Stupid, stupid eBay

dorkbar

I've got a couple of auctions going, and some guy who hasn't been active for a year is high bidder on several, which set off the bells and whistles.

So I e-mailed him to tell him he's live again, if for no other reason than to possibly reach the real account holder to warn him in case some idiot's got a hold of his account.

I go through the process and send, and then I get the page with this on it:


Attention!
We have determined you are trying to contact an eBay member with whom you are not currently involved in an open transaction. For the protection of the eBay community, we sometimes block these types of communication. To prevent this occurrence from happening in the future, we recommend the following:

If you are a seller, respond to all bidder questions before the auction ends.

If you are trying to contact the seller of an item that has not yet ended go to the item page and click the “Ask seller a question” link.

If you are the winning buyer of an item go to your My eBay page under the items I’ve Won section. Click the action drop down menu and choose the “contact seller” action.

If you are a seller trying to contact your wining buyer, go to My eBay and under the Items I’ve Sold section, click the action drop down menu. Choose the “contact buyer” action.

Reply to seller/bidder through personal email provider (if the sender has not hidden their email address).

Thank you for your understanding.


What part of HE'S HIGH BIDDER ON A BUNCH OF MY AUCTIONS isn't open transaction? Am I being paranoid? Is eBay ever going to make changes to its site for the better instead of the worse?

Bochiman

I vote for paranoid.

commoncents05

trying sending the message again. i've had this pop on me before, but it went through after a couple of tries.

-Paul

notwilight

I've been frustrated by the same thing. I assume it is ebay keeping you from contacting him outside the ebay system so that you can't suggest taking the transaction off ebay thus losing ebay revenue.

goose3

if someone did indeed hijack his account....you are going to contact the real owner exactly how by emailing the account thru ebay?

you lost me there.

Musky1011

is it "gandbabies12"????

eagle7

I prefer to let EBAY worry about non payment. In other words, if the high bidder dont pay, EBAY will be notified and I will get my refund. They will then have to deal with the problem. I dont worry about bidders until they dont pay. JMHO.

notwilight

<< <i>if someone did indeed hijack his account....you are going to contact the real owner exactly how by emailing the account thru ebay? you lost me there. >>



An e-mail will go to the real owner's e-mail account. I have alerted two hijacked account owners that way. But not when e-bay blocks me. --Jerry

aficionado

I don't scrutinize the bidders on my auctions. I've had people with 0 feedback be great and people with 1000 feedback be a$$es. Sometimes you have to just let it ride and see what happens.

notwilight

<< <i>I don't scrutinize the bidders on my auctions. I've had people with 0 feedback be great and people with 1000 feedback be a$$es. Sometimes you have to just let it ride and see what happens. >>



Agree but I look before I ship to make sure it isn't a hijacked account.

dorkbar

What I'm worried about is payment followed by shipping followed by chargeback or whatever other nefarious plot might be dreamed up. I don't care if he's some idiot who doesn't pay; I can relist. I just don't want to lose the goods to a scumbag.

An e-mail will go to the real owner's e-mail account. I have alerted two hijacked account owners that way. But not when e-bay blocks me. --Jerry

What notwilight said.

Agree but I look before I ship to make sure it isn't a hijacked account.

And you do that how?

dorkbar

It's not gandbabies12, although I'm sure he's a perfectly good bad bidder, too.

Writersblock

<< <i>An e-mail will go to the real owner's e-mail account. I have alerted two hijacked account owners that way. But not when e-bay blocks me. --Jerry >>


Can't the person who hijacked the account change the email address, the shipping address, phone number etc?

Shamika

Is it common for a hijacked account to be bidding? I don't understand the advantage? Hijackers use an account to SELL items they don't own and then skip town with the money. Who cares as long as you get your money before you ship the item.

Or am I completely missing something here???

agentjim007

I made an offer on a coin and the seller sent me a message via my ebay messages asking how I would pay. When I hit the response button I got that same message. I had to reply through my email.