Ebay reflections

[niftyprose]

Hello guys, the following is "no names, no packdrill" for obvious reasons but I'd be interested to hear appropriately non-specific responses.

 

A couple of years back I had a run-in with a well-known Ebay vendor. They described themselves as a "former professional repairer" and sold me a Lachenal which they described as "fully restored". It turned out to be a wreck. I got a full refund. Later, I found that my experience with let's-call-him VendorX wasn't unique. 

 

Since then I've seen a number of "should I buy this?" posts on this forum relating to Ebay and other online purchases. In cases where quoted details suggested that VendorX was involved I messaged the members concerned and shared my experiences.

 

I also checked Ebay. While the negative feedback I had left VendorX was still accessible via the "feedback left for others" tab on my profile, it was no longer attached to his. It seems that Ebay censored my negative comments but omitted to tell me that it had done so.

 

I'm perfectly happy to keep PMing people on those occasions when I detect the foul odour of VendorX but I'll surely miss a few. Is there a case for a local listing of problem vendors? I will mention that another forum with which I'm involved encourages sales between members, and invites profile updates after successful trades.

Edited January 1 by niftyprose
Punctuation fix; content unchanged

[Tiposx]

Does the ebayer also sell lots of cheap german concertinas, ornaments, medals, toy cars etc?

[niftyprose]

I ain't sayin nothin'. (But will gladly expand if we can agree a policy.)

[Tiposx]

Well if it's the same seller: this person has bought at least one concertina through cnet buy and sell. Then flipped it onto ebay a week later for more than 2.5 times the price.  I saw this because I was interested in the same tina (for genuine restoration) and he beat me to it. To be clear, it is not illegal to do this. But is it ethical? The descriptions neatly understate the true condition of the instruments.

I have mistakenly bought two other cheap Lachenals from the seller, which are not worth working on, but will do as spares. That is my own fault. I am concerned more about the effect on aspiring concertina players who dream of finding an affordable vintage instrument that might work, but doesn't. 

I have advised a couple of members on here, who were seeking advice,  by pm about my own experiences. 

[alex_holden]

16 hours ago, niftyprose said:

I also checked Ebay. While the negative feedback I had left VendorX was still accessible via the "feedback left for others" tab on my profile, it was no longer attached to his. It seems that Ebay censored my negative comments but omitted to tell me that it had done so.

 

Apparently on eBay you aren't supposed to leave negative feedback for a seller after they have refunded you, and if you do the seller can ask eBay to remove it. You're also not allowed to mention if eBay stepped in and forced the seller to give you a refund, and if you do they will remove the feedback. I didn't know that removed feedback was still visible in "feedback left for others" though.

[Diss]

I bought one no doubt from the same seller, advertised as G/C and took for me messaging some repairers/tuners to find out it was in fact A/D.
Decided to keep it as the A/Ds don't seem to pop up so often, so it meant i had to buy another... poor me

[Tiposx]

Concertinas do seem to multiply without much help 🤣🤣

[SIMON GABRIELOW]

Probably best to consider buying specialist stuff ( like concertinas) from already reputable, or known people, or those recommended by others.

[niftyprose]

Thanks everyone, esp. Alex (I didn't know about the Ebay policies he discusses.) Simon's advice is doubtless good. However, I'd like to restate the original purpose of this post, which was to propose a local listing of problem concertina vendors using Ebay and other sites. Is this a good idea? Is it likely to cause legal problems for the site administrators?

 

I will mention in passing that I'm actively involved in two other forums related to other music gear. It seems to me that concertinas are noticeably more prone to scamming than other instruments. Go figure, as they say.

[Ken_Coles]

Anything potentially valuable or expensive or scarce is prone to scamming - I expect many of us can provide examples from other interests we have (used high-quality telescopes in my case, as a retired astronomer). Creating a list of "problem vendors" does indeed raise issues for the site, IMO. The responsible owner of C.net would need to weigh in on that. From the earliest versions of this site he has advised caution in transactions that are not face-to-face. In the meantime, potential buyers should ask around individually. It isn't hard to find out who has a good reputation and track record. I myself searched over a decade for my first concertina (pre-internet) and only bought a used traditional instrument to replace that Stagi after getting to know other players, which took another few years. You can do all this faster today, but because it is "easy" to find what look like opportunities there can be pitfalls.

[niftyprose]

Hello guys, aside from Ken's careful post and a scattering of likes there hasn't been much response to the "problem vendor list" idea which kicked off this thread, so I guess we should count it as a non-starter. Two last observations before I shut up about it:

 

1. Alex drew my attention to Ebay's policy of removing negative feedback if the vendor provides a refund, a practice of which I hadn't been aware and which strikes me as pernicious. In the worst cases, it would enable a serial scammer to list shoddy goods repeatedly with no comeback, so that an unplayable concertina might go out to a succession of experienced buyers whose feedback would be deleted before ending up with an inexperienced buyer who didn't realize they'd been sold a pup. 

 

2. Ebay seems to be abnegating its responsibilities. If concertina.net can't publish negative feedback to fill the gap, perhaps it could publish positive? ilovefuzz.com, a music fx site with which I've been involved for years, assumes that its members will trade guitar pedals and includes as part of its member profiles a field where users can name those other group members with whom they've had good experiences.

 

Happy New Year everyone.

Edited January 6 by niftyprose
missed a word

[Luke Hillman]

Thanks for starting this thread. I agree that there needs to be a reliable way/place to find negative feedback. The absence of positive feedback doesn't mean you're going to have a bad experience, and the absence of negative feedback doesn't ensure a good one. Negative feedback is valuable all on its own. There are plenty of places to see only positive feedback.

 

I made what turned out to be a bad eBay purchase a few years ago, was not able to get a refund, and was not supported by eBay in seeking one (endless back-and-forth exchanges with a different customer support agent each time, each neglecting to read the previous messages). On the one hand, I probably should have been a better informed buyer. On the other, eBay's supposed purchase protection had given me a false sense of security.

 

This is a difficult project because the concertina world is so small. Nobody, myself included, really wants to be the one to name-and-shame someone who already has an established reputation—a dynamic I observed when discussing my experience on this forum at the time. But, given the amount of money I lost on that purchase, I (then a pretty new player) was set back several years of musical progress. That's not a situation I'd wish on anyone. I hope this is something we can figure out.

[Theo]

My approach to auctions in general and Ebay in particular is that they are ways to get rid of stuff that needs to be sold quickly, or that are difficult to sell.   From the buyers point of view that means you should approach everything in an auction with a skeptical eye, and if its not a real auction, where you can view before buying, then even more caution is required.  I think it's very unfortunate that sellers of old instruments of all types now tend to set a buy it now price rather than letting the market decide.  I think this has increased the chances of a bad buy.  Some sellers are devious enough to look for good examples of similar instruments for sale from reputable sources and then to price them at an apparently attractive discount which then tempts the unwary into buying a repair project at almost the price of a restored and guaranteed instrument.