Now I Remember Why I Quit the Hobby: Ebay
jskirwin
Posts: 700 ✭✭✭
I came back to the hobby of sportscard collecting about 6 weeks ago after a 12 year hiatus. Our kid has joined the Navy so the Wife and I are beginning the downsizing exercise that middle aged people do after their nest empties. Part of that has been to pull out my collection of 70's baseball sets, refocus it, and finish it selling off the excess. That way I figure when grandkids come around they'll have something nice or (more likely) I can sell it off easily and give them the cash to buy them hover boards and jet packs.
Selling on Ebay is such a pain in the butt and has become even more so. I've been on Ebay since they gave me a $5 Paypal credit to buy stuff there in 1999. In that time I've had 2 incidents with buyers, and I just give them what they want. In one case I gave them a full refund and let them keep $80 worth of hockey cards because I didn't want the hassle of handling the return and relisting.
Last night I came back from the hospital after the wife had emergency surgery only to find a buyer had given me my first ever neg in 18 years of buying and selling on Ebay. He doesn't message me. He doesn't ask for a return. He just negs me.
My wife is going to be fine, but I had spoken to a nice gentleman in the OR waiting room whose 33 year old daughter was in surgery for a brain aneurysm. I come home to try to relax after unexpectedly spending most of the day in the hospital only to find some @sshat dings me over 40 year old pictures of men. It kept the neg in perspective.
Collecting ancient coins is my active hobby, and thanks to the plethora of online auction houses and Vcoins.com I can avoid Ebay, which is rife with sellers of counterfeits no matter how many times they are reported by ancient collectors.
But for sportscards Ebay is the only game in town. I've seen people talking about Etsy and Amazon just as 12 years ago they were talking about Ubid and other potential Ebay-killers that never scratched the monopoly. Over the past 20 years I've watched them tighten the screws of sellers, making it impossible for all but a few giants to make any money.
I don't sell on Ebay to make money. In fact I buy much more than I sell. **All I'm trying to do is what I did as a kid: trade what I've got for what I need. **I'm a collector so I treat my buyers the way I want to be treated. Most of the time it works, but there's always that one buyer who just bullies you - and Ebay does nothing to protect you. Worse they inevitably side with the bully because in any dispute "the buyer is always right."
Of course if Ebay really cared about the buyer they would take a zero tolerance stance towards counterfeits, but they don't. So the sellers who need to be shut down continue to flourish while honest sellers get screwed. Here's an example where several ancient authorities have attempted to shut down a seller of fake Chinese coins but he continues to do business.
Ebay is in business to make money for their shareholders. I get that. But monopolies are to free markets what ticks are to dogs. They need to be crushed.
Anyway, 22 cards left and I'll go back to my hidey hole of denarii, bronze ases _and imperial _consecratios. I hope the sportscard collecting hobby eventually finds a way to thrive without Ebay but until then I guess it'll keep hobbling along.
Comments
I think you worry too much over eBay, especially as you're just looking to move a few items, not earn a living off of it. Let it slide off your back -- glad your wife is going to be OK.
As to how to deal with scammers on eBay; keep your blocked bidder list well up-to-date; offer free shipping (I consider it cost of moving stuff; note I'm an occasional seller too, not trying to earn a living on the bay) -- send through eBay's shipping and labeling and tracking -- USA only, no foreign buyers. Pack extremely well, ship fast, with sig confirmation and insurance. Hope for the best. So far, so good; a dozen ish sales, small to medium collectibles sales.
Unfortunate situation, it hurts, but you've got to move on. One Neg for a long time like you won't hurt. Provide a response to the neg. and go back to enjoying the hobby for you. Don't let eBay and a knucklehead take the life out of the hobby.
When I first read this I thought this could be me. I left a very rare neutral FB just yesterday. Got a nice card for a great price in a GAI holder. eBay indicated card shipped, but no tracking number - it happens occasionally. Well, card never shows up, I finally contact seller and immediately receive a refund with a snarky reply. Obviously, the seller didn't like the price the card went for and never shipped it. Anyway, I digress.
Glad you got your $ back, if not the card. Similar thing happened to me once winning an auction "too cheap" for a nice comic -- apparently the seller thought so too, as he just immediately returned my payment rather than send the comic! Sigh.
Have some thick skin. A neg is a badge of honor. Focus on family and move on. Ebay is cheaper than brick and mortar and has a larger market. No need to go nuclear for one moron with a bad Outlook about your transaction.
