Non payment

[pzazz12]

I am getting totally fed up with the number of bidders who do not pay.  It is definitely on the increase and I am not sure quite what measures eBay are taking to counteract this.  I know the bidder will get a strike but how does this affect their ability to bid in future. Does anyone know? I do feel eBay needs to instigate harder penalties for non payers.

[eastern-lights]

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@pzazz12 wrote:

I am getting totally fed up with the number of bidders who do not pay.  It is definitely on the increase and I am not sure quite what measures eBay are taking to counteract this.  I know the bidder will get a strike but how does this affect their ability to bid in future. Does anyone know? I do feel eBay needs to instigate harder penalties for non payers.

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If you have your preferences set to block buyers with two or more non-payment strikes, as most wise sellers have, you will not be troubled by persistent non payers. And persistent non payers will be unable to buy from a lot of sellers.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/bmgt/buyerrequirements

[tressygirl]

At the moment eBay have an option ,  well all sellers have been opted in,   with the option to opt out,  excuse the many options here,  to select an immediate payment for anyone who accepts an offer,  they are thinking of rolling this out for auction winners too.

I rarely do auctions but find payments nearly always come late,  but to be expected in a way as few may watch an auction to the end to know they have won, and only realise when seeing eBay sending them a message ' Congrats you've won,  please pay now'.

Yes,  non payers do get a strike for non payment 2 leading to a restriction on buying from many sellers for a full 12 months.

New members do get restrictions on the number of bids they can initially place, even more so if they are the ones not paying when winning.

[pzazz12]

Many thanks, now at least I understand the 'strike system

[pzazz12 · Accepted solution]

Many thanks will go into preferences now.

[petesean2316]

Should`nt be any strikes, they should either pay or lose the right to bid. if my relisted item sells for less than the auction before am i paid the deficit? no, so i`ve been punished and winning bidder gets a slapped wrist over and over. Ebay not sticking to their own rules. when you bid yo are entering a binding contract.

[*help_no_brakes*]

Did you read the link provided by eastern-lights?

[eastern-lights]

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@petesean2316 wrote:

Should`nt be any strikes, they should either pay or lose the right to bid. if my relisted item sells for less than the auction before am i paid the deficit? no, so i`ve been punished and winning bidder gets a slapped wrist over and over. Ebay not sticking to their own rules. when you bid yo are entering a binding contract.

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IF every seller used the system properly (cancel sale after four days citing non payment and setting their preferences to block non payers) then after a second offence buyers do lose for some while the right to bid. Banning for ever for a first offence would be rather over the top. Like jailing a shop lifter for life. And you can ban them from buying from you for ever.

You are being emotive when you use the word "punished", you are not being punished as you have not done anything wrong. Not everything in life goes smoothly but when it doesn't it is not "punishment". It is just one of those things you have to take in your stride if you want to auction stuff on Ebay.

You can avoid non payers on Ebay if you sell Buy It Now and don't send out offers.

[123fiona]

I have noticed this too. It's a huge pain and I am debating whether it's worth listing when it happens nearly every week. EBay offers nothing for sellers, the latest one for me is a scammer but I can't even leave negative feedback! 

[brenata-uk]

Hi

you said above - "You can avoid non payers on Ebay if you sell Buy It Now and don't send out offers."  I just had a non payer and when I wrote the listing it wouldn't let me tick the 'immediate payment' box because it was collection only (for a sunbed) - now I'm worried the same thing will happen again.  I wouldn't mind but I accepted his offer so he got a very generous discount but still didn't pay.  Is there no way to avoid this?

[daro2096]

Block them from bidding on your items.

[jow1995]

The free selling fees will more than cover the problem!

[daro2096]

When you send watchers and interested buyers an offer they don't have to accept. They can even ignore the offer and let the time run out and that can take 4 days now. Annoying, yes but there is nothing you can do about it.

[brenata-uk]

Thanks for the reply Daro but I didn't send the buyer the offer, it's on for BIN and 'best offer' - he sent ME an offer and I accepted - then he messaged me and we discussed dismantling/delivery on that day - he asked me to get a quote from a company I have used and said he would do the same at his end.  After that there was no response to my messages or the invoice to pay.

He even did a screenshot of his mobile and attached it to one of his messages, I didn't ask for it  and didn't realise until a day later you're not suppose to exchange numbers or emails (though how you're supposed to arrange collection without that is a bit odd).

I don't get why Ebay won't let me tick the box that says buyers have to pay immediately when their offer has been accepted when it is collection only, this could happen again.  They still have to pay before collection as cash can't be handed over on collection.  When you as a seller, send offers to people on the watch list it doesn't matter if they don't respond because the item is still listed - in this case I've lost 4 days of it being advertised because it was classed as 'sold'.

[brenata-uk]

I don't really understand how free selling fees would cover the problem - it was a pain having to wait 4 days to cancel the order, 4 days of my ad not being visible.

[brenata-uk]

I've done that now daro - it was interesting though that a near identical sunbed sold the day after I received the offer, could be coincidence but I've read in the forums that it has been known for another seller to send fake offers to get rid of competition, at first I thought 'nah, that can't be true' but given the way this happened I'm beginning to wonder.

[brenata-uk]

What happend with the scammer Fiona?  How did you know?  Thankfully I haven't come across a scammer but I wouldn't even know what to look for, it's awful you're experiencing non payers nearly every week, I usually just sell clothes and haven't had this problem before but this has highlighted the unfairness of it all.