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Hack 20 Sniffing Out Dishonest Sellers
A little research can save you a big
headache.
Just because you're
paranoid doesn't mean they're not
really after you. And just because you take steps to protect yourself
doesn't mean that there aren't
sellers ready to sell you a lot of hot air. Fortunately, eBay
provides a lot of tools to help you discern the good sellers from the
bad.
Naturally, feedback (see Chapter 1) should be your first recourse,
not only when you suspect a seller of being dishonest, but any time
you bid on an item sold by an unknown eBay member. But there are
limitations to the feedback system. For one, it relies on the
intelligence of past buyers, something you can never count on. It
also takes a few weeks for feedback (negative or otherwise) to make
its way back to a seller, so a new user or an old user new to
selling may be able to sell under the guise of a trustworthy
seller for up to a month before his reputation catches up to him.
3.2.1 If It Sounds Too Good to Be True . . .
You've heard it before, and it undoubtedly runs
through your head when you're looking at certain
auctions: if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
Now, there are certainly more exceptions to this rule on eBay than at
most other places, mostly due to sellers who don't
know what they're selling or don't
do a good job of constructing the auction. (In fact,
I've gotten some great deals even to the
point of effectively getting stuff for free simply by being
more knowledgeable than the seller.) Nonetheless,
don't let your desire for a deal cloud your better
judgment.
The photo can be a dead giveaway, both to a dishonest seller and to
an inexperienced seller who simply doesn't know any
better. If the
photo appears to be intentionally
blurry, doctored, or simply doesn't match the item
described in the auction (or other photos of the same item), it
should be your first clue that something's fishy.
Check out some of the seller's other auctions (both
past and present) and look for patterns (or lack thereof); for
example, do all the photos have the same background? If they
don't, the seller may have snatched them from other
auctions or web sites (see [Hack #58]).
This can either mean that they're selling something
they don't have, or merely that
they're lazy.
So how do you tell the difference between someone who is trying to
rip you off and someone who simply hasn't taken the
time to construct a proper auction? Assuming there's
still some time left before the auction closes, ask the seller a
question. Specific questions, such as those that inquire about an
item's dimensions or whether or not it comes with a
particular accessory, are good ways to determine whether or not the
item described is actually the item you'll receive.
3.2.2 The Shipping-Cost Scam
One of the most common scams is to sell something for pennies, and
then make up the difference in grossly inflated
shipping fees. Sellers do this for
three reasons. First, cheaper items show up higher in search results
sorted by price and attract less experienced buyers. Second,
eBay's final-value fees are based on the final price
only (not including shipping charges), so sellers avoid eBay fees by
overcharging for shipping. Third, sellers typically do not refund
shipping charges, so if you paid $1.00 for an item and $12.00 to ship
it, you'll be unlikely to return it just to get your
buck back.
How do you tell whether high
shipping charges are legitimate?
The giveaway is the "Additional shipping per
item" amount, specified in the Payment Details at
the bottom of the auction page. If the price seems artificially low
with respect to the shipping charges, and it costs nearly as much to
ship a second item as the first (e.g., $19.00 for the first item and
$17.50 for each additional unit), then you've found
a shipping-cost scam.
Naturally, it's up to you to determine if shipping
charges are indeed excessive, given your knowledge of the weight and
size of the item: $30.00 is a perfectly reasonable shipping charge
for a bicycle, but not for a deck of Bicycle playing cards. See [Hack #31] for more information.
3.2.3 There's Less Than Meets the Eye
Here's another example of the "if
it's too good to be true" scam:
someone appears to be selling name-brand consumer electronics for far
below their market value, when, in fact, they're
selling only
information on how to acquire the item advertised.
If you see a $2,000 camera with a Buy-It-Now price of $8, then
it's unlikely you'll be receiving
any photographic equipment. Despite the claims made by the seller,
all you'll get is an email or CD-ROM with
information that is already freely available on the Web. See Chapter 2, especially [Hack #9], for ways to eliminate these types
of auctions from search results.
