Selling coins on Ebay. I am Rod Serling, My customers are Billy Mumy!

coinmanic

I feel like I am in a famous Twilight Zone episode called "It's a Good Life" A six year old kid played by Billy Mumy has strange powers and can destroy anyone that ticks him off. Everyone he knows tiptoes around and nervously says nice things like "It's a wonderful day, Billy", in fear that they will be bumped off if they upset him.

With the current feedback system and new top seller requirements I am the now in that episode. "A slight scratch on the holder sir, I will dispatch a skilled tradesman with a buffer to your home". "The coin has a touch of toning, Sir. No problem, a Brinks truck will arrive at your door tomorrow morning for pick up with a Latte for you and flowers for your wife".

Yeeesh. I can't stand to much more of this.

savoyspecial

+1 for the rare Billy Mumy reference

MidLifeCrisis

Nice analogy.

This is one of the reasons I don't sell on eBay.

coinmanic

<< <i>+1 for the rare Billy Mumy reference >>



Thank you. Ebays new top seller program requires that you get no more than one, 1 or 2 star ratings per 200 sales. Impossible I believe and the shylocks at Ebay know that.

Mowgli

Billy is still around. I hope he isn't one of your customers.

adamlaneus

Use these incidents to improve your trade.

In your listing, include a sentence that states that the holder shows minor scratches, typical of any holder.

If a coin is toned, say so. Describe it.

Lots of this will become 'boilerplate'. Doing so should benefit you.

A cheerful, professional and experienced attitude is to your benefit.


Now, that said, please go into more details with some of these yobbos and yoaches that you have had to deal with. We like stories about bad eBay buyers. Please? Thanks!

GrumpyEd

You're a very bad man

highbidder1970

It was idiotic for ebay to block sellers from giving negs

coinmanic

Well Adam. Almost all of my transcactions go off flawlessly. I do not know though if it is possible to do a thousand transactions and not get five one or two scores. For example, the post office on occassion delays a package. If that happens ten times out of 200 sales and one of those ten buyers leaves me a 2 for shipping time, I am toast.

adamlaneus

Yes, eBay does indeed have a good handle on all of the statistics, and it is no mistake that they set the system the way they do.

I've had to coddle lots of folks where it took three weeks for a package to get through.

I think the best thing to do is simply build the expenses of the higher feer tier into your expectations. Getting into the top tier seems like a dramatic struggle that is not worthwhile.
Interesting; It's easy for numismatists to pi$$ money away in some directions, but not others.


Oh man, that Billy Mumy picture gives me the creeps!!! I'll be good. I promise. Here's a nice shiny gold coin for you!

coinmanic

Billy Mumy was cool. Sort of the Anti-Opie.

coinmanic

I do this for a living, Adam. The discount is important in this market. Having said that, Ebay has done some positive things which more than offset the lost discounts (though I have gotten the 20% discount the last several months). Most notable is the Ebay bucks which helps support prices and the 5 free listings which save me quite a bit of Gelt on high ticket coins.

This new system though seems impossible to attain.