I was contacted for advice by someone who had a bad experience with a seller of kitchen knives on eBay. She was buying WUSTHOF kitchen knives and had the misfortune to deal with eBay seller kitchenitems4less.
She made a BIN purchase of some items and paid for them just before mid-December. After returning from vacation on the 2nd of January she still had not received the items so she sent an e-mail inquiring about the status of the shipment. There was no reply to the e-mail and no response back through eBay. On January 7th she sent another e-mail expressing her disappointment in the transaction and lack of communication and stating that she would have no recourse other than to dispute the transaction with PayPal and to consider a negative feedback. She did not iniatiate a dispute via the sispute console.
(I don't have a copy of the e-mail, but she read it to me. It was professional and lucid and was in no way threatening it simply stated the facts. This person is an excellent writer and is very articulate).
This resulted in the seller sending an unrequested PayPal refund, threats of negative feedback, threats of "reporting you to eBay" and the admonition that if she had read the ad she would have known that shipping would take two weeks so it was ridiculous to think that she would have these by Christmas. (The buyer never mentioned anything about having these by Christmas she knew she would be on vacation from Dec 21 Jan 2).
I checked out kitchenitems4less current listings and note that there are several variations on the shipping time declaration. Some of the auction ads mention nothing about shipping/deliver time (other than the eBay inserted "transit time"). Store items have the statement "Please allow up to two weeks for shipment of wusthof knife products" in the page header, but it is not stated in several of the descriptions. Then there are a couple of variations in the auction items: PLEASE ALLOW UP TO TWO WEEKS FOR YOUR WUSTHOF ITEM TO SHIP and PLEASE ALLOW 2-3 WEEKS FOR ARRIVAL ON WUSTHOF PRODUCTS.
In other words, there is inconsistency regarding the presentation and content of shipping/delivery times.
This brings us to feedback. kitchenitems4less has a feedback score of 701 with 13 negs and 12 ratings mutually withdrawn and a clear pattern. Buyers are complaining about slow delivery and poor communication. The seller seems to be under the impression that the buyers are purposely ignoring the 2-3 week ship/delivery time when in fact it is not always clearly stated. Buyers leave a neg, kitchenitems4less retaliates, and then some buyers agree to withdraw feedback to preserve their rating.
It seems to me that so much of this could be avoided if only the seller demonstrated some consistency in their listings. To expect a potential buyer to remember what was stated regarding delivery on a page header once they have clicked on through to an item description seems very unreasonable. As this is an issue that is continually coming up and must be dealt with, I don't see why the seller doesn't just take the effort to have some consistency in pointing out the shopping/delivery times in their auctions. That would seem to take less effort than spreading all the bad karma and attempting damage control.
The other thing that this demonstrates is how feedback can be used to mask poor business practices. When I see sellers whom either ignore negative feedback because they have so many transactions that the percentage is negligible (like bookmarz) or else have a slew of mutually withdrawn ratings it makes me very wary.
My suggestion in this instance was to not leave a negative feedback yet, as I'm sure it would only result in a retaliatory feedback. This person seems to have a real nasty streak based on the feedback that they have left for anyone leaving a neutral or negative feedback.
The dispute console only offers two options:
- You paid for an item but didn't receive it, or
- You paid for and received an item, but it was significantly different from the item description
So, at this point I'm not sure what the best course of action would be. I suppose she could forward the e-mails and a brief synopsis to SafeHarbor, but I'm not sure if that would be acted upon.
Any thoughts on this? It just seems so wrong when crappy sellers continually offer bad buying experiences to people who want to shop on eBay.
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I guess this is a hard one.
I don't think you can file a dispute if a refund's been given, can you? But you're right, it's still not right because the seller didn't hold up their end of the bargain. A deal was made, an item was purchased, but no effort made to send the item.
I would send the emails to eBay, couldn't hurt, though I don't know if it will go anywhere. But I don't think it was right for the seller to end the deal without a mutual agreement, was there even an explanation offered by the seller?
Then leave appropriate feedback.
Debra
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Why didn't she pull their contact information and call them, if she didn't get a response to her inquiry? Perhaps there was no response to her inquiry because THEY were on vacation?
While she may have been articulate, I have seen people here who wig out at the meer thought of someone supposedly "threatening" to file a dispute. (course, I haven't seen that here lately but I do remember a few times). Articulate to some, is a jumbled mess to others.
Now it could very well have been that this package was lost/mislaid/stolen/etc -- or even never sent.
So what is it that you want this seller to do? What do you want ebay to do? The seller refunded the money. There is NOTHING for ebay to do. There is NOTHING for safeharbor to do. There is NOTHING for paypal to do.
