I am doomed. Utterly doomed.

[gerisullivan]

I just became a registered eBay user. It's my first time. Yes, of course I did so to bid on something. It's a very low-cost item. Yeah, right.

I am doomed.

I am not, however, going to increase my bid. Either I'll get it or I won't.

It's not even what I went looking for.

Of course it isn't.

Doomed. Doomed. Doomed.

I am suspiciously cheerful and confident for someone who has successfully avoided this fate for the last decade and more.

Film at 11. In the meantime, advice for an eBay neo would be very welcome. What mistakes should I endeavor to avoid? Well, beside the mistake of registering in the first place?

Comments

[madfilkentist]

There was a short period when I was out of work and selling some stuff on eBay to have at least a little income.

On the whole it went well, but I learned that eBay doesn't give much protection against buyers who ignore the rules. There was an item I was selling, a set of stamps worth just a dollar or two. I offered it postpaid, restricted to the US since any significant amount of postage would eat up the income from the sale. Someone from Korea bid on it anyway, and won the auction. An envelope arrived with a couple of US bills. I sent the whole thing back. The bidder acknowledged having received the return, but put a negative feedback point on my account anyway just to spite me.

A bidder like this can wreck the auction of your item and hurt your standing. As far as I can tell, there's no protection against this. My experience is a few years old, so this may have changed.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

You can comment on their feedback.

[jolest.livejournal.com]

I haven't sold anything on eBay (yet), but I was under the impression that a seller can refuse to accept bids for various reasons as long as they clearly note their reasons in advance in their ad.

Assuming this is correct, you could have included a note "Non-US bids will be rejected." in your auction and then rejected the bid from the person in Korea. That way, they couldn't have given you a negative feedback...