A few yrs ago I sold a graded 1961 Post baseball card for $25. A few weeks later I get a message from the buyer saying he sent the card to PSA, and Psa wouldn't give him the grade he wanted. So then the knucklehead goes ahead and negs me, even though I offered him a full refund upon return. Lots of idiots out there.
IT CAN'T BE A TRUE PLAYOFF UNLESS THE BIG TEN CHAMPIONS ARE INCLUDED
You can never quit the hobby. The hobby will quit you.
I feel you.
A buyer is currently scamming me for $60.
CDsNuts, 1/9/15
Thanks for the comments. The hobby will survive but honestly, being away from it for 12 years gave me an some perspective on it.
Yes Ebay is cheaper than bricks & mortar, but for how long? They've been squeezing sellers for years. A search on Google finds whining and bellyaching about Ebay going back 20 years.
What's good for Ebay is not necessarily good for the hobby. Free listings spam searches. Ebay's condoning of counterfeiting is good for Ebay, but I've seen it kill people's interest in ancients. At least we have alternate markets there like Numisbids.com and Vcoins.com.
Didn't BBCE start out selling raw and graded cards? I seem to recall they attempted to fill the card trading nitch that Ebay has monopolized for so long. Now it appears to sell only vintage unopened.
Vcoins.com is a seller-run market for coins. Prices are higher there than you might get in an auction, but all sellers guarantee their coins and subscribe to a code of ethics. Plus there are hundreds of sellers so they end up competing with one another.
I think that's what the hobby needs.
What's he doing?
Yes, ebay is cheap. If 10% squeezes you, then may be quitting ebay is the answer. Few other markets have overhead less than 20%
JSK/- cards are cardboard. Glad your wife is ok
Bowman Baseball -1948-1955
Fleer Baseball-1923, 1959-2007
Al
Maybe I've been lucky - I've had thousands of eBay transactions, as a seller and a buyer. Had one negative: I left a seller a negative and they did the same to me (back in the days when sellers could leave negatives).
What was the negative for? Card(s) not to the buyers liking? Can you link the eBay sale?
We're not collecting pictures of men....we're preserving sports history. Big Difference!!!!
Are you quoting Brokeback?
Successful card BST transactions with cbcnow, brogurt, gstarling, Bravesfan 007, and rajah 424.
Just because of a neg on ebay? Negs are meaningless.
Ahhhh, so this is what you tell your wife!
I actually like that, the preserving history thing.
Also agree with sportscardtheory. A negative ain't what it used to be. OP, I agree that eBay sucks now and has sucked for the past few years (higher fees, all BINs, etc.), but I would hardly let it taint your enjoyment of this great hobby.
eBay may suck, but you still have the cards!
I wish I knew.
You can't please everybody.Some buyers expect their item yesterday.Ebay is a disaster for small sellers if they even let you list anything.I've been waiting for months and always see $0 left and 0 items this month.Amazon is just as bad and won't pay you for up to whenever they feel like it.Etsy has to be hand made items or you have to go to creative ways to avoid it.The most important thing in everything written is that your wife and the other person are both going to be ok.Everything else doesn't matter.
BST references several
'Ebay is a disaster for small sellers if they even let you list anything.'
Correct. Depending on what email you use, ebay only allows new sellers to list 5-10 items a month. And a $500 limit combined for all your items. And it takes months, up to 6 months to get a higher selling limit. On top of that nonsense, whatever you do sell, the buyers wont leave any feedback. So trying to build seller feedback keeps getting more difficult, and ebay does absolutely nothing about it.
IT CAN'T BE A TRUE PLAYOFF UNLESS THE BIG TEN CHAMPIONS ARE INCLUDED
Ebay has been a savior for the hobby.
Never have individual collectors had such transparancy and access to sportscards.
As for selling...try selling any cards at a show or at your local B&M. Best in the game in LA was always Burbank Sportscards. You could get 50% or so of high book for vintage cards Rob Veres needed. Anywhere else you will be offered 30% on a good day. Ebay plus paypal takes something like 15%..maybe even less. And you can discern an accurate price by searching sold listings. If you don't want to take the risk on higher dollar items, you can pack them up and send them to a consignor like Probstein. I've had fantastic success in selling higher end pulls as well as my expensive and rare Muppets figures from Palisades. Of course Muppet collectors are a small market and rare breed and are generally kind an honest. I sold multiple $300-600 packages with no problems at all. In the instance of the backstage playset, I got an offer at a toy store for $200. I sold it shipped on ebay for $650, so around a $550 net profit to me(its heavy and cost $40 to ship). I can't imagine having to sell that set without ebay.
