Selling Toys - Horror Stories & "Happy" Customers

RicksNerdLife said:
I wouldn't even bother sending him those hands now. I would say "You want to be an asshole? Cool. Hands are going in the trash. Was willing to send those out, but you can eat shit now".
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100%. I'd eat whatever the consequences are and just toss the hands in the garbage and make sure all of my responses are like 'I definitely put them in the package, are you sure you didn't throw them out?' Good luck proving to eBay that they weren't in there, dickhead.
 
Just listed a piece of furniture on Marketplace - I hate Marketplace and I hate that I can't anonymize myself at all. But, it's too heavy to ship and I'm ready for it to be gone.

Four minutes later I get a message "Hello, is this still available?" It's literally FOUR minutes later.

Yes.

"Do you have the bench?"

Does it say the bench is included?

"I didn’t say anything about included. Do you have it for sale"

Thanks to this thread, I'm laughing about this. I just responded If it's not listed for sale what makes you think I have it for sale?

Just to see what the next illogical thought might be.
 
Not exactly a horror story, but I have one experience that sticks with me and I always wonder if I made the right call. I was selling a old rare RPG book thing on eBay and it ended up going for a couple of hundred. The buyer was from another country, but the address they gave me was inside the US. It was like an address for an actual post office in California and the package was for general collection or something? I had never seen anything like that before (or since). It immediately set off alarm bells and I canceled the transaction. But the buyer was SUPER mad and just kept arguing with me after I calmly explained multiple times that the address did not check out and was suspect. He got a full refund and everything. He lost nothing. But he just kept trying to convince me for like 2 weeks to send the package. He went so far as to wait the required 3 months to give me negative feedback (I had some sort of seller status that prevented immediate negative feedback).

But can you just ship a package to a post office for general collection/pick-up or something? I couldn't find any info online and I was concerned how eBay would handle things should no one pick it up or the buyer later claimed he never got it. It was an expansive item after all. Did I make the right call?
 
I would say you have to do what you're comfortable with, in which case yes you did.

But I have had that a few times, and gone through with it anyway. My understanding is they get shipped to that address then forwarded on to their actual country or what have you. I just had one but it was for an active military person stationed overseas. I tend to be more anxious about them than I am with even the regular US shipping but so far I haven't had any issues with those ones.
 
iceyman said:
Not exactly a horror story, but I have one experience that sticks with me and I always wonder if I made the right call. I was selling a old rare RPG book thing on eBay and it ended up going for a couple of hundred. The buyer was from another country, but the address they gave me was inside the US. It was like an address for an actual post office in California and the package was for general collection or something? I had never seen anything like that before (or since). It immediately set off alarm bells and I canceled the transaction. But the buyer was SUPER mad and just kept arguing with me after I calmly explained multiple times that the address did not check out and was suspect. He got a full refund and everything. He lost nothing. But he just kept trying to convince me for like 2 weeks to send the package. He went so far as to wait the required 3 months to give me negative feedback (I had some sort of seller status that prevented immediate negative feedback).

But can you just ship a package to a post office for general collection/pick-up or something? I couldn't find any info online and I was concerned how eBay would handle things should no one pick it up or the buyer later claimed he never got it. It was an expansive item after all. Did I make the right call?
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I'd agree with Ru, I think you made the right call. Always go with your gut in situations like that. I've had similar things happen, and most of the time it's all kosher, but a few times- always the times when I check the address first and a little alarm goes off in my head- I've had issues. Heck, sometimes, even when it is a legit transaction, I'll go ahead and cancel unless it's something I know doesn't have to arrive pristine. More often than not, regardless of how well I package the item, it'll arrive damaged if going through one of those forwarding places. Had something the other week that did, and the guy got super pissed (mind you, it was the teeniest, tiniest little scuff) and he demanded I refund not only the shipping, but the VAT he paid, which obviously I have nothing to do with.

Long story short, always go with your gut. Especially with rarer or valuable things- you'll always find someone else to buy it.
 
Ru1977 said:
I would say you have to do what you're comfortable with, in which case yes you did.