Some sellers start their auctions with a negligibly small opening
bid, such as a single cent, merely to
encourage healthy bidding (see [Hack #33]). This is not the same as the scam
discussed here, and does not necessarily indicate any wrongdoing.
3.2.4 Quick to Unload?
In no time, you'll begin to appreciate the public
nature of every eBay member's bidding and selling
histories.[1] For example, you can paste a
seller's User ID into the "Search
by Bidder" box (see Chapter 2) to
see if they're reselling something
they've purchased recently on eBay.
[1] Due to German privacy laws, the bidding
and selling histories of eBay members registered in Germany
(www.ebay.de) are kept
confidential.
Bidder and seller
histories can be invaluable,
especially if you suspect a seller isn't telling you
everything. You may find that the seller indeed bought the item a few
weeks ago for only a few dollars, but when reselling, neglected to
mention the gaping hole in the side. To find out more, contact the
original seller to get the whole story.
Similarly, if a seller has relisted an item after the original high
bidder backed out, try contacting the bidder to see why he or she did
not complete the transaction.
3.2.5 Hostile Takeover
eBay's feedback system is useful, but not
infallible. Occasionally, an unscrupulous
seller will
"take over" someone
else's account, using that person's
good reputation to fool honest bidders. Here's how
it works:
The seller obtains a list of eBay members' email
addresses, typically from a company that sells such lists to spammers
(not exactly the pillars of society).
The seller sends an email to all the members on the list, carefully
designed to look like it came from eBay. See Investigating Suspicious Emails for ways to
determine the validity of any such email you receive.
Investigating Suspicious Emails
eBay never sends
emails to their members asking for
user
IDs
or passwords.
You can tell whether a suspicious email actually came from eBay using
your email program's View Source feature. Such
emails (and corresponding web sites) use JavaScript to spoof the
actual URLs of the links. If the URLs in the email or address bar of
your browser do not start with something like pages.ebay.com or cgi6.ebay.com followed by a slash, then you
have a fake on your hands. (Beware of sneaky spoofed URLs like
http://pages.ebay.com.fakserver.com or
ftp://pages.ebay.com@fakserver.com.)
I've even had an unscrupulous seller go so far as to
send an email, under the guise of eBay's
SafeHarbor
department, informing me of the "legitimacy of his
account and transactions." The email went on to say
"We advise you to close this specific transaction,
the new Western Union and eBay security system allows you to close
transactions safely." It would be laughable if it
weren't so dangerous.
You can report such emails by going to pages.ebay.com/help/basics/select-RSl,
and then selecting Member Problems
Spam Idon't think an email I received is actually from
eBay
Continue Contact Support.To be on the safe side, never log into
eBay using a link in an email; instead,
just go to www.ebay.com and log
in on your own.
An unwitting recipient clicks a link in the email and is brought to a
page that looks like an eBay page, into which he
types a user ID and password. The server then records the
information.
The crook then uses the user ID and password to log into a valid eBay
account. He immediately changes the password and registered email
address, and then begins to sell high-priced items under the guise of
the unsuspecting user, hoping to use the seller's
good reputation to mask his own motivations.
Fortunately, it's usually pretty easy to tell these
scams apart from legitimate auctions. First, it's
always a deal that seems too good to be true. Second, the seller
mysteriously accepts payment only by money order or other postal
mail-based payment service with no means of protection (see [Hack #29]). Finally, if you search the
seller's past auctions, as described in [Hack #14], you'll most
likely see a pattern that doesn't match the items
currently being sold. For example, if someone who has been selling
doll clothes for years is suddenly selling top-of-the-line digital
cameras, you've probably found yourself a scam.
Report suspicious
listings at pages.ebay.com/help/basics/select-RSl.
In short, be a critical thinker, and don't ignore
that little voice in your head.
