Ebay Scams (is this the right place to post)

mrichards

Hi Everyone,

In the past, I have noticed many scams on Ebay with sellers and false cards. I have never gotten taken myself, but I have known many people who did and it is terrible and I want to help. David Vargha and I cracked a case last year. David did most of the work, I just created the spark. I saw a seller about a month ago selling a card, which could not have been his. It had the usual common sense indicators. #1, it was a 52 Topps Mantle card in a PSA 8. #2, the guy had low feedback. #3 he did not take anything except a money order. #4 he had a very low reserve. I called ebay and spoke to my rep to no avail. She said he did not do anything wrong and unless she received multiple complaints, there was nothing she could do. She sent an email to safe harbor for them to check it out. Needless to say, a week later, the auction closed with a winning bidder. A month later, the seller was no longer a registered user and had -4 feedback. I want to try and stop this and let's (if anyone out there is interested), try to police it a little. This way, when something is listed that doesn't exist or is up in another auction (Yahoo for example); there can be a post to spread the word. What do you think? Do you think I am wasting my time with this one? I am tired of people getting beat by these deadbeat sellers. What is your opinion?

Good Night,
Mike

zardoz51

Mike

It is up to ebay to police their operation. To date they have done an absolutely outstanding job.......of doing nothing.

Ebay is pretty much a caveat emptor situation, just like real life. It would be impossible for an outside group to watchdog the huge marketplace. As altruistic as your idea sounds, actually finding people to act in this role, especially without compensation, would be a forlorn hope.

The obvious warning signs at present, money order only, low feedback, outstanding merchandise....ding ding ding! Red flags! I obtain a sort of diverse pleasure in emailing these "quality" sellers and inquiring as to their not objecting to the use of an escrow service at my expense. To date, not one reply.

I just do not waste my time pursuing these "bargains", he!!, i don't even bid if they want a money order only no matter how high their feedback (unless it is that rare occasion where the buy is an outright steal), but that is another topic of discussion.

metsfan

Mike:
A number of people have "policed" ebay. But like zardoz said,they should police themselves. There are too many scams for everyone to monitor. Just bid "smart" and you should be fine. Alerting others is fine. The Sports Card forum is a better place for this post.

Wayne

JeffVN

I admit it - I was had by a not quite so expensive scam on E-Bay. Low feedback seller pre-selling unopened Topps material for $500.00 a case. By the time the material came out, he was long gone. He eventually got nabbed and is currently doing some time in W.VA. All told, he gat about 50 people for between $10,000 and 25,000. But, I've not dealt with a low-feedback seller of un-opened material since.

E-Bay was no help. Nor was PayPal, who said his account had been closed. But, I was able to go after my credit card company because of the fraud (I had to file a ppooice report and fraud complaint with E-Bay and PayPal. All-in-all a huge pain in the ass, but I got my $$ back because of my tenacity and luck in using PayPal/credit card.

qualitycards

It seems that eBay does have watchdogs out there and many are on these boards. We paste links to eBay auctions where sellers are selling reprint Wagner T206's and claim they were given to them by their grandfather so they must be genuine, and others selling Mantle '52 reprints while pretending they are are original and so on... And due to this many of these auctions have been shut down....jay

mikeschmidt

Though I appreciate everyone's efforts -- and sometimes lend a helping hand -- sometimes I feel that if some people are *SO STUPID* that I no longer feel sorry for them. I mean, honestly, what educated collector will send out a money order for $10 - $25,000 for a fraudulent 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle PSA 8 to a seller with no or little feedback with inadequate scans, etc. I think if people are willing to send money out like that -- I just don't feel sorry for them. To some extent -- people need to educate themselves before they spend their money. A fool and his money are soon parted....