eBay Australia announces Safe Payment Initiative

Randy SmytheOn 04.10.2008 at 10:44 am Said:

Richard, I want both versions. eBay “Classic” and the “New” eBay - you could even call it Express :).

Make it happen okay!

RKS

MistyOn 04.10.2008 at 10:57 am Said:

Richard,
Speaking for myself but I believe I echo many other small sellers feelings here.
We want eBay 1998 with the unique, hard to find one of a kind items but with better customer service and for eBay to uphold it’s promises to remove problem members and close all the loopholes for fraud and scammers. when they are sent a report of such they need to act on it and remove the problem not turn a blind eye to it as they have for far to many years now. PayPal only is not the answer because PayPal/eBay (monopoly) will decide with what makes them the most money not what makes the most sense and is right.

TWOn 04.10.2008 at 11:17 am Said:

“I’ve been told that there are no plans to go to a PayPal-only model for eBay in other markets – US included.”

I wish I could believe this. We know the PayPal must be required as a payment method is coming soon.

Patricia 1On 04.10.2008 at 11:17 am Said:

Richard - I cannot believe ebay (and you for that matter) don’t get it. Its very simple and its been posted in every which way in thousands of posts on ebay and at the end of articles and blogs on the net. Just about everyone is saying the same thing. They DO NOT WANT Donahoe’s new policies. They DO NOT WANT ebay to be just another retail experience…the world is FULL of companies who have been at it forever and do it expertly - like ebay can NEVER do. Ebay has its own unique niche and its beating it to death and destroying it instead of improving it! How many other ways do they need to hear it? I fail to see just why they are still going forward with their plans in spite of all the protests.

If I were Donahoe I would 1) roll up my sleeves and get truly bad sellers off the site; 2) get bad buyers off the site too - ebay has to be “hands on” in this and not simply rely on automatic policies and rules and canned replies to reports; 3) institute a new advertising plan - not a silly one, but a serious one assuring people they can come back to ebay and find the rare and the unique and buy safely. Institute some kind of safety net for buyers - some kind of assurance that they can buy with safety. Perhaps some kind of “insurance” funded by a small monthly charge to sellers? I wouldn’t mind that - IF the rest of these really dumb (pardon my bluntness) new policies are rescinded and the path of trying to make ebay into a retailer where dropped.

There, I’ve given you my very best advice and charged nothing for it and no golden parachute either

TWOn 04.10.2008 at 11:23 am Said:

“So, which is it that people want? eBay to be more like Amazon; eBay 2008 to be more like eBay 1998; or a streamlined combo of the two?”

I want an eBay classic site and eBay to quit trying to be Amazon which they will fail at with their current level of customer service.

At the very least I want to know that eBay will always have an auction format with a more reasonable price structure. I also want eBay to allow me to run my business the way I want to which means accepting which form of payment I want to.

kimbersOn 04.10.2008 at 12:51 pm Said:

Richard-

When you ask ‘So, which is it that people want? eBay to be more like Amazon; eBay 2008 to be more like eBay 1998; or a streamlined combo of the two?’ I have to say that personally, I’d like to see and eBay more like it was in 1998.

One of the things that made eBay so successful in my humble opinion, was that it was not retail. There were problems back then but the biggest complaint was the site would go down fairly regularly.(I remember a time where if the site would go down for however many hours, eBay would automatically add extra time to the auctions that were closing during that time. That was good customer service for a problem while it was being worked on.)

People came to eBay at that time to find the unusual. The site grew into a place where you could find anything and people told their friends.

You don’t hear that anymore. Part of it is because the media continually used eBay as an example when they were talking about internet fraud and frankly, eBay didn’t hit back hard enough publically against that perception but also, the more eBay grew away from it’s core, the more cumbersome it became to use. Seller found themselves finding the ‘venue’ having more control over their business and the buyers were finding it harder to find what they are looking for.
The endless on-going change has only made it worse.

All that said, what I’d really like to see is a copy of Ebay’s business plan or a recap of it anyway. It is not reassuring to have read that a member of the management team says that I am not going to recognize eBay in a year from now.

Fat chance of seeing that I know, but a girl can dream!

Oh and as an aside,when you wrote ‘I’m getting mixed messages’, I thought to myself well that’s exactly what eBay users (buyers and sellers)feel they are getting.

