eBay Hall of Shame
Although it may not seem like it sometimes, 99% of eBay sellers honest folk who write accurate ads, pack items well, ship promptly and honor return policies on mistakes or shipping damage. Of course, there's always a few bad apples around who want to spoil it for the hard workers.
The real problem on eBay isn't outright dishonest sellers (although they exist), it's usually more a slippery combination of laziness, incompetence and lack of personal responsibility when money is involved. I'm working on getting up some pages that give tips on how to avoid the obvious pitfalls to buying on eBay. For now, though, I present you with the first entry in the eBay Hall of Shame.
Irresponsible seller #1 : Louis Yezo (topfuel1941)
This is probably the most typical kind of problem seller on eBay: He seems friendly and helpful until something goes wrong due to his own mistake, at which point he suddenly becomes confrontational then tries to ignore the problem. For all that people complain about PayPal, their Buyer Protection actually works well to stick it to sellers who bung their fingers in their ears and sing "I'M NOT RESPONSIBLE! LA LA LA! CAN'T HEAR YOU!"
This started out as a good transaction, with a responsive seller who claimed he was going to follow my packing suggestions. What he actually did was ignore my requests, do a few other unrelated things that he claimed followed my suggestions, pack a 35 lb iron machine completely naked and loose inside a bentwood case, then blame me for not buying insurance when it arrived smashed up. Insurance wouldn't have helped-- USPS will not honor insurance claims when the packing job was obviously inadequate.
Lou responded to one email and then ignored me until I filed a PayPal dispute. PayPal's dispute process looks *very* unkindly on sellers who try to ignore problems.
Dispute resolution: full refund including shipping