I don't think it is justify to block him, maybe he is not a native English speaker and his tone might not come across that well. He did not break any Ebay rules, one can close the auction and sell to the high bidder at anytime. This is no different than a make an offer auction in my opinion.
Coin Collector, Chicken Owner, Licensed Tax Preparer & Insurance Broker/Agent. San Diego, CA
i dont see anything threatning about his email, he wants to let you know that if he pays with paypal it will cost you money, which of course you already know. the guy may not be able to watch the auction until the last second, if you decide not to end it early, just blow it off, no reason to block the guy, no reason to report anything, just tell the guy you'd like to let it go and you are willing to take your chances, he may even get it for less than he wants to pay. the ones i get annoyed with are the guys that bid high enough to win the auction and THEN try to dictate the REST of the sale or they didnt read the terms of sale before they bid and now dont agree with your terms, the guy is just trying to save a buck, he's not costing you a buck, i see no reason to break out the torches and noose.
I have made offers before and they were accepted and others were not accepted, to me it semed as though he was only trying to justify his offer by offering to pay with non paypal funds. Maybe I am just easier going or not looking for a problem. I would either accept offer or not, but I don't think I would have assumed it was a problem. AL
sometimes we take the exceptions and make them the rules.
I can't stand it. 1 day left on the dang auction, now I had ebay yank it, and reset all of my passwords. So it will be another week at least till I can sell it.
I think you did the best thing. From time to time I get requests to end an auction early. Never have and probably never will. I just feel like it is unfair to everyone else.
In recent years there have been increasing numbers of scams involving fake cashier's checks and money orders. While no form of payment other than cash in hand is completely safe, I shy away from ever accepting those from an unknown party. Yes, there are issues with PayPal charge-backs, but I'd risk that (and be prepared with proof of mailing, etc) before I'd take an easily-faked cashier's check that wasn't taken out from the bank in my presence. Sometimes even the banks don't know it's a fake until 2 weeks+. By then, you've had the check go into your account with, what you think are no problems. The item has shipped, then 2 weeks+ later the check is returned and you owe the bank the check amount plus fees. It's a very common scam.
I would only protest the threatening way he stated his initial message!
I've ended auctions early for a number of board members and/or prior customers who've made a reasonable offer on the item.
You already accepted that you'll have to eat the Paypal fees when you made Paypal an acceptable payment method.
If I was the bidder I probably would have said it more along the lines of.... "I intend to pay with Paypal if I win, but if you accept my current bid (which meets your reserve) and close the auction now, I'll send a money order, thereby saving you 3% in Paypal fees. Please let me know if you have any interest in this offer."
I wouldn't have accepted his offer the way it was worded, and probably would have ignored his email and let his bid ride.
....or I might have pointed out just how offensive his message sounded and given him the opportunity to make his request in a manner that might be more politically correct. (as much as I hate the concept).....
He might even learn to phrase his future offers to sound less like a threat and more like an opportunity that will benefit both parties involved.
If his second offer still made him out to be a jerk, I'd just ignore his lame attempts to make a profit at someone else's expense and happily accept his Paypal payment if/when he won the aution.
So what if he's a jerk!? If he wins and his money is good, you still get what you were looking for.
PS
I would like to make note that email can be such a poor medium, lacking in tone and inflection, leaving the recipient to guess at whether the intent of the sender was perhaps light-hearted, rather than hostile. How do we KNOW what his intent was without investigating further?
<< <i>He will do you a favor and pay with a credit card that has 3% fees if you don't take his offer, Rob. >>
Funny thing about that. This same bidder won my auction when I sold my 3 piece ASE set with the PCGS 70 reverse proof. The final bid was $1206 so I offered him free shipping plus a $1200 settlement if he paid by other than credit card PayPal. He chose to send a money order so I still came out further ahead than if I had accepted PP. I figured I'd rather reward a buyer who helps me than pad PP's coffers. The other funny thing is that the eBay invoice had shipment to a gent in NH while the payment came from a gent in Philly. The coins shipped to Philly. I assume the gent in Philly was using a friend's eBay account. I expect thats probably why that you got the offer you did.
