Beware eBAY sharks

[likaleica]

Most of you may not be as daft as to buy a Contax II on eBay, but I did. From a supposedly reputable dealer trading under the eBay name sebsandiego.
It was desribed as being in good working order and so I paid a fairly high price. It arrived looking good cosmetically but with the self-timer not working. The first roll of film did not go through properly, with double exposures..... a second film was OK. On the third film the shutter jammed completely.
Repeated e mails to sebsandiego asking them to contact me have been ignored. I am left with a useless camera which will cost at least £50 to fix (even if I take the risk of shipping it to Oleg Khalyavin in Russia - more if I have it done in the UK).
Please spread the word about such eBay sharks - and give sebsandiego in particular a very wide berth.

Simon

[Tacitus]

I "won" a Leitz 50mm accessory finder from the same guy. His description was "rather optimistic", though the price paid just about 'OK'. I'm not inclined to buy any more from him; there are more dependable sellers on EBay ..... .T.

[likaleica]

I'm not surprised. After threatening to relist the camera on eBay and to name him him with reference to his disregard for customers, I did eventually get a reply from sebsandiego.
Sebsandiego simply insisted he was a "reputable dealer" but made no offer of any kind of recompence for a clearly misrepresented item. As a dealer, even if sebsandiego did not know the shutter was close to failure, it's incumbent on him to make some amends.
Very shabby.

I also think it somewhat outrageous that almost without exception, sebsandiego splits original camera bodies from their matching lenses and even their ever ready cases in order to auction them separately to maximise profit. He is destroying vintage cameras. If we own collectable cameras with matching lenses maybe he is doing us a favour by making our cameras even more valuable....but it's not really the point, is it ?
Added to that, I have only just realised why sebsandiego's cameras look so fantastic in the eBay photos. He jacks up the contrast and the brightness in Photoshop to iron out detail and any imperfection. The modern equivalent of a thorough "airbrushing."
I would like everyone reading the AP forum to boycott sebsandiego to show him that real camera enthusiasts have no truck with his methods. If enough of us do it, he won't get away with it.

[nspur]

I buy a lot on eBay and clean and repair what wants cleaning/fixing and put the cameras/lenses back onto eBay with a detailed description and usually make a reasonable return for my efforts. What I've noticed is that a lot of eBay sellers haven't the faintest idea about cameras and lenses and will say "in good condition" if it looks OK and "in working order" if the film winds on and the shutter makes a noise when the shutter release is pressed. I suppose about half the time I have complained that the goods are faulty I get offered some sort of refund, usually with an "explanation" that they were selling it for a friend that supplied the information, but the other half of the time I get either abuse or no reply. It's part of the eBay experience and is balanced by sometimes winning some reallly good equipment for very little money or getting something described "for spares or repair" when all that was wrong was that the battery had been installed the wrong way round.

I don't think I would bid for a Contax II on eBay but I have bid for several Yashica FX-D (137 clone) outfits that were very cheap because the leatherette had disintegrated.

[Tacitus]

I also think it somewhat outrageous that almost without exception, sebsandiego splits original camera bodies from their matching lenses and even their ever ready cases .....

That is/was a fairly common thing, amongst both the bigger high street shops (when they dealt in used gear) and the smaller ones too.

On the wider points, the real problem is that the UK & EU Distance Selling Regulations (2002) and Companies Act (amended 2007) which regulate mailorder traders and commercial websites, appear to apply to EBay traders who operate as a businesses, as well as to other internet and mailorder traders. Also, while is EBay ostensibly an "auction" it does not appear to be excluded from the aformentioned laws.

So, enforcing the pertinent regulations is difficult, as this is largely the responsibility of local authorities "Trading Standards Departments"; and they are under-resourced, understaffed and often reluctant to take on petty "internet crime" ..... From my discussions with Trading Standards Officers some seem to be unclear about the detailed implications of the 'new' legislation and how to apply it to internet trading in practice.

As a result, many EBay traders can flout the law with virtual (and actual) impunity, especially as EBay itself is essentially rather powerless (and largely unwilling) to impose higher standards - it also regularly claims it has no responsibility to do so. The answer is to be very cautious about volume sellers with dubious ratings, and maybe to deal with EBay Power-sellers (who are sort-of regulated) wherever possible. Good luck. .T.

[Muffin]

I had a very unfortunate experience on eBay whilst trying to buy a flash gun. The firm was emilyandlily and allegedly based in Nottingham but it turned out to be an American company based in New Jersey. They claimed I had ordered two flash guns and then started sending totally illiterate emails to me. eBay weren't interested. They are clearly making quite a lot of dosh from emilyandlily and they don't want to upset them. If you try to leave negative feedback to alert other folk then you find the barriers are up and you can't do it. Knowing that a dealer is 98% genuine is, I'm afraid, not a guarantee of anything.

[T_Sargeant]

Agree with all of the above, I ended up with a totally knackered Rollei from ebay, my first and only "whoopsie". I'm now a lot more careful. The one thing that I really hate are people who "don't know anything about cameras", which usually means they know it's shot it's last photo, but can claim ignorance later, very similar to the people who are "selling their dead fathers collection". I'm not saying that all of the people that say this are being underhanded, but some are.

At the end of the day

Caveat Emptor

[Tacitus]

I guess the one pretty basic check (apart from feedback) is to ask the vendor two or three separate but relevant open questions, rather than just one, or even none at all. By the third reply you may have a different picture of the seller: it may be reassuring, or may reveal some points for concern. Since doing this I have been better able to decide whether to bid or walk away ... and have bought very few 'lemons' compared to a few years back - all considered. .T.

[Muffin]

The one thing I have found so annoying about eBay is that it is quite impossible to communicate with them. You can ignore the very high percentages of folk satisfied with a particular dealer because if they cheat you then you will find it very difficult to leave any negative feed back about them. I wrote at length to eBay about emilyandlily but they just ignored my messages.

[tazio35]

How is it difficult to leave negative feedback? Obviously, there's the risk of being neg'ed in return, but you aren't prevented from leaving feedback, are you?

[Muffin]

Watchdog did a programme recently about eBay and they cited some of the problems. eBay claims to have made changes but not sufficient in my opinion. I had problems with emilyandlily who were allegedly trading out of Nottingham UK but actually trading from New Jersey in the USA. My efforts seem to have filtered through to eBay and emilyandlily are now listed as trading from the US. Leaving proper feedback was quite impossible and even if you can leave feed back it is often only a few words. I tried to buy a flash gun from them but only received totally illiterate emails saying they didn't do flash guns. I bought a flash gun from someone else - totally satisfactorily - and then emilyandlily tried to charge me for two flash guns after sending me another illiterate email saying that the deal had been cancelled. I sent copies of the emails to eBay but they did nothing. Communications with them since the Watchdog programme have got easier!

[0lybacker]

One of the problems on eBay is that you get people selling photo kit who do house clearances for a living and know nothing about specialist stuff. They clear a place for a set fee, find camera gear, ask mates at the pub if it works and is worth anything and then put on eBay. If you learn to read between the lines of the description you can often work out if the seller is genuine and knows what he/she is talking about.

[Larry Shone]

Anyone familiar with a seller named peterw4000? We just ordered a camera from him, his rep is all good.