LurchOn 04.10.2008 at 1:13 pm Said:

Yes - definitely more like 1998. In service, attitude (especially attitude from eBay’s side), usability for both buyer and seller, encouragement of people to stay on the site (and not via silly social networking and blogging tools - but by getting them to actual be encouraged to look around at listings), actually making it fun again for all (and no, having a “Back for more fun?” above the login box don’t make it so), and I could go on. I’m not bothering to get as detailed as Patricia’s post, because there’s still been no follow-up to my comment/question on the other blog entry (Catalyst Conference). Someone might want to think about closing comments on older posts if no one is going to check back on them. I’d also let people know how long comments will be open for a specific entry…

Then again - given the fact that it sounds like you’re pretty much new to eBay, do you have any idea what it was like in 1996? or 1997? or 1998?

JJHOn 04.10.2008 at 1:40 pm Said:

Speaking of 1998, you should see screen shots of what item listing pages looked like back them. SIMPLE. uncluttered, just the facts, nothing else. Pages weren’t bogged down in javascripts, tracking icons, cookies. No hidden ID’s, people used their actual email address as their user ID and users could talk to users directly with eMail. You could spot shill bidding easily. Feedback was not transaction based, you could give anyone feedback for any reason. It was friendly, it was fun, it was not loaded down in crap like it is now.

Then ebaY went public, the lawyers came in, and things changed. Not for the better. And here we are in 2008, 10 years later, with an ebaY that looks nothing like it’s roots. It’s rather sad, really.

SharonOn 04.10.2008 at 1:49 pm Said:

We want Ebay 1998 back, only with a company that recognizes that as Ebay grows, so will the fraud. Bad buyers learned to scam the system, bad sellers also.

More often than not, when a situation is reported to Ebay, all that is ever sent is a canned response totally unrelated to the topic at hand. Customer service is at an all time low.

We want Ebay back with the recent changes reversed, i.e. Only positives for buyers, DSR’s, Best Match,etc. Sellers need to have the ability to leave negatives or neutrals for buyers. Many times this is the only protection sellers do have. It forces buyers to atleast work with us.

We want customer service that will deal with the real problems that we face on Ebay. To police the site and deal with the fraud.

Recognize that there are bad sellers who use feedback wrongly and remove them. Just as there are some bad buyers who need removed.

Stop with the multiple ID insanity. I know that Ebay has our IP addresses, use that to tie all ID’s together and to prohibit bad buyers and sellers from simply getting another ID, after being suspended. It happens way too often.

If Ebay insists on exploring retail, which I don’t think will work, then separate the two. An Ebay classic and an Ebay Retail Division.

We want Ebay back. There are many people who depend on Ebay for their income. These changes are coming at a bad time what with the economy such as it is. Many people are desperate and just want Ebay to Listen!

Just my two cents worth.

MechelleOn 04.10.2008 at 2:10 pm Said:

The absurdity with going into a retail format for eBay is that the eBay brand is synonymous with lower than retail, bargain, discount, wholesale pricing. Even I having my own eBay store if looking for a product on eBay I can’t find it cheaper than retail - I just buy from a source outside of eBay. To be honest it irritates me when the same prices as retail are being offered on eBay unless it is discontinued product.

On the other hand I am not only interested in the unique I like to win an auction or a BIN for a new release or a very high end -out of reach for the normal income people- products cheaply. This cannot be achieved on Amazon, Wal-Mart, or any other retail source right now.

So, yes eBay is tossing its special something with their lack of understanding eBay’s value- essentially they demonstrate a lack of faith in the eBay company and that certainly doesn’t create a wave of security for eBay’s customers- clearly, we are feeling that right now.

Are frauds and cons an issue on eBay? Yes! Who’s fault is it eBay’s? eBay perpetuates and enables these marketplace deviants at the expense of every eBay member. It is outrageous to announce to the world and its customers that it is eBay customers (their only customers those of us renting space to run our business from) who are at fault. How dare they put that on us as a whole or at all- frankly it is eBay’s fault that I have potential customers email me asking if something I am selling is real, new, or whatever. Why?
1. They tell the world we are all frauds and scammers with their incessant announcements of creating a safe fraud free marketplace.
2. When making declarations of cleaning up the fraud in the marketplace it is always in reference to those of us doing business on eBay .
3. They have “PayPal the only safe payment method” posted every where and after suggesting rather stating to purchasing eBay members that they are putting their selves at risk if they don’t use PayPal, because they will not have buyer protection. This game they play to get everyone to use PayPal is in essence spreading the message that eBay is an unsafe marketplace.

All of these action on eBay’s part sets an expectation in eBay marketplace buyers that they will indeed be scammed so they better prepare and protect themselves by using PayPal- “the only safe payment method”.