I've recently had an eBay bidder who bid using her sister's account (address in TX.), paid using her own Paypal account (address in NY.) and wanted it shipped to her father-in-law as a present (address in ME.)......and.......when I requested her contact info from eBay because this raised all KINDS of red flags in my head......I got a NY. phone number that had just recently been changed to another NY. number.......
....it turns out she was in the process of moved across the county..... and all the info was correct.
....Sometimes it pays to dig deeper when things don't look right instead of just panicking and reacting negatively......
I now have a new customer who wants to buy a few more items for her fahter-in-law for father's day.
the cold hard reality of it is that not everyone plays fair, i get offers all the time, i gotta have this item, i cant wait for it to end, so i say make a good offer. 9 times out of 10 my make a good offer is interpreted as what is the least you would ever expect to pay. those are the types i dont want to deal with before or after the auction. yeah, i have been the victim on the flip side, a nice coin gets listed only to end early and you know full well that someone else made an offer and it was too much to resist, well, it never hurts to ask. especially when you are wuite sure that if you dont, someone else will
Comments
San Diego, CA
AL
sometimes we take the exceptions and make them the rules.
I can't stand it. 1 day left on the dang auction, now I had ebay yank it, and reset all of my passwords. So it will be another week at least till I can sell it.
I cant take it.
<< <i>I'd cancel his bid and block him.
Russ, NCNE >>
I must say,
Twitter
<< <i>What Russ said PLUS, report him to Ebay. That should fix it. >>
yup that is the thing to do.
Joe
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The Mysterious Egyptian Magic Coin
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I've ended auctions early for a number of board members and/or prior customers who've made a reasonable offer on the item.
You already accepted that you'll have to eat the Paypal fees when you made Paypal an acceptable payment method.
If I was the bidder I probably would have said it more along the lines of.... "I intend to pay with Paypal if I win, but if you accept my current bid (which meets your reserve) and close the auction now, I'll send a money order, thereby saving you 3% in Paypal fees. Please let me know if you have any interest in this offer."
I wouldn't have accepted his offer the way it was worded, and probably would have ignored his email and let his bid ride.
....or I might have pointed out just how offensive his message sounded and given him the opportunity to make his request in a manner that might be more politically correct. (as much as I hate the concept).....
He might even learn to phrase his future offers to sound less like a threat and more like an opportunity that will benefit both parties involved.
If his second offer still made him out to be a jerk, I'd just ignore his lame attempts to make a profit at someone else's expense and happily accept his Paypal payment if/when he won the aution.
So what if he's a jerk!? If he wins and his money is good, you still get what you were looking for.
PS
I would like to make note that email can be such a poor medium, lacking in tone and inflection, leaving the recipient to guess at whether the intent of the sender was perhaps light-hearted, rather than hostile.
How do we KNOW what his intent was without investigating further?
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<< <i>He will do you a favor and pay with a credit card that has 3% fees if you don't take his offer, Rob. >>
Funny thing about that. This same bidder won my auction when I sold my 3 piece ASE set with the PCGS 70 reverse proof. The final bid was $1206 so I offered him free shipping plus a $1200 settlement if he paid by other than credit card PayPal. He chose to send a money order so I still came out further ahead than if I had accepted PP. I figured I'd rather reward a buyer who helps me than pad PP's coffers. The other funny thing is that the eBay invoice had shipment to a gent in NH while the payment came from a gent in Philly. The coins shipped to Philly. I assume the gent in Philly was using a friend's eBay account. I expect thats probably why that you got the offer you did.
....it turns out she was in the process of moved across the county..... and all the info was correct.
....Sometimes it pays to dig deeper when things don't look right instead of just panicking and reacting negatively......
I now have a new customer who wants to buy a few more items for her fahter-in-law for father's day.
___________________________
click to email me
ronsrarecoin.com
ebay auctions for ronsrarecoin-com
Hoard the keys.