Bidding prankster
Summary: arcor.2 has been a long-time seller on eBay and reports the problem of joke bidders with zero ratings who never pay. Other participants confirm similar experiences and suspect bots or malicious people as the cause. Several discussion participants talk about the limitations of the current eBay settings for blocking such bidders, with bikenerd.23 and stubenkram criticizing the limited options. xforce-2013 expresses general doubts about eBay’s policy and complains about the lack of sanction options for sellers against problematic buyers.
Hello,
I’ve been here on Ebay for 25 years now and mainly sell through auctions. Unfortunately, people with zero ratings bid on items, or at least try to, and then never get in touch again. Sometimes the names aren’t like Max Müller but “None of your damn business!” What’s that about? What do they get out of it? I cancel the bids as best I can, but sometimes bids only come in shortly before the auction ends. Unfortunately, it’s not possible to exclude zero-rating bidders from bidding; I have to cancel them all manually. Ebay, do something about this already!!!!
xforce-2013
·2 weeks agoI find eBay's policy pretty questionable anyway by now. As a seller, you basically can't leave negative feedback for buyers anymore.
No sanctions follow; after 4 days of non-payment you can only cancel and relist. Online trading as a whole for private sellers is no longer what it used to be.
bootyooty
·2 weeks agoIf you want sanctions, then do what I already wrote to you in your own thread just now.
Online trading for private sellers has been booming again since private sellers no longer have to pay any selling fees.
stubenkram
·1 month agoDue to post moderation in the forum, replies with image material are only visible “with a delay.”
If it is no longer possible to exclude buyers with fewer than so-and-so many ratings from bidding/buying, why is this function still available in the block settings? That is what it is intended for exclusively.
mmstore74
·1 month ago · EditedGood morning @arcor.2 ,how about this setting?
I don't have this setting myself and therefore can't say whether this is what you need?
bikenerd.23
·1 month agoThis doesn't help and only refers to the previous rules. eBay removed the blocking of bidders with too few ratings a few years ago
arcor.2
OP1 month agoWhat do the bots or their programmers get out of it if they bid on things and never get back in touch?
alter_mommark
·1 month ago · EditedYou’re thinking too "reasonably"; it probably has to do with hurting other people, just like that. Maybe they’re also competitors or some envious people, who knows. It doesn’t necessarily have to be bots.
arcor.2
OP1 month agoWell, I maybe post around 10 articles a month, so that with the competitors is rather unlikely.
stubenkram
·1 month agoThat could also just be some random kids who are bored.
You can basically exclude all buyers from bidding in the block settings if they don’t have any ratings yet. Does that stay ineffective here, @arcor.2 ?
arcor.2
OP1 month agoUnfortunately, that doesn't work; you can only exclude bidders with multiple warnings for unpaid items and bidders who live in countries I don't ship to.
stubenkram
·1 month agoI haven't sold anything in ages, but "back then" this worked effectively here with these settings. If you select, for example, 0 (or 1) at the bottom and activate this option, the one above it becomes active too. Then nobody who doesn't have any (or only one) rating can bid anymore.
arcor.2
OP1 month agoUnfortunately, you can’t generally block buyers who have zero points; that only works for people who were warned because of unpaid items.
petersmodellbahnstuebchen
·1 month agoHi @arcor.2
since when has it been possible to exclude bidders with a residence abroad?
I only know this setting:
"Block buyers whose preferred shipping address is a place I do not ship to"
Warm greetings from the Baltic Sea
Peter
arcor.2
OP1 month agoExactly what I meant.
bikenerd.23
·1 month agoThat just happened to me again too. This looks like bots - often only signed up a day ago. Annoying
arcor.2
OP1 month agoThe only way to curb this a bit is to keep checking the bids again and again to see whether the highest bidder is a zero-feedback bidder, and then block them. Such a pain, and Ebay doesn't do anything about it.