Help - Someone is threatening me through ebay and I am afraid they will come to my home.

[deerejohn1979]

I have received a threat from an ebay member that he will buy all my items and come to my home and I am scared.

I cannot end the listings and I have just literally by minutes missed the customer service line.

Please help

[deerejohn1979]

The username for future reference for anyone who may find themselves in a similar situation is and he is not a nice person 😞

[redwick1]

Please go to options then edit and take out that members id before ebay do
it is not allowed on here.

[deerejohn1979]

I did not know that. I'm sorry.

[redwick1 · Accepted solution]

Contact the police and tell them straight away

They take that kind of threat very seriously and you do not have to put up with it.

Mostly that kind of thing is just bluffing.

Ebay would not be able to do anyting about it.

Why are they threatening you

[deerejohn1979 · Accepted solution]

Because I wouldn't sell outside of the auction. I have had to end all the listings and email each buyer to explain why and explain I cannot let them sell at the prices they have sold for. I am so upset. I have never known anything like it 😞

[redwick1 · Accepted solution]

REad this and report them by the link or phone ebay in the morning if needs be
They open at 9am on a weekend

https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/policies/payment-policies/offers-buy-sell-outside-ebay-policy?id=4272

You really should not have ended the listings as you will pay the final value fees if there were bids.
Not sure why you say you can not sell at the prices they have sold for
If you put them up for sale and they sold at the price you asked then you should sell. If you wanted more then you have to start your items at a price you are willing to accept

I hate to say this as you are under enough pressure but the buyer has a point as it looks as if you sold the items and have refused to honour the deals.

That is still no reason to threaten

[deerejohn1979 · Accepted solution]

No, sorry. I didn't explain that well. I listed them to start at 0.99p and they were getting a lot of bids. Three were meant to end tomorrow and I am sure that they would have gone up a lot more. But I ended them because he threatened to buy all my items under another user if I blocked him and then he would get hold of my address and "come and collect if you know what I mean (thumbs up icon)" That is what he said.

I had to end them early because I was afraid of what he might do.

[redwick1 · Accepted solution]

I took it when you said you could not sell them for the price they had sold for they were the items that show as sold.

You could have blocked them by using the Buyer requirement link and then you go back to buyer requirements and scroll down to Stop blocked bidders from contacting me
That way they would not be able to bid or contact you as long as you are not in a transaction with them when you do the buyer requirements
https://pages.ebay.co.uk/services/buyandsell/biddermanagement.html

If it was the lawn mowers then there will be no charge as you had no bids on them
Dont list at 99p if you list again start at a proper price

[deerejohn1979 · Accepted solution]

It was the chainsaws and the blower. I am not very clever when it comes to things like this. And I have never needed to block anyone. I went on to try and figure it out - but if you imagine someone has just sent you a horrific message like that - especially when your husband works nights it is quite terrifying. So I did what I could to prevent it from happening. I feel like I have done wrong. But all I wanted to do was stop this person from getting my information.

[redwick1 · Accepted solution]

Oh dear.
You did sell them then and if you cancelled the transactions without the buyers agreement then you can understand why the buyer was upset.
I am not condoning their actions in any way but they wasted their time bidding on your items and are disappointed
You will be charged the fees at 10% which will be about £27+
If they paid and you refunded through paypal then you pay the fees and three defects on your account
AS you sold the items to them then you were in a transaction with them and blocking them would not have done any good at all.

[red_magpie]

Yours is one of the fairly few questions we receive about threats which goes beyond the usual abuse and insults.

Forget eBay. Any "we know where you live" implied threat of violence or intimidation is a matter for the police.

The threat does not have to explicitly threaten violence. The very fact that the threat has left you frightened makes it reportable.

Do not delay. Contact your local police in the morning. If you can, print out all the messages concerned, and provide as much information you can to identify the seller, and their address. Also tell them the seller's eBay username. If necessary, the police can contact eBay to get their full name and address.

By the way, despite the seriousness of this seller's behaviour, don't let it scare you too much. Most threats of this sort are just bluster by sad and inadequate people. But they need to be stopped in their tracks before they do this to other buyers.

[redwick1]

Absolutley right red-magpie

It is a serious threat and needs to be dealt with straight away.
No one should be frightened

As said it is probably just bluff and bullying.

[deerejohn1979]

Thank you so much. I am a bag of nerves. I have managed to end them all. Although I think it has cost me so much loss I cannot even begin to think about it. I had to end them early. They would have quadrupled in price 😞 I should have put a reserve on, however they would not have needed it had this not have happened. I feel so upset and angry.

eBay support is not very helpful. I have tried to use them before and it did not get me very far. I have never been on this forum before. I am no grateful for your help and advice.

[redwick1]

You start at a price you are willing to accept and not rely on bidding for the price to go up
Reserves cost 4% of the reserve price and you pay that is you sell or not

[deerejohn1979]

I have never ever had an issue in 17 years of using eBay. I just put things up for 0.99p and they sell. Sometimes it is good and sometimes maybe not. But this is because someone threatened to come to my home, the one place in the world that you should feel safe - and I did the only thing I could think of to stop that from happening.

[deerejohn1979]

Hindsite is a wonderful thing. But this is not something I experience every day and I didn't know what else to do.

[*guinevere*]

You did not need to end all your listings. Add the member's ID to your blocked bidders list here

https://offer.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?bidderblocklogin&hc=1&hm=uk%600d71f%2Be22b

I think there is also a way to stop them from messaging you too, I will have a little search and get back to you.

Edited to add:

I found this:

"Add their id to your blocked bidder list.  Then go to your buyer preferences and tick to block messages from people who are on your blocked bidder list.  Tick to apply to current and future listings."

The only trouble being that they can still contact you via "Ask seller a question so may be a waste of time. But definitely put them on your blocked list so they can't bid/buy.

[captain*obvious]

Block him from bidding here

https://offer.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?BidderBlockLogin

Report him to eBay tomorrow although if the threats are violent or sexual in nature you should be talking to the police.

[deerejohn1979]

Thank you so much for your help. I am so glad I found this section of eBay. It is a lot more helpful than eBay itself.