EBay fails to mention to the world or post all over the eBay site that they indirectly (giving eBay the benefit of the doubt) encourage and enable fraud and retaliatory feedback. Why when feedback removal is petitioned in clear cases of feedback extortion do they deny the removal- yet on the other hand they have Feedback Withdraw? Because if eBay’s customer gets a low enough feedback rating it is eBay’s policy to suspend them of course if that occurs they will lose out on money that its customer brings in regardless of their disgusting character . Never mind this deviants injurious effect on their customers and to hell with the deviants effect on the perception of the rest of the vendors choosing to do business on eBay.

Example you tell me why this person is still doing business in the eBay marketplace if eBay is so concerned about the buyer experience and ridding the marketplace of these plagues?

This is from the feedback thread in the eBay answer center- this person actually charged 39 dollars for HANDLING fees and the package and product arrived in sub-par condition. The customer left a neutral - the vendor a negative
Seller’s feedback % only 98.1 %
231 users left negatives
84 neutrals past year
77 negatives past year
130 Mutual Feedback Withdrawals

DSR shipping and handling only 4.0

Is this the picture of a ethical professional? Or is this the picture of someone who should not be participating in the eBay marketplace if eBay is sincere about their wanting to clean the place up? This individual should have been evicted long ago and certainly shouldn’t still be around.

These counterfeit listings are all over the auction floor in this category

http://health-beauty.search.ebay.com/mac_Makeup_W0QQcatrefZC6QQdfspZ32QQfromZR2QQfrtsZ24QQftrtZ1QQftrvZ1QQsabfmtsZ1QQsacatZ31786

This page is littered with fraudulent Mac cosmetic listings- it is well known that Thailand and china list fake Mac and unsuspecting “eBay Buyers” purchase this garbage.

Another indicator that this is trash and not real is the auction floor flooding of the essentially the same lot auctions from the same “seller”. Mac is not cheap it is in high demand so naturally in the free marketplace it is costly not only for my customers but me as well and 99% of everyone selling Mac. Even if it could be purchased dirt cheap, which it can’t, no one in their right mind would degrade its potential value by flooding the floor with these lot auctions.

I have reported this crap at least a hundred times in the last 6 months and not one time has eBay removed the listing- not once!

Even worse one of the people selling Mac had put in her listings to beware of fake Mac and listed some of the indicators and they removed her listing and when she put it back up the limited her account.

Some idiots would suggest that eBay can’t police every listing, however when I and many others report specific listings they should have no obstructions to investigating the listings. Also, due to the known reality that the frequency of these listings coming from China and Thailand are fake they could very easily dis-allow these people from selling on eBay.com, but they don’t and the probable thousands of people being scammed by these crooks are not as much of a concern to eBay as getting the fees from the sold junk.

Not only is eBay allowing these people to be ripped off they are literally putting the person physical wellbeing at risk. Who knows what these people are using to put in the pots they are distributing to eBay.com members. It’s disgusting their flagrant disregard of these deviants and their very negative and potentially hazardous effects in the eBay marketplace.

So, yes there are a lot of problems within the eBay marketplace, but these will not be solved solely by switching to a more retail like platform- that will only lead to eBay’s demise. If eBay wants to clean up the garbage they very easily could, but rather than pay an employee to actually work and not just hit a random response to a customer’s question, they just let it be so they can keep collecting fees.

You know the problem with eBay’s business approach is that it function in the short term- they want the quick right now dollar and sacrifice the long term effects of building a good reputation that would exponentially increase revenue. These new policies are not succeeding in their own customer retention, and they may believe that they are effectively weeding out the deviants, but it is quite the opposite. When the only customers they have left are those with reputations such as those above examples eBay will bottom out and die. None of this BS they are inflicting on us will clean anything up it will only increase the deviant behavior, because that is all that will be left here as their customers- it only takes so long before everyone learns that eBay is filled with gutter trash , and never go back.

So this safe payment idea is irrelevant even more so than it is right now. All the time you hear “buyers” claiming PayPal always sides with the “seller” and the oppsing from the “seller”, but the reality is PayPal sides with whom ever it is that will allow them to keep their fees. If the “buyer” uses a credit card they win because Paypal doesn’t want to take the loss of a chargeback if they sid with the “seller”, no credit card and they side with the “seller”. They want their money and that is their priority always the idea of pretections is a myth

Kevin_TOn 04.10.2008 at 2:33 pm Said:

Richard,
Forget 1998 or 2008, Ebay should simply be a service and a tool with which I can run a reliable small international business. I am happy to pay for that service, but I do not want Ebay INTERFERING with either my business or with the marketplace in general.

