Ebay Bargains - Not For Me!

There's been some discussion on this list about finding 'treasures' on auction sites like ebay.

I wish it would happen to me!

I've actually purchased some good lots over the years that have been outrageous bargains, but in all the cases I'm thinking of I never actually received the stamps and had to settle in the end for refunds.

This has just happened to me AGAIN. I bought an item the other day for $20 that I think was worth at least $200.

Today, the seller informs me that he has 'mislaid' the item and is offering me a refund. I've been down this road before - I suspect he's ended up selling the item to someone else and is fobbing me off with a story about how he's misplaced the item.

In the past, the items have sometimes never arrived and the sellers have been unfazed by that and suspiciously keen to give refunds.

What are the chances of this happening, but only to items that were great finds?

Does anyone else have stories of their ebay 'discoveries' never arriving or being, supposedly, mislaid?

My 2 cents

I just bought some lots off ebay.

One set of 550 old US stamps with duplicates advertised like this: UNITED STATES - USA - LOT OF MORE THAN 500 OLD STAMPS USED

I paid $ 8.00 for this excluding shipping. Anyway, it arrived but with tremendous amount of duplicates of the same stamps!

I literally had probably 100 duplicates of 3 cent George Washington (Brown background). All in all I probably had 25 different stamps...Out of 550!!

From the same buyer I purchased another lot of 350 European stamps (old ones) - This lot was much better but also costed me
$ 8.50

Coming back to your situation, just 2 days ago I bid on some indian old stamps at $ 60.00 and about an hour or something before the auction expired someone bid $ 100.00

Sometimes, there is the possibility of sellers bidding on their own stuff via different accounts...

The best thing is to buy from people with 100 % good feedback.

Unfortunatly I think it is common practice for some. Same BS has happened to me a couple times . However 1 time a MNG CAN large queen I bid $8 on and won came with the same story of its misplaced- I won 2-3 other items from same seller so he refunded me in full for the what I thought was a steal. Received the items 2 weeks later and no large queen then out of the blue he emails and said he found it and sent it no charge. I was shocked and it short lived revived my hopes for humanity.

i sold some stamps to a guy on ebay. I then forgot where I had put them.. Told the seller I lost them, refunded the seller.
4 hours after all this has transpired, I find the stamps. I sent them to the guy, no charge. It was a 2.00 sale, not big money. But sometimes you just need to do the right thing.

So far my experiences on ebay have been quite positive...maybe just my luck.I also tend to return to "stores" from sellers that I have made purchases from before..so the trust factor has been established both ways.I recently started collecting stamps again (thanks to retirement from the workforce)..and i've been having fun finding stuff online. Apart from ebay i've been finding stuff from Bidstart and Delcampe sellers. (helps if you know a bit of French with Delcampe)

I find ebay the company outstanding.
Easy to deal with and helpful. Vendors may be a different cup of tea.
As a purchaser all deals came through excepting the last two
supposedly posted December 14th.
I advised both vendors I shall leave negative feedback,
and was repaid immediately both times.
I did not leave neg feedback, and will repay should the items arrive.

looks like a great bargain...http://www.ebay.com/itm/Canada-QQ-S...em1c30588a44

A rule for buying at live auctions applies to ebay doubly: only bid on what you VIEW, never on descriptions alone.

I've gotten lucky a few times.

I bid 10 bucks on a pile of Albanian stamps that had just a really bad fuzzy picture and it was hard to tell what was in it. I messaged the seller and he sent me some additional pics...

I won the auction for 10 bucks, and after getting it, I estimate that it easily contained $500 in catalog value.

I can honestly say I've never had a seller lose or misplace the items I've won. I've always gotten what I bid on. As far as bargains go, most of what I think of as "bargains" are usually bid up to realistic prices in the last minute or so, so the sellers don't feel compelled to "lose" them because of no/low bidding. that's just my luck I guess. Bargains are few and far between for me.

At least as far as US material is concerned, if you want to avoid most dishonest sellers, only buy from members of the American Stamp Dealers Association.

I did have one lot go missing from Delcampe. Regular seller, so dont think that was a sellers problem.

There was a strange experience with another seller.

I bought 4 lots and then discovered he wouldn't ship overseas due to previous 'lost' goods. I said I would accept the responsibility if the goods went missing (mainly because there was a couple of real bargains in those 4 lots).

He also said he preferred if I could use a payment method other than Paypal, and I ended up sending him the value of goods in USA mint postage at the rate of 130%

Other than that I have been happy with on-line transactions.

Knock on wood. So far I have not had a bad online purchase. I have even had sellers include bonus stamps. I have had shipments arrive that were damaged by the PO. Low value purchases with no insurance but still annoying. Dan

From a seller's point of view. I do lose the odd lot after it has been purchased. I try my best to stay organized, but it is very frustrating when I can't find a certain item. I might spend an hour looking for an item I sold for a couple of dollars because I just hate to tell the buyer that their item has gone missing.
Most buyers are understanding, especially if it is a lower value item. (Yes, if it was a real bargain, I would be a suspicious buyer as well).

I refund and if I find it later, I offer to send it if they still wish it.
I once asked a buyer if they wanted me to send an item already refunded, free of charge (ie. they would get it completely free). For some reason they declined, saying they were no longer interested. Perhaps they misunderstood what I meant by free.

Perhaps I just got jinxed after I read about this topic. I have bought & received successfully on ebay before, but right now I am waiting for a small purchase. I paid for it on March 31st, didn't receive it & emailed the seller. I was asked to wait a couple of more days, even though the purchase was from a neighboring state. I waited & emailed again. The item was prepared on April 11th & I still haven't received it. Seller asked if my post office was confused by an address & box number. I'm still waiting...
Thanks for listening everyone!

I felt I needed to update my recent ebay experience. I did receive my stamp item this morning, so crisis averted!
I must say that every time I've had a problem with a purchase, which really has been rare, the ebay seller has "fixed" it to my satisfaction.