How is it possible to scam people on eBay?
Summary: The discussion concerns concerns about potential scam risks on eBay. chemetoc_11 raises the question of how users can be scammed on the platform. marioelegio and heavenwelkin respond, but the details of their answers are not provided.
Over these past few weeks I’ve looked at hundreds of phone listings on Ebay and they’re all fake. Phones sold as new, sealed, never used, etc., when in reality they’re used or refurbished phones. There are dozens and dozens of sellers doing this, so it’s common practice. I’ve tried reporting some of these sellers to Ebay, with chat logs between me and the sellers, pointing out that the listing says the phones are new but then they admitted they weren’t in the chat, and nothing Ebay says it’s in line with Ebay policy.
At the nth scam listing I ask myself: 1) how it can be possible that Ebay allows scamming. 2) How this crap can be put to an end.
heavenwelkin
·9 months agoDear chemetoc_11
Since honesty and seriousness are no longer fashionable, I’d rather ask why society is degenerating so fast?
Automated systems have too many false positives, which is why manual reports are relied on, but manual reports also need a human operator to review them.
If there are lots of reports and few operators, a lot of reports don’t get checked.
I had bought (not on ebay) a hair clipper from the official reseller and he provided me with the DHL tracking number, but it was delivered 200 km away from the shipping address.
If you’re not more than savvy and don’t know how to navigate this jungle of dishonesty and coldness, you get overwhelmed by it.
I had to go through a procedure I didn’t know, contact DHL and have them put in writing by email or chat that that tracking code did not match the address provided on the sales portal.
For privacy reasons they can’t tell you where it was delivered, but they can confirm that it didn’t go to the address you provided them.
After that I had to get in touch with the human agent (luckily it wasn’t an AI or automated system) who contacted the seller and invited them to respond within 5 working days.
The seller never got back to me and the agent unlocked the refund for me.
Getting in touch with an agent was, among the various options, the least intuitive and hardest one to reach.
From what I’ve read around, if you rely on automation, once it verifies that the item was delivered it closes the dispute in the seller’s favor.
I also noticed that in this seller’s feedback there wasn’t even a single missing delivery for issues like mine.
In 2025, if you’re a buyer who needs to make a purchase or get a gift, to play it safe you have to go back to the old tried-and-true method: go in person to a physical seller, whether private or professional, whether they have a shop or sell online, and check everything carefully yourself before paying, because by now you really can’t trust anyone anymore.
Best regards
marioelegio
·9 months agoIt’s not easy to monitor millions of listings, but I think they should improve their AI; today it’s a disaster and all it does is reply that it hasn’t found anything unusual.
A few weeks ago I reported listings for codes for purchasing with appliance bonus. Those codes aren’t for sale, and on top of that the listings explicitly asked for payment outside eBay. Despite the reports, the listings were not removed.
hi
mario