I appreciate that Ebay has moved on from it’s “just a venue” stance, and that it needs to control aspects of the site that will allow fraud, but it should not be trying to dominate MY business (and that MY stands for the individual business of each and every seller), it should not be throwing up constant change which everyone has to adjust to, and interferes with productivity and sales (and affects Ebay’s own bottom line). We do not work for Ebay, we pay them a fair price for providing a service. Whilst no-one complains about Amazon’s payment service, it was always there - Ebay offered the ability for business or private sellers to use their own terms and payment methods according to what they found appropriate for their own business. Ebay prospered because of this, but now is trying to impose their will on all businesses as though they don’t realise that they are only a service provider.

Ebay needs to realise that every time they change rules, make the site harder to use, or remove payment options which will make some buyers leave the site, that they are affecting livelihoods. Ebay need to consider changes BEFORE they make them, and how they impact on the businesses that are paying for the service. Don’t threaten us with bolder and bigger changes more often, promise us a simple trading platform where we can work efficiently, create a better turnover, and Ebay can simply reap more fees and commissions. Don’t threaten to raise fees at any time, stick with annual fee adjustments so that businesses can budget and work to a business plan. Oh, and try to understand that the people who pay the fees and commissions to Ebay are actually their clients - many announcements nowadays treat sellers like criminals and the buyers like Ebay’s clients. Yes, the buyers are very important in the marketplace, but the sellers are the ones who are paying for Ebay’s services and are running the businesses that attract the buyers.

The Australian market will be adversely affected by the changes to payments allowed on Ebay. Some buyers will leave and some prices will fall (we won’t know which parts of the market will be affected until specific buyers dissappear). Ebay will make up the shortfall through the additional income from PayPal, but the businesses that are selling on the site get the worst of both - lower prices for their auction goods and increased fees because they are not allowed to accept payments which cost nothing to process, and which some buyers prefer. Livelihoods and business models will be affected by this, and this is not the business structure we were enticed to the site with.

After 10 years on Ebay, I am currently considering my future as an online seller. There SHOULD be no reason for me to do so, but I prefer to work for myself rather than being treated like an untrustworthy employee by someone who *I* am paying.

I am frustrated and dissappointed with what Ebay is doing to the marketplace.

Richard, I do thank you for taking the time to at least try to analyse and listen to the responses that you are receiving - that aspect is appreciated.

Kind Regards, Kevin

BrendaOn 04.10.2008 at 5:35 pm Said:

Sarah,

I have only bought so far on Ebay. Being tech challenged it is easier for me to call someone. I am thankful that Paypal has phone service. Unfortunately out of 4 phone calls made to Paypal mistakes were made by the phone reps 2 out of the 4 times I called creating follow up time that I had to lose by doublechecking the information. 50% isn’t an acceptable standard.

I can’t risk a 21 day payment hold to a company that has shown me only a 50% accuracy rate while doing business on a venue that doesn’t have viable customer service until certain levels of performance are met. Would you trust this situation if you were me? If yes why

HenriettaOn 04.10.2008 at 5:48 pm Said:

Richard you come across as a very sincere person.

For your average long time small seller eBay has always been more than a sales venue. It has been a community and a way of life. Go take a look on the Answer Center board. There are people with thousands of posts who put in a regular shift every day, they are performing voluntary community service. They do not do this for recognition or pay, it is a way of making eBay a better place. THAT is the eBay we don’t want to loose.

It is a very emotional issue. People who are emotionally involved in a relationship that is breaking, if not already irretrievably broken are not always able to make clear and reasoned summaries. These are the people who take pride in their feedback, I can assure you the Bargainland type sellers don’t give a rip.

For many the ‘noise’ is a form of grieving. People like Usher Lieberman casually dropping dismissive and denigrating comments all over the media do nothing to smooth over the fuss. They exacerbate it! Its like pouring vinegar on an open wound.

Over the last two years we have been living in a metaphorical earthquake zone. The ground beneath our feet is shaking but we don’t know which way to run to safety. If that seems overly dramatic please consider the plight of sellers of digital items. Not just 99c eBooks, but template and website designers, graphic artists, logo and branding specialists, accounting templates, knitting, crochet and sewing pattern makers, the list is very long. Rather than putting them ALL out of business with less than five days notice, couldn’t eBay have simply said ‘no feedback on any item which sells at less than $XX’?