The ability to complete master sets of Heritage and Allen & Ginter each year is nearly entirely predicated for me on buying cheap lots on ebay and then filling in the gaps with the few really reliable sellers/breakers out there like Jim Parker. Without ebay, it would be a monumental task to complete these sets without clobbering the bank account.
I agree. I live in the Southeast L.A. County area and it's very difficult to find someone who deals in Heritage singles, particularly for past issues on this side of town; most sellers prefer to sell by pack. Over 95% of my Heritage purchases have come from eBay. Of course, shipping hikes the price up where at times it's better to wait until the card appears at a more reasonable price but I suppose it's the price of doing business.
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Most negs come from Noobs, under 10 feedback buyers and under $10 sales .
That is the saddest part !!!!
COMC works great as a buyer if you need several cards that are $1 or more. You can leave your purchases there until you have several built up and can ship all at once. I finish off my sp's from heritage there and it's almost always cheaper than eBay. I mentioned Jim Parker in my previous post and he has quite a bit of old heritage and opens multiple cases each year. His prices are fair and he is very honest. He lists some of his stuff on eBay, but you can also contact him directly. Sportslots works great for commons and low end inserts if you can find one seller that has all your needs.
I have purchased items from Jim in the past and he's one class act. I have also purchased off of COMC, but the shipping prices tend to be a turn off, even though I can accumulate several cards to send. I have master sets, but then I go beyond by collecting the SSP cards and the subsets with the exception of autograph and relic cards. I have quite a few of them, although it's a slow and expensive process.
BTW, how many collectors who participate on this forum and who collect Heritage live in the LA/OC area? Somebody out there is buying all of those packs from Walmart and Target.
I recently had quite the opposite experience. After a 5 or 6 year selling hiatus, in late January, I received a special offer from eBay for 5 sales with no final value fees taken out. Naturally, I listed my 5 most expensive cards. Almost immediately after those sold in a week, they upped my total items to sell to 100 from 25, and my max $ limit of listed items to $5,000. After a few more listings of $50-$200 cards, I've been bumped to 190 listings and $9,500 limit. All in a matter of 2-3 weeks.
I hear you on the feedback though. I've had 70 sales the last 2 months, and only about half have left feedback. Pretty lousy, considering I leave the buyer feedback immediately after payment is received.
You got lucky.They still have me at 0 items and $0 this month.Been like that for several months.Maybe they see you can make them decent money and decided to treat you better.
BST references several
Is there some reason they won't let you sell anything now? Did you have some unhappy buyers?
Nope not at all.I signed up for a seller's account several months ago and that's what it has said every month.I never hear back from them when I send the higher limits request.I tried signing up again on a different network with my vacation home info and got the same thing.0 items and $0 limits.
BST references several
Have you tried calling them?
No I haven't.My hearing isn't very good.
BST references several
On baseball card transactions I send feedback upon arrival of purchases or sales. Generally I receive feedback for my sales, although my purchases exceed what I've sold. Where I have had some problems with receiving feedback is when I've sold non-baseball card items, even though I left positive feedback for the buyers.
I signed on eBay in 1999 and there is one significant difference I've noticed. It used to be where people would demand feedback on a transaction. I have never asked for feedback as I figured it was the buyer's choice whether they felt the transaction was to their liking or worth the time to comment. I don't have anyone being so forward about receiving positive these days.
Funny thing is just last week a seller, one with <200 feedback, messaged me and asked me to leave fb on one of my purchases. I didn't say anything but thought that was a pretty risky strategy.
A buyer just tried to scam me over $1. Well, 99 cents and free shipping, to be accurate. LOL
I've been on eBay about the same amount of time, and once as a buyer got an old postcard for like $12 and it was nice; I hadn't gotten around to leaving feedback, but planned to later in the week. I opened up my messages to find like 5 from the guy, progressively getting more aggressive and demanding I leave him feedback on his sale. So I did, but made him wait a couple weeks. LOL
On the feedback topic, I had a seller with 3k+ feedback, ask me three times for feedback on my purchase and they would then reciprocate.
I usually leave feedback in bulk and will do it once every week or two and dont really even pay attention if I have been left FB or not, it doesnt matter. BUT, in this case, I am intentionally NOT leaving any until they leave it first. I have always thought, that as a seller, the buyers responsibility is a single thing, TO PAY, after that, they can leave any FB they want based on the quality of the item
As for baseball card/collectibles I haven't had any really large sales, but when I've been scammed it has been for items for 3.00 or less. Thankfully it has occurred less than five times in my purchases off of eBay.