Outrageous?

(To avoid taking the current Torx Head thread off topic I thought I'd reply to a comment by Bill Phinn here)

<Bill Phinn Wrote>

I suspect this may have something to do with the, to me, largely incomprehensible reaction of those apparently quite common buyers who give negative feedback of the following kind: "Paid instantly, seller said item not in stock & refunded - OUTRAGEOUS!!!"

If a seller lists something on eBay it is (to me) reasonable for the buyer to assume he actually has what he is offering at the time he (the buyer) comitted to buy. After paying upfront and then to be told that the vendor coesn't actually have what he is offering and is refunding, it seems perfectly reasonable to complain.

I just had a somewhat similar case myself. A buy-it-now from the Far East with multiple quantities of the item offered. I payed immediately.

A week later I got a shipping notice .... well these days it says "Your order is bieing shipped" which is actually meaningless. After another three weeks I got a Paypal notice saying the seller had refunded. No communication or explanation from the seller. When I followed up , it transpired he didn't have what he was selling - and apparently couldn't get it.

And yes - I'll probably leave negative feedback.

Yes, I completely see your point Bandersnatch if the non-availability of the item becomes clear only after the buyer has been left in eager anticipation of its arrival for a week or more, but I suspect that in quite a few cases the outrage comes on after a much shorter delay than that. Those were the cases I had in mind.

Really, I was trying to find a reason why sellers feel the need to send substitute items without telling you; fear of a customer backlash if the customer is informed, even on the day of purchase, of non-availability seemed like a plausible suggestion.

A recent experience I had leads me to believe that although there may be a huge number of far eastern sellers of a particular item on eBay, there may be a lot fewer actual suppliers of said item. Which might explain not only the inability to supply but also the same error from multiple sellers.

I ordered a 16mm square 16ER insert threading tool on eBay. this was advertised at less than a quarter of MSC Industrial's price. Then a 20mm square tool arrived; obviously too large for my S & B toolroom lathe. I went through the "return item" process with eBay to get a full refund, and then ordered a 16mm squre tool from a completely different supplier. Two weeks later, another 20mm square tool arrived! "return item" time again.

I came to the conclusion that a lot of these sellers are effectively retailers who call off items from a wholesale type operation when they get an order, and if those parts aren't in the correct bin, then the wrong part goes out time after time. Third time lucky with ordering the 16ER tool from yet another supplier, I received a 16mm square item this time.

BTW, all three of these tools appeared to be of good quality, and a quick try out with a European sourced 16ER insert indicated a good fit in the two "wronguns" as well as the one I'm using now.

Edited By Stueeee on 21/08/2019 21:23:06

I hadn't actually got that far Harry - doubtless I'll find the same as you.

Another little "sting in the tail though". After Paypal refunded my payment, my eBay account reverted to showing that the item as "commited to buy" but not yet paid for! I've since straightened that around ... but more hassle.

(Edit)

I just tried and was able to leave (negative) feedback.

Edited By Bandersnatch on 21/08/2019 21:55:37

Offering for sale, goods that you don't actually have on the anticipation that you can get them after the money rolls in (using said money) was illegal at one time - at least in North America - though I suspect it isn't actually illegal these days.

In any case, the risk for an eBay seller following that practice is negative feedback if it goes wrong (it ain't likely to be positive).

Edited By Bandersnatch on 21/08/2019 22:08:53

One trend i noticed recently especially when buying things for Arduino is certain sellers will advertise an item usually with multiple quantities available and a price range from a few dollar to $30 or $40 which one would usually expect the low end to be for one unit and the other end for multiple units , if you look carefully at the pictures there will also be another item in there like a cable or something cheap and useless. So you think this is a good deal and click the drop down menu to grab 10 units and it will be listed as out of stock and the only thing you can buy is the useless part ! They also tend to have multiple listings for the same thing with slightly different prices just to fool you into buying something from them , Another really irritating thing is when a seller lists their entire range of brand X products ( drill bits for example ) and list them in 0.1 mm increments so to get past their advert you nearly wear out your scroll wheel on your mouse getting past them !

I am almost certain there are scams where the UK supplier sources the goods from China after the order is placed.

My example was where I ordered from a UK supplier (at extra expense) because the part was needed faster than the China delivery guarantee, but even though an email arrived to say it had been despatched (within a day or two of the order being placed), it took longer for the item to arrive ‘from the UK’ than it might have done from China. Can’t remember the time but ten days to a fortnight was the order of things. It had been posted in the UK, for delivery to me.

Furthermore, the postal sticker on the package was for priority delivery, so had not been hanging around in the postal system. My feedback was challenged by the seller, but when I pointed out his scam and that I would not withdraw my comments, they went very quiet. They knew they were on a sticky wicket.

I’ve also ordered from an apparent UK source and the goods have arrived from Germany. That has occurred twice. Delivery on those two items was only marginally slower than the UK Postal service (but possibly faster) and there was no real price differential compared to delivery from China. I suspected a bit of a VAT scam was going on there, or perhaps some other form of tax dodge.

I have had an offer of lower purchase cost for goods by paying into a third party account, before now. I declined that one as just a bit too risky.

Got to say ""Paid instantly, seller said item not in stock & refunded - OUTRAGEOUS!!!" is over the top feedback in my book. Getting your money back rather than the item ordered is IRRITATING. OUTRAGEOUS!!!" is when someone sends you a turd instead.

Dozens of reasons why items might not be available. Gosh, Tesco's no longer stock my favourite coffee (Cafe Imperial) and they ran out of Peanut Butter one week. Last ebay item I bought was American made, ordered from a seller in Madrid, and delivered from Poland. Genuine item, works perfectly, and less than half Catalogue price : that's globalisation for you!

Chaps have short memories - remember 'Allow 28 Days for Delivery' and 'POA - Send Stamp Addressed Envelope'.

Dave

Ah yes, I forgot about the 28 days for delivery! I’m not sure I ever waited that long though. I recently ordered some parts from a company. I asked if the prices were inc or plus vat and how much the shipping was for the parts I required. I placed the order online and got several email confirmations. A week later and the parts hadn’t arrived so I emailed asking if the parts were in stock? No was the answer, lead time is 30 days so you should get them in three weeks time. It would have been really nice if they’d told me that up front then I could have looked elsewhere.

As for eBay I’ve only had one poor transaction and although the pictures of the product were very misleading the full description was actually fair. I use eBay virtually every week for all kinds of stuff.

The only issue there is the 30 day ebay refund that you can easily miss out on.