Those same digital sellers, exploring eBay Classifieds found that when a potential lead clicks on their paid advertisement for further information, they get a warning from eBay that off eBay transactions are not safe. This is OUTRAGEOUS! How can eBay take money for an advertisement and warn off respondents?

What I and many others see is “My way or the highway” eBay wants to control how I interact with my fellow sellers, how I get paid, (for a fee), how I ship, and my opinion of my buyers, because sellers are bad and retaliatory. Paypal will freeze my entire account if it ‘thinks’ I may have engaged in a restricted activity, because I am guilty until able to prove innocence.

There is a lot of bad stuff out there and one wonders if there is a plan or if management is merely reacting to a perceived problem without thinking it out.

DaveyOn 04.10.2008 at 8:07 pm Said:

@Richard,

I don’t know if I’ve said this before, but I not only sell, I also buy (and very large-ticket items too). I walk both sides of the aisle.

What disturbs sellers about the eBay/Paypal functional monopoly gets back to the absolutely, indescribably, bottom feeding (I feel like Clark Griswold on Chirstmas Vacation here), horribly poor customer service of either one, leading to the lack of trust on the part of sellers or buyers. The next problematic root area is the denigration of the feedback “trust” system. Both problems point to the abandonment of Pierre’s original Community Values by eBaY corporate. When eBay pays lip service to trust issues, they reciprocally lose that trust from their customer base.

You buy from a merchant or private seller because you perceive they and their product have integrity, first and foremost. People and organizations who have integrity don’t need a safety net for those they interact with. Buyers are also proud of their integrity, and want it recognized and respected. A good, bidirectional feedback system, when it still worked, was an assurance of that integrity. Every sale also has a bit of caveat emptor for buyers and sellers alike (I don’t know the latin for “seller beware”), even with a B&M business. But, people found fit to trust each other, did their research, and part of the joy of the marketplace was that Pierre’s ideas REALLY WORKED!

Paypal in its early days was a breeze to use, and although you had some payment holds and glitches, I found that if you had a problem, you could get someone that would understand the problem and dealt with it fairly. This is no longer so. Lurch noted that eBay/auctionweb likewise was approachable and took the ideas of their community as being important to their growth.

Now, Paypal is very dangerous for sellers–extremely dangerous. Much more so than a merchant account, which the sellers of Australia will not be able to use anymore. For buyers, Paypal has fewer pitfalls than for sellers, save the “glitches” that pop up like the current chronic payment priority bug that has been around for 2 months or more. For sellers, more and more stories pop up of arbitrary claims decisions that defy logic and cannot be appealed for independent review, holds that can go on up to 180 days for secretive reasons, limited rights of data submission to support a seller’s position in a claim, and the like. A buyer SNAD claim, the hardest to defent against, is a nearly sure loss for a seller of everything from the item, shipping, and listing fees. And of course the brain-dead cusomter service does nothing but anger an aggrieved buyer or seller! Dishonest buyers are starting to take advantage of Paypal and shipping loopholes, which drive up sellers’ losses. Sellers are taking economy shipping off of the buyers’ choice list (raising prices) because of the losses they can suffer by using it and buyers cannot be trusted to take on responsibility for their chosen shipping type and inherent risks thereof. I could go on and on over stunts Paypal has pulled on me alone that would amaze even a third grader, and I’m only a 1/2 Powerseller.

I won’t comment on the executive team that grew eBay, but I think other than keeping them adequately capitalized through growth, I don’t see much of anything Meg did that made the marketplace any healthier at all. Of course she made herself and some of the other management fabulously rich, but community members began to sense the base principles of eBay changing from “What do we do to be mutually successful,” to “What can I do to bring in more net revenue at any cost to my community?” Customer service went to computerized responses that are mostly worthless and care-less (and customers see that immediately and scorn any business that would treat them that way). Then, other problems that popped up on the marketplace were dealth with in kneejerk ways that tried to minimize any use of judgement on the part of a human being. Suggestions for simple ways to change things that needed to be changed were ignored, which gave the appearance of extreme arrogance. Fraud was swept under the rug and never talked about publically.

Yes, I want eBay something-less-than-2006. It worked, it grew (even though every business cannot grow infinitely large), and it was enjoyable. The current eBay doesn’t recognize who its customers are, take care of them, and does not appear to care who they are anyway.

Incidentally, when you are talking internally, ask why Google Payments is not considered “safe.” If you look at that objectively, you should see that the “safe” does not consider the buyer nor the seller, but eBay’s bottom line and control of the sale.