Rick:
I sympathize and empathize very much with you. I
too was victimized by another eBayer two years ago and it cost me two
separate legitimate accounts with nearly a 2000 feedback each. You
may or may not remember when eBay purchased Half.com about five years
ago. At the time sellers in good standing on both sites were given
the option to keep separate accounts, although eBay was very strongly
pressuring people to "combine" identities into one. I would use Half
to sell vhs, dvd and laserdiscs and eBay the same but also movie
posters. As a way to know which account I was signed on with when I
made a purchase, I would buy on eBay under my Half ID and on Half with my
regular eBay ID. For about ten months everything was fine, until one day
I found myself searching for a sold out, hard to find video for a
potential sale. While signed on eBay under my Half ID, I found it, bid and
won. Over the next couple of days I received an email from the seller
telling me that my purchase would be delayed as she had to go into the hospital
for an operation. I wrote back that I sympathized with her situation,
but I really needed the item shipped immediately and could she please let
me out of the obligation so I could find it elsewhere. I never heard
back from her in any way. Six months passed and again I found myself
running around the internet trying to find another rare video, when I happened
upon an auction of it on eBay. The seller's ID "sounded familiar" but
I couldn't remember "how". This particular day I was especially busy
with online searching and had been multitasking to the max, and FORGOT to
"change IDs" when I found this auction on eBay. I was unfortunately signed on
under my eBay ID, while attempting an "eBay purchase situation", whereas my
self-imposed rule was to buy eBay items with my Half ID only. I won the
auction and then about a week later, woke up one morning, flipped on my
computer and discovered that I WAS SUSPENDED from eBay for a MAJOR RULE
VIOLATION. No detailed explanation was given, no easily understandable
procedure of appeal was offered. I was suspended with nothing more than a
standardized, boilerplate form letter, offering a broad generalized
statement of offense referred to as a "major rule violation". I
sent emails of appeal to no avail. I pleaded with eBay to just inform me
WHO MY ACCUSER WAS and WHAT EXACTLY DID I DO. No, they couldn't share that
information as it would violate the privacy of the seller. After another
week of wracking my brain and searching my archive folders (never, never delete
any emails) I deduced it was the lady who needed the operation from over six
months earlier. After our exchange of emails, and my plea to "let me out
of our transaction", she BLOCKED MY EBAY ID (Half.com ID), but NEVER INFORMED ME
she did so or that she had any objection to "letting me out of the
auction". Because I was signed on (by accident) under my official eBay ID,
and won her second auction, my "Major Rule Violation" was that of "eBay Identity
Fraud" and purchasing an item from someone who had previously "Blocked my other
eBay ID" (which was my Half.com ID). No one at eBay would
consider that I might not know that she blocked me and that this was
nothing more than an unintentional error in process.
There is a funny (and sad) aspect to this story.
During my "week of detective work" of determining who I had angered and why, I
deduced the "operation lady" as the culprit and approached her to help me remedy
the situation. I paid her via PayPal for the second item, offered to pay
her for the item from six months earlier, and asked her to remember that she had
never communicated to me that she had blocked my Half ID or had a problem with
me from the earlier auction. She never responded to my note, but SHE DID
SEND THE SECOND ITEM I had won at auction and paid for via PayPal. It was
a bootleg dupe copy of the rare factory studio original video item I was
seeking. Investigating her further found that she would regularly deal in
these items, and most likely the item from the first auction would have been a
bootleg dupe copy too. She stills sells on eBay and from all appearances is a
cyber citizen in good standing.
Dennis
From: MoPo List
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Richard
Auras
Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2006 8:39 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: [MOPO] OT: ILOVEFILMS but ebay hates me.....
Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2006 8:39 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: [MOPO] OT: ILOVEFILMS but ebay hates me.....
I have got to vent and I apologize in advance to those of you stuck
listening.... Let me start by a warning to ebay sellers.... beware
of who you partner with. My sales have been slow during the summer so I
partnered up with a friend in China and opened a second ebay account to sell
sports jerseys. The jerseys looked nice and sales were good so I was
making some money to spend on my movie goods. Well in the effort for the
jerseys to look nice they put emblems on them that I did not know such as puma,
adidas and such which made them knockoffs. Ebay suspended the account
which I don't blame them for but with that they suspended my 10 year movie
memorabilia sales account and even my wifes account because she was in my
household. I sent an email pleading for reinstatement so I could keep this
long established and hard worked account but got the canned email signed by a
gentleman named Chucky no less (I can just see that darn doll working in ebay
customer service) stating that my suspension was "indefinate with no plans of
reinstatement". Man did I mess up.... The ebay account was paying
the credit card bills I had from buying collections from a few of you...
Anyone out there need a kidney?
Luckily Rich at Movieposterbid.com has not labeled
me as a threat on society and all of you who have dealt with me know I am a guy
who would do anything I can for you so I will post items on MPB and hope I can
manage to at least make the minimum dues on my credit cards. One day
ILOVEFILMS will rise again and be reborn but it just ain't gonna happen on
ebay.
Thanks for listening.
Rick (ex-ilovefilms)
