Publication of the return address in the item description
@miriam@ebay , @steffi@ebay
Hi Miriam, hi Steffi,
There are always posts here in the forum (unfortunately more and more often) where a buyer has problems with a delivery because the item does not match the description or the buyer wants to revoke their purchase. And I assume that this only affects a fraction of the problem cases that occur.
This mainly affects Chinese sellers who provide insufficient information about the right of withdrawal and whose return address is not visible at the time of purchase.
Today, on orders from my "government," I searched for an electric coffee grinder, see here
When I looked through the cheaper offers, I noticed that hardly any of them meet the minimum requirements of German case law on consumer protection:
Most offers have an item location that is not stated correctly (only Germany, only Hesse, only a street without a town)
For most offers, it is not stated where the item must be sent back in the event of withdrawal or a complaint.
Therefore, I expect Ebay to
1. check the withdrawal policy for correct information. Such information as this
has no place on a trustworthy platform. You might want to train your AI to hide such offers before publication.
2. To build trust with the potential buyer, the return address stored with Ebay should also be published before purchase so that they know where to send the item back in the event of problems.
After all, what good is free shipping from China, Tonga, or Lummerland if, in the event of withdrawal, I have to bear the cost of return shipping?
I do understand that the revenue from, for example, Chinese sellers is important for Ebay, but in the example above (coffee grinder) I am more inclined to buy this item from the local retail store for € 20.00, since legal consumer rights such as the right of withdrawal and warranty apply here.
Unfortunately, this platform keeps getting more and more littered with such offers, and I can hardly find any appealing offers that meet the minimum consumer protection requirements.
Best regards from the Baltic Sea
Peter
miriam@ebay
Hello @petersmodellbahnstuebchen and thanks for this suggestion, which, as we can see, is also getting support from others. On our Help page: Selling internationally we translate as follows:
"If you sell to buyers abroad, you must comply with the laws in both your country and theirs. Your items must meet the sales and eligibility requirements for the eBay site in each country where you sell."
Our new guide at ebay.de/Rechtsvorschriften was created for exactly this reason and offers a good way to see which legal requirements for selling on eBay are necessary depending on location and target markets.
petersmodellbahnstuebchen
OP1 year ago@miriam@ebay
Hi Miriam,
thanks for your feedback and for passing it on. It would be nice if something moved in that direction sometime.
By the way, I bought the electric coffee grinder, as written above, from a local retailer.
Best regards from the Baltic Sea and have a nice weekend
Peter
ttd4it
·1 year ago@petersmodellbahnstuebchen
Hi Peter,
unfortunately, it shows that internally there still obviously isn’t a simple list to work through that gets processed before commercial customers are activated.
Best regards to you and your loved ones
Thomas
petersmodellbahnstuebchen
OP1 year ago@ttd4it
Hi Thomas,
A simple list before activating the account probably won’t help, since these sellers are probably not registered on Ebay.de but on Ebay.com.
However, it should be easy to create an algorithm that checks exactly these points when the seller offers shipping to Germany.
It works in other areas too, like Lucid registration.
Best regards from the Baltic Sea
Dagmar, Mila, Pacco and Peter
ttd4it
·1 year agoI see it the same way; as soon as a VAT ID is provided within the EU, additional processing features should be displayed.
At the very least, AI should be able to do that. 🙂