Public service announcement

[ajish4]

http://cgi.ebay.com/GIBSON-LES-PAUL-COU ... dZViewItem

Poor dude.

FROM THE AUCTION.

THIS is why I hate copies.

"THIS GUITAR IS NOT FOR SALE!

HELLO BOYS AND GIRLS. EBAY PULLED MY ORIGINAL POST OF THIS BUT I'M BACK AND THIS TIME ITS PERSONAL. PLEASE LOOK CLOSE AT THE PICTURES ATTACHED. THESE ARE PICTURES I TOOK OF THE FAKE GIB**N LES PAUL THAT I GOT SCREWED ON FROM A EBAY THIEF. THIS **** GOES ON ALL THE TIME AND I THOUGHT IT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN TO ME BUT IT DID. I WAS TOO LAXED IN MY ATTITUDE AFTER HAVING ABOUT 14 SUCCESFUL GUITAR PURCHASES ON EBAY BUT THIS IS THE ONE THAT ENDED IT. NO MORE FOR ME. THE PICTURES I SAW WHEN I PURCHASED THE FAKE WERE A LITTLE DARK BUT CLEAR ENOUGH TO FOOL ME. I THOUGHT I WAS GETTING A USED GOLDTOP FOR A DECENT PRICE, NOT TOO CHEAP, NOT TOO MUCH. WHAT I GOT WAS NOT A GIB**N! THE THIEF THAT GOT ME WAS A PERSON THAT GOES BY jyselva@comcast. aka ebay member jose050585 aka yolanda blanco. AS SOON AS I OPENED THE CASE I KNEW IT WAS A FAKE. THE GOLD WAS WRONG, THE FINISH WAS WRONG, THE PLASTIC LOOKED CHEAP, THE SERIAL # WAS WRONG, THE WEIGHT WAS WRONG, IT WAS JUST ALL WRONG. THE SELLER WOULD NOT RESPOND TO ANY CONTACT AFTER THE DELIVERY. EBAY DID NOTHING FOR ME AND PAYPAL DID NOTHING FOR ME. I HAD TO FIGHT WITH MY CHARGE CARD BANK OVER MANY MANY MONTHS TO FINALLY GET A CREDIT BACK. I T WAS NOT A PLEASENT EXPERIENCE AND I DONT WISH IT ON ANYONE. YOU ARE ON YOUR OWN WITH THESE AUCTIONS. I HAVE RECEIVED ROUGHLY 40 E-MAILS FROM OTHER MEMBERS AND AT LEAST HALF OF THEM WERE ALSO RIPPED OFF ON A GUITAR AUCTION CONCERNING A FAKE GIB**N. PLEASE BEWARE, LISTEN TO YOUR GUT. IF IT FEELS WRONG IT PROBABLY IS. I BLAME MYSELF PARTIALLY FOR LETTING MY GUARD DOWN BUT THERE IS SOME REAL SCUM OUT THERE JUST WAITING FOR ANOTHER RELAXED EBAY MEMBER. DONT LET IT BE YOU!! "

[whojamfan]

That really sucks, and I feel for this poor guy.
That's why I don't buy instruments on Ebay. I have bought instruments online from stores with the agreement I could send it back, but any substantial purchase on Ebay just freaks me out.

[winston]

Buying anything sight unseen can be a **** shoot as I know from personal experience..........but that's another story and one my 4001 will remind me of until I locate another suitable tailpiece for it.

[kiramdear]

I've never used eBay. I could never make a large purchase without physically shaking hands with the seller. Craigslist has served me very well for sales and for purchases too in that respect. I don't allow shipping. I'm a toughie

[captsandwich]

I've never used eBay. I could never make a large purchase without physically shaking hands with the seller. Craigslist has served me very well for sales and for purchases too in that respect. I don't allow shipping. I'm a toughie

I feel the same way. I have purchased 2 pieces of gear from eBay, and both times I met the seller face to face to pick up the items. That in itself is a little risky, so I made sure that both exchanges were done in a very public place. I noticed when I bought my 12 string that the seller also brought a friend along, he must've been wary of a ripoff, too. My brother was sitting on the patio of the restauant I chose to do the exchange, so I knew I was covered.
Maybe I'm paranoid, but that's part of my job.

[ajish4]

No Surprise,

The seller is no longer a REGISTERED USER.

I guess he got the message out.

I've purchased many an instrument on Ebay, and I had only one bad experience.
She also caught a few other forum members here as well.
This lady's scheme was listing highly desirable RICS (as well as a few other brands) with LOW BIN prices. She was VERY SMART, she sold antiques as well as guitars. She had a good amount of feedback as well. Her antique sales were public, so all could see the feedback, but her guitar sales (as I later discovered the reason for this) were listed as private.

