ebay seller ID and feedback

EDW

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On ebay, do you consider sellers that have very little feedback or do you avoid them? Does it make you wary to see very few transactions or that the user ID was recently changed?

I have seen a couple of items recently that seemed like decent deals, but where there was almost no feedback on the sellers. In both cases I found that it was a new ID, active within the last couple of months. It makes me nervous about buying from these people and I wonder if the change in ID was to hide previous dealings.

Do others feel the same way or am I being overly cautious?
 
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Low or many negative feedbacks, and/or short history would give me pause.

Depends how desperate I was or how rare the item was, and I would balance that with my 'need' and/or risk-tolerance.

On average, I try not to deal with anyone with less than 100 feedbacks, nor 99% positive. Maybe this bar is high for some, but I've bought on ebay since they started, and any time I deviated from this discipline there were problems.

I also I will ALWAYS message the seller with 1-3 questions about the item not covered in the listing, and HOW they respond and IF they respond can be a clue as to whether or not this will be a problem transaction.

I also have little patience for getting sniped on ebay (happens way to often to me) and usually only look at 'BUY-IT-NOW' items and then sort by 'Price + shipping, lowest first' while applying the above criteria in selecting a potential item.

Hope this helps! :)
 
That's how the scammers work, always getting kicked out of accounts, then coming back with new IPs, low to no feedback and accounts only opened...

Oh and their scammer buddies put up the feedback too, remember they're out there working in teams.

Forget it, don't take the chance...

When it comes to buying online, stick to Amazon over Ebay, and there are also a lot of great Music Stores online that will give you better deals at times, so be sure to surf around! :)

I just bought from a Music Store online and I got a better deal through them, then Ebay or Amazon!
 
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Personally I pick someone who has been there for at least a year and has at least 95% positive reviews. For example I have been on eBay for 17 years but only has about 130 transactions. Most have been purchases. Always 100% feedback. Until I got this incurable UAS, I really did not have much to sell. Then in the last 4 months, I already sold 3 ukes. 2 on eBay, then one here on UU. A seller should be willing to tell you as much about the uke as possible. Bought new or second hand, any dings or dents, repairs, kind of strings ...etc. if anytime the answer seems elusive to you, just turn away.
 
HMS/the Ukulele Site, Mim’s Ukes, Uke Republic (Mike), Elderly, fellow UU’ers, and that’s about all I trust here. Sounds suspect
 
Everyone has to start somewhere. Everyone once had no feedback as a seller.

I do however consider thing such as do they have decent photographs that they have taken themselves. I don't like stock photos unless it is a reputable professional selling new stock. How good the description is. DO they answer questions. There is always some risk with new sellers. If a listing states that they reserve the right to cancel the auction and sell elsewhere they I immediately go somewhere else.
 
That's how the scammers work, always getting kicked out of accounts, then coming back with new IPs, low to no feedback and accounts only opened...

Really? What happens if you are new to ebay, we can't all start of with hundreds of positive trades. Not every new person is a scammer!

Oh and their scammer buddies put up the feedback too, remember they're out there working in teams.

How do you know all this is factual?

Forget it, don't take the chance...

When it comes to buying online, stick to Amazon over Ebay, and there are also a lot of great Music Stores online that will give you better deals at times, so be sure to surf around! :)
 
I wouldn't buy a ukulele via eBay - I've done it several times in the past and there were issues every time, mostly because the seller didn't know anything about what they were selling. Nothing major, but annoying enough to make me decide that in the case of ukes, if I can't buy in person then as others have noted I'd go with HMS or another well-regarded seller.

For smaller-ticket items though, I use eBay all the time (I'll opt for it over Amazon whenever possible, in the hopes of supporting an independent seller and not a corporate giant!) and quite honestly some of the best transactions I've had have been with sellers who were brand-new and had little to no feedback history. The absolute worst experiences I've had have been with so-called "Power Sellers" with bajillions of feedback left, maybe 95% positive, but often my experience would fall into that other 5%.

I've used eBay since the start and if there's anything I'm sure of, there's no one-size-fits-all experience. Not all new sellers are scammers (none that I've dealt with ever were), and not all sellers with 10,000+ feedback left are going to be reputable and honest.
 
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