Do Auction Houses Falsely Report Sales?

Who said anything about uneducated, new or clueless????
Rules are for everyone....
How can a auction house know if a buyer is
"uneducated, new or clueless"??

I'm confused. Does this seller have this on ALL of their listings or just one? If the latter, then I agree, it's inconsistent. If the former, then I see no problem with the statement. As a seller, I would want to know at the time of purchase whether the buyer plans to put the item on extension (same as AH's do), not 30, 60, 90, or 120 days after the purchase.

As with most eBay/PayPal "kill a fly with a shotgun" solutions, this new 6-month window replaces the possibility for abuse by a small number of sellers and items with one that now gives buyers similar abilities but on a much larger scale.

Kevin
I have a Studebaker for sale. I have added saw dust to the gear box to quiet the worn out gears, I have JB welded a crack in the block and then covered it with grease to hide this flaw. I throw it in the classifieds with a lower price and a 'as is' note. The car will drive home with the new owner without problems but within 100 miles they will figure out that I screwed them. But wait, the ad said 'as is' so I am covered. I can sleep at night and not be worried that I am a jerk who takes advantage of other people… Sorry, I just could not see myself being that way.

There are all kinds of sellers and customers. Some are not very ethical, some sleep just fine. Some are not emotionally stable and can do very unexpected things when they feel they have been ripped off. Others just shake it off and never buy from the seller again, other may just give up on the hobby. So like you said, a seller can post whatever stupid T&Cs they want and justify it with a 'buyer beware' attitude. Having a right to do something does not translate into it always being the right thing to do. This is why my opinion remains that this is not 'good' and that it hurts the hobby.


RevCollector,
Please understand that I am in no way saying the new eBay/PayPal return policy is a good thing. And as my post mentions, I don't understand why every buyer would not simply tell the seller, 'I am going for a cert' whether or not they actually will. Simply have T&Cs like Ken Srail's; you have 30 days to get a cert on any item (or better yet and if you are trying to sell a higher end stamp why not get a cert upfront?).
Right now we are communicating with a seller who is selling a U.S. #39 blue, 90 cents cover for six figures. No cert. What kind of fool would buy something like this without a cert? The seller has every 'right' to sell it like this and I guess they can sleep at night. If it were me, I would be afraid that the buyer would hunt me or my family down if I took someone for that kind of money.
Don

Never knew you were so advanced????

In my opinion, for whatever it's worth, the only justification for selling something "AS IS" is when the lot contains more than 10 items - and that is also standard action terms worldwide - *OR* if an item is very badly damaged and that damage is obvious in the picture(s) and appropriately described and correctly identified. Otherwise, as Don points out, it is just a terrible practice.

It is particularly troubling when an item is misidentified, yet is sold "AS IS" for that way, the buyer does not even receive the correctly-identified item! Things like (for example) a 10c 1857 Type V (Scott #35) with the perfs cut off to make a fake imperf and then sold AS IS! Or coil stamps sold AS IS because if they are fake then they are NOT identified correctly as the raw material to make them is a cheap and virtually valueless different Scott number. For example, a Scott #356 coil fake is made from a perforated 10c stamp with the perfs trimmed off (usually a Scott #338) so when that fake is sold AS IS, the buyer is really getting a cheap #338 with perfs cut off! How fair is that? Yet such AS IS sales occur all the time on venues like ebay and the other similar sites.

So one way to try to protect yourself from these AS IS sales is 1. Do not bid with any dealer who you see does it and 2. By buying from APS/ASDA members you get some added protection in that APS has a Bylaw which states that there is no time limit (for practical purposes) that a buyer is stuck with for returning for full refund any stamp that has been altered, repaired, faked or misidentified. Therefore, things like fake coils, or regummed stamps, or any stamp where the buyer did not receive a correctly ID stamp can be returned for a full refund. Sellers must abide by the society Bylaws. So very often the ethically-challenged dealers will not join APS or join but quit when they realize they can't get away with screwing buyers in these ways.

At one time, ebay specifically prohibited AS IS sales, but recently I believe they abandoned that. So on one hand they fall over backwards to protect buyers with outlandish return policies yet look the other way when sellers foist off valueless material AS IS! Go figure!

FOLLOW UP;

I apologize, it is not an APS Bylaw which covers this, it is a Standing Resolution as follows;

"3.9 Return of Philatelic Items Resolved, that in the absence of a written agreement, the APS goes on record as establishing a two-year limit from the date of sale for the return of any item which has been declared by a recognized expert committee to be other than as described at the time of the transaction. - 38th Annual Convention, 1923; amended 99th Annual Convention, 1985. further amended 34th Spring Meeting, 1991.";

So it is a two year limit and it covers anything found by expert services to be not as described, so of course, the things I mentioned would be covered.