After much investigation, what she basically did was collect the funds for the guitar sale, then purchase her monthly supply of antiques, FLIP THEM, get the money and then come up with some BS reason for not shipping the guitar, then refund your money. One of those divorce story's, you know, selling hubby's collection. She NEVER sold the same guitar twice, but did list a Hofner, Fender Jazz all nice guitars in all. SO, she funded her antique business with bogus guitar sales! It took me quite a while to get my money back but I was lucky, I used a charge card and they went to bat for me. Paypal was useless in helping me recover my money.

Just amazing.

[kiramdear]

Yeah, I just really like buying from stores, ones that I know, where I can A-B a bunch of contenders and close the deal at once. I make their job easy so they give me the best deal they can. Everybody's happy and they love to see me come back. My real guitar shopping is done when I'm broke, gearing up for the next one. I don't bother them about that. Aside from that, I bought guitars that I already played from friends only.

"... just because you're paranoid
don't mean they're not after you ..."

[Scastles]

No Surprise,

The seller is no longer a REGISTERED USER.

I guess he got the message out.

In all liklihood the seller will be back with a new account. These kind of louts always find a way, unfortunately.

[jingle_jangle]

Yadda yadda yadda

What strikes me about the whole thing is that the buyer (besides SHOUTING like an irritating fool) claims that Ebay and Paypal did nothing. I've been denied one claim by Paypal, but the seller was wiley and played the rules to the letter, so my bad. But I wonder how this guy went about making a claim, and how long he waited. Paypal's claim process is fairly easy, but you do need your ducks to be in line, and to be fair, it's easier to do for someone who is a professional (as in the sense of "professional businessman") and can clearly and concisely lay out his case...it's not too friendly to anyone below a certain level of literacy or unable to summon clarity in stating his case.

Apparently Ebay did finally kill the seller's account. Seller is apparently somebody who makes his dough by bottom-feeding and living in the cracks in Ebay's facade.

Anytime I have difficulty with a seller, a threat to summon Paypal usually works wonders. The burden to satisfy has largely been transferred to the seller, and Paypal doesn't mess around--the threat to freeze a seller's account works wonders.

But, yeah, crooks are out there and nobody needs 'em.

[jakeox]

I'm having a really weird eBay/PayPal experience right now. I spotted a v63 with a nice BIN, hit it about 15 minutes after it was posted, and an hour later have an email from the seller explaining that he really meant to list it for $2733, not $1733 ... a whole bunch of stuff about how he's reluctantly selling things to make ends meet (which jives with his other listings) ... eventually he asked what I wanted to do. I told him if it was truly a mistake, to reverse the transaction and relist the bass, and I'd understand. He wrote back and offered to sell it to me for an additional $300, and I said, no, please just refund and relist. Even though that's a good price still, when things get weird I walk away.

It took a couple days but he initiated the refund through PayPal ... and it was declined by his bank this morning. PayPal says they will try again in 3 days, and of course it takes 3-5 days after that, so I can't really do anything about this for another week or so. At this point I'll be surprised if the refund is not declined again (the seller claimed to have the funds still sitting in his PayPal account the whole time).

I'm still not sure if this was a scam or not ... I think the bass exists, anyway. I have no idea when I'm going to see my money, though, and I'm a little unsure how PayPal is going to handle this because it's not an item not received claim or a significantly not as described situation. But you can bet I'm going to open a PayPal and eBay dispute as soon as I'm able, if the second attempt at a refund doesn't go through.

Probably the seller's intentions are good, but I'd really like to have my bases covered here. I probably should have made him send me the bass in the first place, actually, because this is a pretty ****** reward for doing someone a favor.

[jps]

After this ****, I'd tell the seller a contract is binding; he sold the bass to you for $1733 so he should live up to his end of the deal!

[rickboy88]

This doesn't sound good, Jake. If he really wanted to list it for $2700'ish, he would have taken you up on your offer to re-list. Also, the money should have still been in Paypal to refund to you if I'm reading things right.

Good luck on the situation. So far, I've been fortunate with trombones and basses from ebay. The seller of my '98 4001 had me worried a bit, as he took a while to reply to emails, but I got it OK - wacked out neck and all (but a truss rod adjust fixed it). Also, the extra fee from UPS for stuff from Canada wasn't fun for another non-Ric bass. I know to have the seller use the U.S Postal Service next time. He was good about it and Paypal'd me the extra fee.