Great ebay workaround

mattacjones

Spotted this innovative way round ebay's rules that prevent you making your direct contact details public. The thumbnail to the far right!
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Prs-Brent-Mason/322848789489?hash=item4b2b4993f1:g:5fwAAOSwbtNZ8f45

Funkfingers

I expect that some officious **** will detect that and pull the listing.

MtB

Good call. I had wondered about doing that - whether they could check the content in photos.

Legionreturns

It'll just take one report. 

I find it dead odd that they think people will buy guitars, cars and other high end items without seeing them in person. Finding a way around that is somehow cheating. Dicks. 

SteveRobinson

He should have used a faster shutter speed to catch that speeding headstock

JDE

I saw an ad the other day that had the fella’s phone next to the item in the last picture. The phone was open in its Contacts section. It was open in the entry titled “Me” with his number next to it! Good on him, I thought!

Funkfingers

Text recognition 'bots scrutinise the typed Description content of listings. Any string of eleven digits can be flagged as a possible mobile telephone number to be checked later by a human operative. 

eBay probably has staff, randomly inspecting listings, on the off chance of detecting naughty workarounds. 

Other than that, detection is entirely a matter of members reporting each other. 

BBBlues

So under the ebay rules now, if he takes down this item early and ebay find the pic are they within their rights to charge him selling fees? Could end up being stung - maybe not so clever.

paddyb

They are clear about their fee's so why bother listing it there if you don't want to pay them. I'm not defending their fee's but these days I choose to sell on Forums/Reverb/Gumtree because of them.

underdog

paddyb said:

They are clear about their fee's so why bother listing it there if you don't want to pay them. I'm not defending their fee's but these days I choose to sell on Forums/Reverb/Gumtree because of them.

It isn't just about avoiding fees though anymore, the fact is a lot of people will want to see and play a used guitar before buying it, same for cars and other items. EBay now forbids that.

mbe

ebay enforcement seems an awfully good way to buy a pig in a poke

Rebar

Simply put, Ebay are scumbags who have managed to scare half the people who choose to list with them. They have also shot themselves in the foot by putting decent people off. Thank God for forums and Reverb. 

Strangefan

Actuslly now they are looking for messages from buyers asking for emails that now gets flagged, I have been banned for 7 days because a buyer asked and I gave it to him in code

mikeyrob73

i have put my number in the listing and never had an issue, 

spark240

I had an email from them saying that contact details could only be provided after a sale 

RandallFlagg

I might call him and ask him whether dogs see in colour or black & white. Well he did say "any questions".

skaguitar

I had my Elliott Tonemaster on there for a short while and was then made aware of their new rules regarding how they can charge a selling fee if they think you are trying to deal outside of Ebay... I hadn't put any contact details or had any correspondence with anybody on it for the week or so it was on there but I didn't want to take the chance and would now never sell anything on there worth any sort of money. Smaller low value items are fine but I'm not paying selling fees for giving someone my contact details ..! I've never had any success selling guitars on ebay anyway.. lol

Jack_

I'm sure if they don't already, they will soon have software that analyses pictures for text and then logs it.

Three things are certain in life; death, taxes and eBay pissing on your chips.

John_A

underdog said:

paddyb said:

They are clear about their fee's so why bother listing it there if you don't want to pay them. I'm not defending their fee's but these days I choose to sell on Forums/Reverb/Gumtree because of them.

It isn't just about avoiding fees though anymore, the fact is a lot of people will want to see and play a used guitar before buying it, same for cars and other items. EBay now forbids that.

There's nothing stopping sellers adding some text to a listing along the lines of 'Feel free to buy it, come and have a look and if you don't like it we can cancel the auction'  A bit of a long way around, but you still get to try before you buy and will hopefully discourage tyre kickers

Rebar

I'm impressed that someone hasn't chimed in by now to defend Ebay for offering such a 'wonderful' service

Strangefan

Rebar said:

I'm impressed that someone hasn't chimed in by now to defend Ebay for offering such a 'wonderful' service




Don't worry the dad brigade will be along shortly