Bonefish Blues
Banging donk
- Location
- 52 Festive Road
How are we finding the used market?
- Thread starter wafter
- Start date
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It's all good - doubt it'll be a quick and easy job and I'll be interested to see what you make of it when you do get round to it
That's fair - tbh I hate ebay but the Ofo has been on FB marketplace for weeks; with a bit of interest but no firm takers. Judging by the price others seem to be going for on ebay I think I have a reasonable chance of getting somewhere near what I want for it. Time will tell!
- Location
- London
Apologies if have asked before (have memory of a goldfish) , but can I ask why you hate the bay?
I have bought many bits on it, and also bought a bike (for all of £30!) - are you referring to selling on it?
Yes; my main issue is with selling. I was a fairly early adoptor of ebay and for years loved it as a seller.. however in more recent times I've had real issues with selling on there; mainly because of their increasingly heavy-handed, authoritarian approach to governing the site.
There are too many examples to remember or list, but despite the fact that I've always played by their rules (never ending auctions early / selling off-site etc) I've been stung by restrictions on listings and message content (such as emails and phone numbers), being forced to take Paypal on collected goods and take the hit on their fees despite requesting cash, losing money through having postage costs capped by their wildly inaccurate algorithm at below what it actually costs me, having listings pulled because they supposedly infringe their rules even when this clearly hasn't been the case.
I also lost a lot of faith in the site when they removed the ability for sellers to leave negative or neutral feedback for buyers - how the feck is that fair if you've been dicked about by an idiot buyer and have your hands tied regarding warning other people? It grossly unfairly stacks the odds in favour of the buyer and promotes dishonest behaviour on their part. In times when I've had cause to address these issues I've found the site staff at best unknowledgeable and unhelpful, at worst willfully obstructive, punitive, belligerent and confrontational.
I've also found the listings process has become increasingly restrictive, convoluted and difficult to navigate - I was perfectly happy entering all pertinent data manually, rather than having to wade through their dumbed down circus of limited multiple-choice options. Photos are another one; occasionally when I had a lot to list and was in a hurry to get the listings up at a preferential time (Sunday evening during a promotion, usually) I'd often leave out photos and add them the following day. Now you must have photos for the listing to go live, meaning more of my time wasted uploading and then replacing an arbitrary image.
Also, while the auction process can be good for maximising value on higher-priced goods (or in cases when you're unsure of value) in a lot of cases it just drags the process out un-necessarily.
As much as I dislike Facebook for all the usual reasons, I've generally had a fair bit of success selling on there recently - no fees, far less hassle to list, a broad audience and often quick turnarounds.
I really did love ebay for many years but after seemingly being repeatedly kicked in the balls every single time I've tried to sell on there in the past 2-3yrs I now avoid it like the plague. The only time I'll consider using it now is when there's a low/no fees promo on and I've exhausted every other possibility as I find the process frustrating, tiring and tbh while I was very happy for them to take their cut in the early days, now I bitterly resent giving them a penny of my money.
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OK, so I've just listed a couple of items on ebay and straight off the bat I encountered a litany of infuriating occurances like a shotgun blast to the face:
- I can't simply write a description and select an auction category, I have to enter keywords, let it make a selection for me, pick from a list of similar items then delete all the shite attached to them and replace it with my own prose. Evidently ebay doesn't trust its users' ability to write a simple ad.
- The site pushes me for detail in the item heading, but hides the description and by default simply repeats the heading in this section - surely that's where all the detail should be..?
- I got half way through writing a description and the page just completely lost it all and defaulted back to ebay's chosen one-line suggestion.
- The listing is constantly pushing / defaulting to irrelevant or detrimental "features" - no, I don't want to entertain offers of half my starting bid. No, I don't want to offer your recommended postage of £3 Second Class of a f*cking 17 kilogram bicycle.
- Despite the fact that ebay no longer own Paypal, it's still present as a non-negotiable, de-facto form of payment.
- The listing won't publish unless I enter my full postcode; that feature must be well-loved by those with expensive, stealable items for sale.
In the old days it was simple: Write a title and description, choose a category, bang in some photos; done. I could have achieved the whole process far more quickly, efficiently and with far less stress had the site not seen fit to lead me by the nose through a load of questionable / pointless / detremental options like some developmentally challenged child.
Every time I list something on ebay I swear it'll be the last.. I'll update when some petulant jobsworth inevitably pulls my listing or otherwise p*sses in my cornflakes for some minor infraction I've no doubt committed somewhere along the line
- I can't simply write a description and select an auction category, I have to enter keywords, let it make a selection for me, pick from a list of similar items then delete all the shite attached to them and replace it with my own prose. Evidently ebay doesn't trust its users' ability to write a simple ad.
- The site pushes me for detail in the item heading, but hides the description and by default simply repeats the heading in this section - surely that's where all the detail should be..?
- I got half way through writing a description and the page just completely lost it all and defaulted back to ebay's chosen one-line suggestion.
- The listing is constantly pushing / defaulting to irrelevant or detrimental "features" - no, I don't want to entertain offers of half my starting bid. No, I don't want to offer your recommended postage of £3 Second Class of a f*cking 17 kilogram bicycle.