But I have had that a few times, and gone through with it anyway. My understanding is they get shipped to that address then forwarded on to their actual country or what have you. I just had one but it was for an active military person stationed overseas. I tend to be more anxious about them than I am with even the regular US shipping but so far I haven't had any issues with those ones.
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I've had the military one before a few times. That gets delivered to an American post-office on the military base overseas and tracking still works and confirms delivery. In this instance, the package was going to be shipped to a domestic post office. And then someone physically would have to show up and claim it. I've probably had close to a 800 eBay transactions now and I've only seen that once.
 
Listed my MK figures (I'm out) as a lot for less than retail. Sale, pick up, no trades.

"Any interest in trades? I live an hour away, we could meet halfway."

Look. Move along.

New buyer: "I can be there in twenty minutes, is cash okay?"

Sell it. Close it.

First guy messages me hours later:

"I sent you an offer and you read it. You left me on seen??? And it's sold now???"

I could not help myself, and told him, "That is all true. However, as my listing was for sale and you offered me a trade, and my listing was for pickup in this part of the city, and you said you lived elsewhere, it occurred to me that there was no point in responding to you because you come across lacking reading comprehension and it would be a waste of both of our times."

He hit me back with a homophobic slur.

I can't fight an unarmed man in a battle of wits, so I left that on read.
 
Funny, unrelated, but related...

I got into it one time with a guy on Facebook years ago over something goofy. I can't even remember exactly what it was, but his aunt had done something stupid in our town, I called it out, and he came into the discussion to come after me for calling it out.

At the end of the spat, he says something to the affect of "Get off of Facebook and go spend time with your ugly wife".

I said, "First of all, my wife is a beautiful woman, and I know you're just saying that to get under my skin--especially when I can see the pictures of *your* girlfriend. Secondly, my wife has nothing to do with this. Say what you want about me, but do not talk about my wife".

He deleted that post fairly shortly after.

But I vowed that day that if I ever see that guy, since it was a local Facebook page and I knew he had to be nearby, it was on sight.

Lo and behold, over the summer, I took on a gig working for my city. Who was the first person they pair me up with? My old buddy who called my wife ugly--now my co-worker.

I texted my wife immediately to tell her that she might have to get some bail money ready, who in turn, literally begged me not to do anything.

But he and I got to talking--talking about life, our families, etc. As the conversation progressed, we moved on to online trolls, people talking tough on Facebook, etc. And I began to regale him with this story of the time this kid called my wife ugly. I never once break eye contact with him, just burning a hole through him.

I see the realization hit his face, and the color just drain from it. He was a big boy, too. A gym bro. I didn't know if I could truly do any damage to him, honestly.

But that's my wife. And I'm not a little guy, myself. And just letting him know that I knew who he was was intimidation in and of itself. I know *I* would shit myself. Lol. That I didn't bark loud, but just spent the whole morning bullshitting and then casually sliding in that little morsel...

...who wouldn't have that "Oh, fuck" moment?

Wouldn't ya know it? Just an overbearingly sweetheart of a guy to me from there on out until I realized the job wasn't for me and left. Funny, that.
 
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I spent a lot of my life, and this is not a brag, genuinely not being afraid enough of what kind of damage other people could do to me. I would get some gym-bro in my face and be like 'I can probably take 'im.' I work out, but I've always been a thin guy, average height. I don't look intimidating in the 'big muscle man' sense. But I bring that pitbull-on-meth energy to a situation that makes much larger guys back up wondering what kind of absolute psychosis is going on in front of them that this little guy will absolutely go ten toes down at a moment's notice with clearly no fear for his own safety.

And the honest truth of that was... I just never thought about it until after. I am 100% a bad case of 'gets mad, sees red.' I'm sometimes surprised I survived as long as I have.
 
I evolved the same. Most of my bullies were not as tall or broad as me and seemed to take issue with that, but could never back it up. Once I learned that I just started calling bluffs no matter how big or aggressive they were.

Alligator mouth, hummingbird ass theory.
 
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