Personally, I don't care what every other ad of this guys says. All that matters is what the ad I bid on says. If it says "two weeks for delivery" - then that's what it says and that's what I expect. And I *DO* expect myself to remember it. It doesn't matter how inconsistant his ads are from each other -- or if the timeframe of of delivery differs from 1 week to 4 weeks between the ads. All that matters is what the ad I bid on says.
When in doubt - ask questions before bidding.
print a copy of the ad so you can reference it easily.
check feedback before bidding.
I guess I just don't really know what you expect this seller to do especially since the funds were returned.
There's always a lot of blame on crappy sellers (and there are a fair number out there). But there are tools in place to help spot the crappy sellers.
I wouldn't have bothered to respond - but one thing does cross my mind --- this is the second thread w/in a short time period (a day or two?) that you've started naming sellers and pointing out their FB. One I ignore. Two I start to wonder ---- why?
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I think his problem is in the way he phrases it. I checked the item for one of his neutrals that says "ship time took 21 days, too long". His auction states. Allow 2 weeks for item to ship. Which I assume means it will ship in 2 weeks, so you have to add shipping time on top of that.
But of course ebay has transit time on his listings, so customers probably see that, but in the ones I looked at, he does state it will be 2 weeks before he ships, or he states 2-3 weeks for arrival of item, which would be the same.
I would say that the ebay transit time has probably done him in on these.
There is one listing though where he didn't mention shipping time.
Jill
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Actually if you are talking about the 95 negs thread that one was started almost a year ago lol. Took me a couple of times to figure out
BTW-I owe you a couple of PMs-but will have to get to them tomorrow
Originally Posted by rosiebud this is the second thread w/in a short time period (a day or two?) that you've started naming sellers and pointing out their FB. One I ignore. Two I start to wonder ---- why?
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AWW.. so THAT's what's going on!
Ok, corrndog - nix my question!
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We've had some threads bumped the last while that have made me because it takes me awhile to figure out they are old
Originally Posted by rosiebud AWW.. so THAT's what's going on!
Ok, corrndog - nix my question!
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OK, rosiebud, I can see how you would be confused if you didn't check the dates on the posts.
By "articulate" I meant: Expressing oneself easily in clear and effective language. I'm not sure sure what you mean when you say: "Articulate to some, is a jumbled mess to others." (Actually, that seems the opposite of articulate).
Over the years I've started other threads that pointed out specific sellers and their feedback - such as I'll probably continue to do that as the occasion presents itself.
I should also clarify that I did not identify this knife seller as a "guy" or a "him" - simply as a "seller". I don't know the gender of the seller.
It seems to me that the seller held the buyers funds (sent via PayPal) for around 3+ weeks, failed to ship the items within that time (otherwise they would not have provided an unsolicited refund) and then refunded simply to avoid the issue - and sent a little threat along for good measure.
There really seems to be no mechanism in place (other than leaving negative feedback) to deal with this issue.
If you are a bidder and fail to pay for an item you can receive a NPB strike and if you accumulate enough you will be NARU'ed. But a seller that consistently ships late, doesn't communicate and demonstrates a proclivity for threats can simply fly under the radar by refunding payment and moving on the the next buyer - hopefully someone who will put up with the abuse, I suppose.
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Your best recourse is to neg the seller, plain and simple. I don't see the great injustic here, simply because I haven't seen any proof from this specific listing that says the seller didn't ship the item and didn't ship it in the appropriate time frame. I took what you said as meaning it would take 2 weeks before the seller would ship the item at all, Just before mid Decemeber? So around the 12th? Well with the Christmas rush and shipping, I'd say that package could have easily taken 4 weeks if there was a 2 week delay from time of item being bought to time of shipping.
I don't know, I just don't see what there is to be done. The eBay system is NOT a fool proof system, but I've yet to see one that's better. The seller might be a jerk, the only thing to be done to prevent other buyers from falling trap is to post a neg. The buyer had a bad experience, but got their money back and is now able to buy elsewhere.
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Originally Posted by Roundabout I don't see the great injustic here, simply because I haven't seen any proof from this specific listing that says the seller didn't ship the item and didn't ship it in the appropriate time frame. So... you think it is possible that the seller shipped the item and then reacted with an unsolicited refund when the buyer made an inquiry as to when it had been shipped?
I don't think so.
I do think that posting a neg is the only recourse in this case. However, given the sellers history, it will most likely result in a retalitory neg that is undeserved. Buyer purchased an item, paid for it in a timely manner, inquired as to shipping 3+ weeks later, was ignored, inquired again and the seller chose to end the transaction.