Here you go, some bed time reading.
Once upon a time, my sister went to a sundries auction and got a bag of things. She didn’t know what those things were but thought they might be handy.
When she got home, she opened up this bag of things and looked confused. What were they? She asked around and no one knew. They said they were a part for something not that they knew what the something was.
So like everyother time she has a bag of strange things, she gives it to her sister (me).
l look at these things and work out that they are a adapter plate that fits between a camera and its dock. l further suss them out and find that they are suitable for a older digital that most likely no one has.
Never mind, l put a box full in my shop and try selling them for $1 each.
No intrest.
l drop the price to 50 cents each, no intrest. l take them to market and put ‘free to good home’ on the box. They are still sitting there at the end of the day.
Pfft.
l wonder if there is a market further afield than my swamp so l list a bulk lot of 10 online. For $10.
No intrest.
l list that same bulk lot in one of my online sites. No one even looked at the page.
l give up and throw the box full away.
While cleaning out a part of the store room in the shop, l find a bag of them that l must of tipped out of the box when packing. l sit this bag to one side and ignore it.
A email arrives from USA, Jenny wants to know if l would sell her one. She saw my old listing and hoped l still had some left. (Yeah, you could say l did).
l tell her l will send her one if she pays for the postage. Turns out the postage is weight driven so l can send three for the same price as one.
Jenny says she will pop the $9 in my paypal, along with a little extra as she really needs this gadget as she broke hers.
She puts $20 US in my account and l tell her she is too generous. l post off her pack of 3. (The AU $ is pretty shit at the moment).
Unbeknown to me, she keeps the one she badly needed and auctions off the other two. They make $80 US and $68 US. She emails me to say she has just put half of each amount into my Paypal account. Its our christmas pressie for ourselves.
Isn’t she nice?
She tells me to list up the others but open it up to International. And that l will be amazed as people over there have this kind of camera and cannot get this part for under $50 US – thats if they can find them.
So l list up 2, and sell them for okay money, nothing flash but around $20 AU each.
l list up a Buy Now auction with a price of $35 each. l sell 10 of them in one night.
Ohhhhhh. By this stage, l am kicking myself l threw that box full out!
Now the fairy tale starts to burst…..
l have had several US sellers emailing asking to buy a bulk lot. l am but a dumb Australian. One offers me $100 for 20 of them (keeping in mind l sell them for $35 each). Another offers to buy all that l have but at a discount price of $5 each and l pay the postage. (Do we see ‘sucker’ written on my forehead?)
l end up ignoring all these emails for if you dig into their background, they sell these parts for around $70 US each. And they tell me l need to drop my price?
One decides that since l am ignoring emails, he will buy all my Buy Now auctions that are listed. All 9 of them, at $35 each.
Because they are instant payment terms, he has to pay via paypal straight away. Which he does.
Then he emails me and gives me the biggest lecture alive about the high cost of my listings. And how he HAD to pay top $$ for them. How dare l have the cheek to list them at that price? (He sells them for much more!)
He wants them posted by courier and he wants them by Christmas (in the US?)
l reply back that l very much doubt he will get them by then as its only 3 working days.
Well. That went well.
Is it any wonder Australia is such a mess when people like you have a business. (Um…you are US and telling me what about your economy?)
Its rude to end your emails with ‘cheers’ when doing business (l were childish and left a parting of ‘would you like fries with that’ on all future emails to him..)
l am your customer and you should do all you can to accomodate me, free postage is the minimum l expect. (Dream on).
l paid the $35 each for them when in fact you had originally listed them as $10 for 10 and didnt sell them. So you owe me a refund. (l’m not even going to answer that one).
l want to buy all the remaining items you have but l will not pay what you are asking. (Hey fuckwit, they are selling at the current price. Who died and made you God?)
l offered to cancel the transaction and refund him his lousy $400. He told me l were rude and he no longer wished to speak to me. Just send out the package and it had better be correct. Mint condition and extras added. (As if).
Now the trouble with Paypal is that he can do a chargeback at any given time if he claims he didnt recieve them.
He paid $54 post on top of the purchase price. It cost me $74 to send them Express International with extra insurance and ID / Signiture confirmation. Try a charge back now, buddy.
Humpf.
Sister said, on hearing the tale, ‘oh, l know where l can get another 4 boxes full. Do you want them?’.
No.
No.
No.
l do not. l want nothing further to do with them. When this current lot of listings end, thats it. No more.
l dont care if its all pure profit.
l dont care if they have made over $1000 in two weeks.
l dont need the headache and rue the day l ever set eyes on these suckers.
My poor post office is buried under paperwork of the kind they didn’t even know exsited. It took over an hour to set the paper trail and they even fed me chocies while l waited.
*mutters*
Chockies??? Chockies???? No-one shared with me!! I’ll remember that one!
Yep. Soft centre ones too.
At one stage l had that much paperwork over the bench, Jenny told her OH to go get me a brandy before l went nuts.
They had never had cause to use half of the paper trail l filled out today. By the time l’d finished, that parcel had a sticker or decleration on every available surface.
Considering l’d come into town for two quick errands, l got stuck at the Trans Centre for over an hour and the post office for another hour.
Mutter
Mutter
Mutter.
You come in and you said summin. But l cant remember what. Did you ask me to do summin or was l to pick up summin?
Fucked if l can remember now.
Nothing was asked of you. I just wished you good luck. I didn’t want to hang around, that’s all. Catch up soon.
Cool. Its was minor bedlam so weren’t sure really what you said.
Catch ya.
Woo. For that kind of profit, if you don’t want to do it tell your sister to send them to me and I’ll sell them (don’t ask me how as I’ve never sold anything in an online auction in my life but for those kinds of $$s I’ll make an exception and learn
)
Sue, you dunt know what you say! No amount of money is worth the type of tossers that have crawled out of the wood work. Tis one big headache.
These bulk buyers only want the lot to resell. Fair enough but they dont want to pay me my selling price even when l know the prices they put up.
And because l wont bend for them, l am being ‘Australian’ and know nothing. Even Aiden said they were the scrapings of the barrel bottom with their attitudes. He says they shouldnt talk to another person in that manner, muchless a female that they dont know.
l’m over it. As soon as the last one of this lot is gone, l’m closing all my listings to domestic only (AU buyers).
And l dont think l’ve heard the last of them either. Those bulk ones that have bought, l fully expect them to try chargebacks through Paypal. They wont succeed but they will mess me around because Paypal will freeze my account while they sort it all out.
Must admit, some of those reasons (plus a lot of other things I’ve heard over the years) are the why of why I have never bought or sold anything on line. I like to be able to see and touch and turn upside down (where appropriate
) whatever it is I’m buying and similarly I’m happier dealing with a real life person (PARTICULARLY when it comes to money 
) than someone flitting in over the airwaves – not that I’m necessarily a hugely better judge of character in person!
l have no issues with dealing through the correct channels with International sales/buying – but l’d rather not use Ebay/Paypal for those dealings.
l have a business mentor in USA (real world) if l need one and he usually susses things out for me.
But he did say from day one that he wipes his hands of online auctions as they are not wise nor practical.
l have no issues with online selling domestic. Been doing it for a few years now and l can count on half of one hand any problems l had.
*sigh*