eBay and PayPal = monopoly
Someone at the Justice Department needs to look into how people are being gouged by ONE company handling both the auctions and the ONLY sanctioned online payment service offered by eBay.
To list my Mac Pro on eBay, it cost me $37. When it sells, its going to add on another $60-70 in “final value fees.” THEN if the buyer isn’t local (please be local, please be local), and they pay via PayPal (also owned by eBay), that will be ANOTHER $70 in fees paid to them.
$37 to list ~$70 based on the final auction bid ~$70 for PayPal's cut ----- $177 in fees!
That’s equal to the entire six-month insurance policy quote I received on a travel trailer we’re looking into buying.
I think eBay has lost its person-to-person charm. I have used eBay since 1999 when it was in its infancy. It was SOO much better back then. It was a time before every company in the world decided to cash in on the eBay craze. Nowadays its really hard to find items that are sold by actual PEOPLE and not businesses. Personally, I wish eBay would have developed a completely separate business-postings site (ebayscams.com, for example) and left eBay as a strict person-to-person exchange. What it is now is not what it once was, and I miss the good ole’ days. Wow. I’m only 32, and I’m talking about the “good ole’ days.”
But, where else is there to go? Yahoo! gave up on auctions. The other auctions sites have at most a hundred users or so, if that. Sounds like a monopoly charging whatever it wants because it can to me.
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August 5th, 2008 at 8:21 pm
I agree!!
August 6th, 2008 at 5:47 am
Craigslist? More likely to get a local buyer and less of the middle-man problems presented by eBay. You lose some of the “security” of working through eBay for whatever it’s worth (becaues eBay and PayPal haven’t been especially good about handling one or two less than satisfactory transactions we’ve done).
I remember the “good ole days” of the 90s on eBay too. The culture has shifted a bit.
August 6th, 2008 at 8:16 am
Well I have the computer listed on my local Craiglist, like I said in a previous post, and so far, I’ve had 3 people offer me $500 for it (1/6th its value) and FOUR requests to ship it to the United Kingdom with the buyer paying via Western Union. I like Craigslist, I’ve bought and sold a lot on it, but the computer and technology board is the most fraud-filled exchange forum in the world.
For example, I’m looking to buy a MacBook Pro with the money I make off of my Mac Pro. There have been several listed on my Craigslist over the past couple weeks. I think I’ve sent questions or requested more information on about 9 or 10 of them. Only one was from a legitimate seller that would let me come actually see the computer locally before buying. The other ads listed the item as being in my area, but once you contact them they say, “Oh, I just left for school in England,” or Germany, or some other country where they want you wire them $3,000 and trust they’ll send you what you paid for. I’ve had EIGHT of those contacts. And because of Craigslist’s anonymous posting “feature” you have no way of knowing if all the MacBook Pros listed one morning are all from the same scammer.
No, an eBay-like service that is restricted to individuals only is what the Internet needs. And if someone can pull it off and compete with eBay, it would be a hit. Of course, if it became a hit, then it would probably run into the same problems that eBay is facing — being too big to be monitored by anyone.
August 8th, 2008 at 5:26 am
Ah. I missed the previous post about Craigslist. Well, it looks like it worked out OK on eBay after all.