Urgent Ebay

[POP]

urgent could anyone please tell me how safe is it to buy from Ebay,my reason for asking is that they have for sale a brand new item i am interested in, bidding is at £100,this is way below the store selling price of over £300.they also have the same product at £150 new and boxed.

John

[SimonC]

I've never had any problems.
check the sellers feedback rating, and read the comments (especially any negative or neutral ones!)
one tip, don't bid yet. wait until the auction is nearly over. Many ebayers will place their bids in the last 2 or 3 minutes

Oh & another thing, make sure that if the item is coming from overseas, you read all the "small print" as you may get stung with large import duties!

[POP]

Simon thank you still looks to good to be true

John

[Brian Stone]

The price may be low because the auction has a while to go. As Simon says the serious bidding normally only occurs in the last few minutes (or even seconds). If you are bidding at this time make sure you don't end up paying over the odds. It is very easy to get carried away.

I would also reiterate the importance of checking feedback and hidden costs such as postage and import duties. Contact the seller before bidding if you have any doubts about these costs.

Look at the payment methods available to ensure these are OK for you.

Finally make sure you can't get the item cheaper anywhere else. The store selling price can be much higher than some internet sellers. Use a site like Kelkoo to look for the best online price for an item.
http://www.kelkoo.co.uk/

I have purchased many items on ebay with no trouble.

[POP]

Brian many thanks

John

[jayhunter]

I too have purchased many items off Ebay, Jessops for example often get rid of their unwanted lines this way. Just check their feedback also check what past buyers have said this, lets you know what their line of merchandise normally is.

[digi-birder]

I'm still very wary of Ebay - I've even read in their forums that sellers can have problems as well as buyers. I would rather accept a cheque, but I'm told that buyers prefer the PayPal system. I'm wary that once the item is posted, the buyer can request their money back from PayPal, saying that it wasn't satisfactory or something, and still keep the item. Maybe I'm just paranoid - I know thousands of transactions take place every day.

[Andy Bright]

I notice that you're keeping this one to yourself :-) Let us know about it after you've bought it, then we'll all have a good cry.

As long as the seller has plenty of good remarks (big sellers always get one or two negative remarkds), you should be fine.

[scampo]

My experience is that most items shoot up to silly prices in the last hour or less. It's rare to find a popular item on eBay that can't be had for the same (with all that means in terms of warranty, returns, etc.) from a store. Also - nothing is a once-off: I ahve found that there will ALWAYS be more of the same if I can curb my often almost overwhelming impatience. Bid fever is a terrible illness (-:

An example - Compact Flash memory cards are significantly MORE expensive on eBay than from a number of suppliers, e.g. www.7dayshop.com (http://www.7dayshop.com/)
I'm about to try from something which I lost the other day by £1-00, but I don't hold out much hope. I know there'll be lots more chances though.

[Brian Stone]

My experience is that most items shoot up to silly prices in the last hour or less. It's rare to find a popular item on eBay that can't be had for the same (with all that means in terms of warranty, returns, etc.) from a store. Also - nothing is a once-off: I ahve found that there will ALWAYS be more of the same if I can curb my often almost overwhelming impatience. Bid fever is a terrible illness (-:

This is what I was getting at. I frequently see secondhand items going for significantly more than they can be bought new at well-known e-tailers.

[Jane Turner]

I have bought several pairs of bins and two scopes over Ebay.. no problems... just check that people have good feedback.

I decide what something is worth... and put my top bid as that and some random amount like 73p... nothing worse than losing out on something because somene bit 2p more than the £55 you decided it was worth!

Oh and check for people who charge ludicrous amounts for postage.... or who won't insure valuable items in transit... ask first!

[Jane Turner]

I routinely try and pic up good optics!

[scampo]

...Oh and check for people who charge ludicrous amounts for postage.... or who won't insure valuable items in transit... ask first!The postage is a scam - a £20-00 memory card at £5-00! Worth checking the bottom of the page as you say.

[Surreybirder]

I'm amazed at the prices that second-hand copies of "British Birds" magazines fetch. I've bid on several lots and have not got them. As others have said, they seem to go mad in the last few minutes before the bidding stops. And the postage costs seem to be ott too.
there were quite a few copies of Birding World on sale last time I looked, if anyone's interested.
Some of the sellers are obviously dealers 'cos as soon as an item sells, they put the same item up again.
Ken

[bubbles]

urgent could anyone please tell me how safe is it to buy from Ebay,my reason for asking is that they have for sale a brand new item i am interested in, bidding is at £100,this is way below the store selling price of over £300.they also have the same product at £150 new and boxed.

John
I've bought several Nikon lenses and ancillary bits'n'pieces over the years. As many have said, decide what your reaswonable limit is, leave that as you max and do not be tempted to get in the excitement of last few hours.

Words of caution with recenty ebay activity when I was looking at some trinovids and ultravids - when checking seller details I was suspicious that the sellers were selling premium, new binos at ridiculous prices and that their previous history was in different types of products - I contacted a previous customoer of two and found that there was indeed something amiss - ebay shut down those auctions - there are pirates out there who can steal a respected sellers identity - happens with premium goods. So check their record, and contact a previous customer who was satisfied - ask them where the seller is located and if it does not match auction details walk away (or rather browse away!). also worth emailing seller fo things like serial numbers and providence - e.g. for old trinovids (you can then check serial numbers with leica - if that is what you are looking at I have a summary list for trinovids).

good luck!

[POP]

Thank you to everyone, whose advice has been most helpful
John

[Robert_Scanlon]

I would reaffirm what bubbles said..if anybody is selling something with a fairly high value at a very good price and the only thing they have apparently sold before are items unrelated and in different price brackets, forget it. Scammers on e-bay are very common, there are even books for sale on e-bay about avoiding scammers on e-bay! The old saying applies, if it seems to good to be true, it probably is.

I would be further wary having been stung slightly on a camera I bought..it was advertised by a seller with about 20 positives and no negatives for selling similar equipment. When I received the camera, it was not in as good a condition as described (there was a dent on the bottom edge where it had obviously been dropped), and when I complained and asked for a refund, I was told "It is not my policy to give refunds" and that the camera had been examined by the person local camera dealer and no fault was found with it. So establish your right to a refund if the goods are not up to your expectations before you bid.

Having said that, I have bought and sold a few other items without a problem.

[Brian Stone]

One more tip. If you are after a real bargain (rare now on ebay) try misspelling the item you are after when searching. Spelling is attrosciouose (bad) on the net and ebay is no different. Do a search on "speekers" and see what I mean - this tends to throw up car speakers for some reason. Worth a try.

[AndyC]

Another thing.......

If you are selling on ebay and someone offeres to pay by cheque and wants the goods shipped overseas, be very, very wary. A lot of the cheques will be made out in US $ and can be forgeries and very good forgeries at that. The trouble is that you don't find out until the cheque bounces(this can take a week or two)and the goods have gone. Seller be very beware.

AndyC