Once again, the topic of private sellers who are actually commercial sellers. | Seller Lounge

prismor · 2026-05-26T17:11:15.482000Z

Hello everyone, I’m aware that I’m not the first person to bring up this topic, and I’ve also read through various other posts about it. To sum up, I’d describe the takeaway as: "You can report it, but nothing will happen."I operate in an area here where it is completely normal for the "competition" to consist largely of private sellers. That’s totally fine with me as well; I try to set myself apart through quality, and those who are genuinely selling privately usually only have a small quantity anyway.What has always existed, but is now really getting out of hand, are the "private sellers" who offer their products in listings with multiple variants or larger quantities. Sometimes in the two- or three-digit range per item. Often marked as "New" (even though that’s frequently not correct), but also with the note: no invoice, no returns, no warranty. In some cases even with negative feedback already received, because a return of defective items delivered was refused with reference to this note.The bureaucratic hurdles in my area are sometimes a bit absurd. I was happy to wait 2 months until a district court confirmed to me that I had deposited the required 21 cents of insolvency-proof security, or rather that I had generously rounded it up to €10, in order to get a number that is basically absolutely necessary for selling some products here. I don’t expect everyone who really should to go through that at all.But it would already be nice if people paid taxes where appropriate, or at least paid the eBay fees. I also think it would actually be quite beneficial for all of us here if at least the legal minimum of what is offered as "New" were also guaranteed.Messaging people directly was only semi-successful too. They were "already aware of it but still thinking about whether they really...." all the way to "LOL, I know I’d need that but nothing ever happens anyway"... I’m done with that.Is there anything useful I could contribute to improve this? And yes, lawyer and all that, but that’s really neither my style nor do I actually have the time for it.

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