cheapest things I ever purchased, why would I go through all this trouble if I really received the stupid audio cable? I mean, c'mon.

This whole post because of 9 bucks? Just go buy one wth. At some point in every life there comes a time when you decide which battles should be fought and which ones are not worth even the time out of your life to THINK about the issue. $9.00? And you spent time posting this rant here.

Dig up one of your retirement coffee cans and pull $12 out and be done.

 

[TheGreatGatsby]

My problem with Ebay is twofold.

1. They just outright close my account if I don't use it for a year. (I don't want to have to make a new account every time I want to buy something).
2. As a seller, it costs a lot to put anything on there; and you don't get your money back if the item doesn't sell. Basically, if you're not selling big ticket items, forget about it.

 

[TheGreatGatsby]

My problem with Ebay is twofold.

1. They just outright close my account if I don't use it for a year. (I don't want to have to make a new account every time I want to buy something).
2. As a seller, it costs a lot to put anything on there; and you don't get your money back if the item doesn't sell. Basically, if you're not selling big ticket items, forget about it.

And I'd throw out a third issue, that their company paypal is too involved in politics and bad business practices. I haven't closed my paypal account just yet though.

 

[strollingbones]

moon is right all that cheap chinese shit is all over ebay and amazon