What should I do if I have long-standing, repeat customers who insist on paying with checks or money orders, even after I explain the benefits of electronic payments and offer suggestions?
We know this may happen occasionally, and if you accept checks or money orders from these customers a reasonably small percentage of the time, this will not be a violation of the new payments policy. However, we will not allow abuse of the new policy and will be watching for sellers who accept a significant amount of prohibited payments. Remember also, you can refuse to accept these payment methods. If the buyer doesn’t pay, you can file an unpaid item (UPI) complaint. Buyers who insist on paying with these prohibited payment methods in a UPI claim will lose the claim and will not be allowed to leave negative feedback.
You can check out the eBay payment policy here.
If you’re an eBay seller and going to stick with them and do the electronic payment thing, you may want to read this:
ProPay Announces Details of Electronic Payment Alternative for eBay Sellers
You can always drop us a line and let us know how it’s working out for you.
I would like to add this thread to the existing blog, a copy of email sent to the AT publication in response to Robyn Austin’s editorial.
Dear Robyn…I have been waiting for AT to respond to the sorry state of affairs and policy changes at ebay. Regarding your input in the article, I can assure you that you are not OVER REACTING! As a seller and buyer since Sept 2000, including a brief stint as a power seller, I feel I am qualified to comment on this subject.
I would like to clarify some of the points you made. Cash has been banned by ebay for at least two years, however, like you I don’t recommend sending cash through the mail. Even stating in my listings that cash is not accepted as payment, a few customers chose to send cash anyway. They always received their merchandise, but I had a queasy feeling until the items were received by the recipient.
Ebay has long discouraged acceptance of Western Union payments, stating that this 100 plus year old company was unsafe to use, while promoting PayPal, a known corrupt payment processing service owned by ebay. PayPal was once a great honest company, prior to a hostile takeover by ebay in a GREED motivated move to replace their own BILPOINT payment service which was on the ropes due to higher fee structure and corruption. Once acquired by ebay, PayPal began to earn its infamous reputation for corrupt dealings which can be verified through many sources. This includes litigation by the states of California and New York for illegal and fraudulent business practices won by the aforementioned states.
There is currently active litigation against PayPal for similar dealings in a class action format. This is all public record for those willing to research on the internet. Among websites that expose the corrupt ebay and paypal dealings are the following: http://www.aboutpaypal.org http://www.paypalwarning.com and http://www.paypalsucks.com. Take time to view the horror stories on these websites, which are only a portion of the thousands upon thousands of registered complaints against both PayPal and ebay.
None of ebay’s new policies are in place to promote a safer and better website, but rather a promotion to add to their bottom line. They should be worried with the current situation of our overall economy, however, according to ebay CEO John Donahoe, this will just make ebay stronger as more people will be using the website to obtain cheaper goods.
I have been following ebay stock on nearly a daily basis for the past two years, starting with a plunge from about $121 per share to shares trading in the lower $70 range. In a brilliant financial move, ebay decided to give shareholders a two for one split in 2007 when stock rebounded to about $84 per share. That current split value of about $42 a share has now shrunk to a low of $16.50 as of today, October 7th, 2008. While this may be due in a small part to failure of our country’s major financial institutions, it must be noted that ebay stock as been on a downward slide for over a year now and was in the $22 range prior to the aforementioned institutional failures and subsequent bailout legislation.
Ebay’s slide is due to pure GREED, marketing themselves out of the internet auction market, which is in itself is no surprise. Insider rumor has ebay building a new business model which will not include the auction format. Ebay’s seller base, for the most part is GONE! Without sellers furnishing goods that buyers are seeking, especially in the antiques and collectibles venues, the ebay ship is fast taking on water. They have done everything possible to discourage the mom & pops sellers such as myself from selling on ebay. Sellers in all venues have left ebay by a conservative estimate in the hundreds of thousands, due to no longer being able to make a profit selling on the ebay website.
I, alone, am in touch with many sellers who share the same feeling of having been discarded by ebay as one would throw out garbage.
It is doubtful that I or my wife will ever sell on ebay again. She was suspended in January of 2008 because she REFUSED to accept paypal for payment. Note: this policy change was not to take effect until mid February. I, too, have received a similar suspension notice in July 2008 for the same infraction, NOT ACCEPTING PAYPAL FOR PAYMENT! It might be noted that my current feedback rating as a red star seller is 100% with over 2500 positive feedbacks received!
Accepting PayPal for payment can be akin to committing FINANCIAL SUICIDE! PayPal (& ebay) can freeze your financial accounts WITHOUT any reason at all! If you were careful to read the fine print you would have been aware of this! Untold numbers of sellers were forced into bankruptcy after having their accounts frozen which include personal bank accounts as well as funds left in a paypal account. Chargebacks allowed by PayPal when all evidence points to buyer fraud! Little or no assistance when dealing with fraudulent sellers! These are some of the things ebay members are up against when using the ebay website.
I hope if you print this, it will be without editing out the ‘meat’ of what I am trying to warn the AT readership against. These are just some of the traps ebay and paypal have set for unwary new and existing members. Any one wishing to contact me can do so at logjammer_58@att.net ebay user I.D. logjammer58.
As a long time subscriber to AT, I thank you for reading my letter. Regards, Wayne Nielander, Belleville, Kansas 66935