- Despite the fact that ebay no longer own Paypal, it's still present as a non-negotiable, de-facto form of payment.
- The listing won't publish unless I enter my full postcode; that feature must be well-loved by those with expensive, stealable items for sale.
In the old days it was simple: Write a title and description, choose a category, bang in some photos; done. I could have achieved the whole process far more quickly, efficiently and with far less stress had the site not seen fit to lead me by the nose through a load of questionable / pointless / detremental options like some developmentally challenged child.
Every time I list something on ebay I swear it'll be the last.. I'll update when some petulant jobsworth inevitably pulls my listing or otherwise p*sses in my cornflakes for some minor infraction I've no doubt committed somewhere along the line
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Bonefish Blues
Banging donk
- Location
- 52 Festive Road
OTOH despite the pain I've already sold my Cinder Cone and have an offer pending on the Sutra.
Bonefish Blues
Banging donk
- Location
- 52 Festive Road
... and whilst typing the Sutra has sold too. 6 weeks accum. on 3 cycling sites and some minor tyre-kicking vs less than 24 hours on eBay and they both sold.
The ofo has sold for £72 (assuming the deal completes) which is a little less than I'd hoped for but better than a kick in the spuds.
As an aside; ebay seller irritation No. 35,365: listed another item at the same time which didn't sell. Declined numerous coercive ebay suggestions during the original listing; lo and behold it's been automatically re-listed and the new one is now inviting offers, which I specifically declined on the original listing. And it won't let me remove the feature. Absolute tossers
As an aside; ebay seller irritation No. 35,365: listed another item at the same time which didn't sell. Declined numerous coercive ebay suggestions during the original listing; lo and behold it's been automatically re-listed and the new one is now inviting offers, which I specifically declined on the original listing. And it won't let me remove the feature. Absolute tossers
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- Location
- London
This might explain something. I have sometimes seen ads which appear to invite offers and made offers near the full price which weren't even replied to, whereas i would expect a counter offer suggestion at least. Was left wondering why they invited offers. Maybe they hadn't really.The ofo has sold for £72 (assuming the deal completes) which is a little less than I'd hoped for but better than a kick in the spuds.
As an aside; ebay seller irritation No. 35,365: listed another item at the same time which didn't sell. Declined numerous coercive ebay suggestions during the original listing; lo and behold it's been automatically re-listed and the new listing is now inviting offers, which I specifically declined on the original listing. Tossers
Bonefish Blues
Banging donk
- Location
- 52 Festive Road
Silly story about daft seller who might be me. Decided it would be just as easy to chuck the Cinder Cone in the family bus and drive it down to the buyer who is in Bethnal Green. I don't sleep in on a Saturday anyway, and it wouldn't take long, and the delivery charge would cover fuel and pay me about £3 an hour!
Idiot amateurish delivery driver was distracted by a lorry doing something daft and wandered about 75 metres into the ULEZ/Congestion Charge Zone. That'll be£27.50 sir. I'll not be taking it up as a profession, methinks!
Idiot amateurish delivery driver was distracted by a lorry doing something daft and wandered about 75 metres into the ULEZ/Congestion Charge Zone. That'll be£27.50 sir. I'll not be taking it up as a profession, methinks!
Sounds entirely likely - I only found out when I got an offer out of the blue. I've now revised the ad to state in the description that I won't entertain offers below the starting price, but I doubt anyone will read that. You see what I mean about their constant coercian - obviously it's in their interest that the item sells for something rather than fails to sell at all, so everything is geared towards achieving this despite the seller's wishes potentially being to the contrary.
Yet another negative experience to chuck on the growing list and further incentive to never sell on the sodding site again; I used to respect ebay's rules but if I get any interest in this item now I'll end the listing and finish the transaction off-site to avoid the fees.. which are something else that's been quietly reinstated with automatic / unsanctioned re-listing, after the original was listed during a promotion
Man, that sucks and would have made me very, very angry!
Bonefish Blues
Banging donk
- Location
- 52 Festive Road
It did for a while - but then it just becomes a(nother) silly episode, and entirely my own fault
- Location
- London
Automatic/unsanctioned relisting? Can't you stop this? If not, that sounds akin to theft by ebay of your stuff.Sounds entirely likely - I only found out when I got an offer out of the blue. I've now revised the ad to state in the description that I won't entertain offers below the starting price, but I doubt anyone will read that. You see what I mean about their constant coercian - obviously it's in their interest that the item sells for something rather than fails to sell at all, so everything is geared towards achieving this despite the seller's wishes potentially being to the contrary.
Yet another negative experience to chuck on the growing list and further incentive to never sell on the sodding site again; I used to respect ebay's rules but if I get any interest in this item now I'll end the listing and finish the transaction off-site to avoid the fees.. which are something else that's been quietly reinstated with automatic / unsanctioned re-listing, after the original was listed during a promotion
As for completing deals off-site, won't you be banned for this?
In any case how would you and the potential buyer make contact under the ebay radar?
