Has anyone here used eBay to buy things online? If so, how do you do it? What are the risks of doing so? Do you recommend it?
Need some help...
moving this over to the Knicks forum for a little while so it gets some more love.
I've gotten both sides of it. I bought a jersey off eBay and got it within the next week. On the flip side, my sister tried to buy a graphing calculator for something like $70. It was never shipped and it cost us $20 to cancel the check.
Overall, it's not bad. The one thing that should almost be considered a must, check the users' feedback comments from the other members. They'll tell you upfront whether you can trust them or not.
I purchased a Volvo S40 and paid 2k less than the blue book. Buy from a dealer, or buy from someone who obviously sells for part of their income. That way if you have a reasonable case to leave negative feedback, they'd be more willing to work things out with you.
Is it easy to pay? Is your personal information secure? No risks other than having to cancel an order?
[Edited by - KnicksFan on 06/12/2005 11:28:47]
Posted by Knicksfan:
Is it easy to pay? Is your personal information secure? No risks other than having to cancel an order?
[Edited by - KnicksFan on 06/12/2005 11:28:47]
Since ebay is a huge site, it is relatively safe and secure. Almost everyone accepts paypal, and your personal information is most definitely secure in ebay's servers. The risks are extremely small if you buy from "non-shady" users who have a lot of feedback, and don't act stupid.
You can easily find lots of good deals.
Feedback is everything. Never buy from a new user or a user who has negative feedback. The other thing to look for is how old their feedback is - make sure they've been doing Ebay for a year or more and that they have developed a good reputation. But I agree with what the guy above said - the deals there are good if you're patient.
By the way, just as a tip - for an item that several people are bidding on, like an ipod or something popular, what tends to happen is that the price seems kind of low until about 90 seconds before the auction closes, then everyone starts bidding and the price shoots up, so timing is important.
Sorry for my ignorance but Im new at this: what's exactly paypal and how does it works?
Posted by Knicksfan:
Sorry for my ignorance but Im new at this: what's exactly paypal and how does it works?
Paypal is a form of payment, and in fact is owned by Ebay now. It is the most popular form of online payment now. You basically sign up for a free account and can add checks, credit cards, banking accounts, etc to put money into your paypal account or withdraw money if someone sends you money via paypal.
http://paypal.com is the official site, which should explain a lot
Absolutely look for at least 98-99% feedback and make sure its substantial (at least 100 ratings). Look at their ratings. See why anyone gave the seller a negative. A lot of people make their livings on ebay and a bad sale will ruin their rep and their business, so if you you find the right sellers you should get good service.
Isiah should try to trade Kurt via E-bay!
He may get more hits!
I bought the sprewell swingman jersey for 10$ at Ebay. Ebay is good depending on who the seller is.
EBAY is so stupid.
I tried to purchase a camcorder way back in 98 for $350.....which I won the bid and gave up the money but I never got the item. I tried to report them and I went through with all the stuff they said and I never heard about it again. So I lost $350 on this crazy site. There are no safe guards for theft.....at least back in 1998.
Reciently I won a bid for some comics I wanted but the same day I found some guy on the street selling them so I just got them from him. I never went through with the purchase and there was all this mumbo jumbo about me not going through with the purchase. What happened was Ebay charges the seller a fee if the person changes their mind. It was stupid. The seller was pissed off at me sending me e-mails and stuff.
I would use ebay if I ever wanted something hard to find or if I was trying to sell something but I would only use it as a last resort thing. It's definately not safe......but other people love it so go figure.
I use eBay all the time. The key to buying is going at the last minute, instead of bidding for an item days before the auction ends. I've bought tickets, jerseys, books, speakers, action figures and everything has worked out fine. Just look at the seller, and make sure he has good feedback...
Posted by EnySpree:
EBAY is so stupid.
I tried to purchase a camcorder way back in 98 for $350.....which I won the bid and gave up the money but I never got the item. I tried to report them and I went through with all the stuff they said and I never heard about it again. So I lost $350 on this crazy site. There are no safe guards for theft.....at least back in 1998.
Reciently I won a bid for some comics I wanted but the same day I found some guy on the street selling them so I just got them from him. I never went through with the purchase and there was all this mumbo jumbo about me not going through with the purchase. What happened was Ebay charges the seller a fee if the person changes their mind. It was stupid. The seller was pissed off at me sending me e-mails and stuff.
I would use ebay if I ever wanted something hard to find or if I was trying to sell something but I would only use it as a last resort thing. It's definately not safe......but other people love it so go figure.
I think it was a combination of your purchase being from 1998 and some bad luck that you lost your $350... there should be better protection by now for fraud with large amounts of money involved...
And what can I say about the comics, that was probably wrong of you to do lol, if everyone did that then ebay seriously would suck
Posted by VDesai:
Absolutely look for at least 98-99% feedback and make sure its substantial (at least 100 ratings). Look at their ratings. See why anyone gave the seller a negative. A lot of people make their livings on ebay and a bad sale will ruin their rep and their business, so if you you find the right sellers you should get good service.
This is good advice. Also, check the amount of feedback they received. If the numbers are low, it may be that the seller had bad feedback, so he opened a new eBay account to start again. Another thing to look for is who leaves the feedback. If most of his positive feedback consists of people who've left a large number of good reports, be suspicious of the feedback.
Mostly, eBay sellers are honest people and pleasant to deal with. But, as in anything, you always need to be careful.
Thank you everyone for your good advices! They have been very helpful. Thanks!
