Power Sellers Unite

dobermomm · Joined: 26 Dec 2006 Posts: 2

It seems eBay has a new trick up their sleeves. This may be old news to some but I just learned (the hard way) that Power Sellers now have sales account managers. I had a recent problem with a seller. I bought several items, paid for them, and then watched them as they were resold. The seller refused to send me my item.After trying everything and spending several months doing so I finally posted negative feedback. Almost a week later I was contacted by Jason Schwartz-eBay Senior Account Manager.

He said "Hello my name is Jason Schwartz and I am an account manager at eBay. It has been brought to my attention that you are having problems with a recent purchase from l**********t." He said he wanted to help me get this fixed to my satisfaction. I sent him back the information that he requested which included that I had purchased the items elsewhere (one of which cost me double). He NEVER read that because his next e-mail said that they were sending my merchandise. I told him again that I already had it. The items arrived and I tried to send them back. He e-mailed again saying that since I had now received my item (free of charge) he would like it if I would "revise" my feedback by making it positive instead of negative. He said they would remove me from their blocked list and everything would them be fine. So, I revised it.

He sent me another e-mail to say thank you and to let me know That they would not remove me from their blocked list after all-since "negative feedback is a emotional issue". After that He would not reply to my e-mail and I have never heard from him again.

A few days ago I called eBay about this. Long story short---- they did not even take down his name. They told me that he worked for this seller and other sellers and that this was common practice. I never knew sellers had their very own eBay employees to manage their accounts, let alone someone who would contact unhappy customers to try to get feedback revised.

Had I known up-front that Mr. Jason Schwartz represented the seller I would have never spoken with him. I feel that he should have told me that he was working for them in the first contact.

I was told by eBay that once feedback is revised there is nothing that can be done about it. I feel cheated and manipulated.

I have every e-mail that passed between us and offered to forward them to anyone who would take the time to help me. They didn't even want to look at one not to mention the 17 separate e-mails that were sent/received.

To make matters worse the three other negatives I had left for this seller were removed by eBay after my conversation They were only factual and to the point. I said nothing derogatory in them just stated the facts.

How is this type of manipulation allowable? How is it that eBay allows this type of behavior from one of it's Account Managers?? How is this fair to the regular eBay member who isn't a power seller (although I have 100% positive feedback since the day I first joined)? How is it right for them to remove your feedback?

Please pass this on so others may avoid what happened to me.

Baconsdozen · Joined: 06 May 2008 Posts: 753

Did you try getting your money back via paypal?.

surplusdealdude · Joined: 07 Aug 2009 Posts: 551

Doubtful that this guy you dealt with worked for ebay at all - it was just the seller's way of scamming you to change your feedback.

Stockmiser · Joined: 03 Jun 2006 Posts: 1146

When you say that you "received the items (free of charge)" do you mean that you already were refunded and got the items anyway?

Why did you spend "several months" on this? This is a simple "Item not received" issue (assuming you paid and were not refunded). You file with paypal, they fail to show delivery, you get back your money back - it's a 100% slam-dunk for the buyer.

When you say that the seller "resold" the items, I thought the items were somehow unique. But then you say that they sent you the same items months later. So they were not unique. So your assumption that the seller "resold" the items is really nothing more than him relisting the same auction for duplicate items - something sellers do all the time, over and over again.

It seems that the only thing the "ps rep" offered you was to get "unblocked" in exchange for FB removal. So did they send you a FB revision request or not?

So they removed the negs - what did you say? Some "factual" info is not allowed. Other reasons why FB could be removed is if they thought it was malicious (competitor, retaliation), or if your contact information was not valid at the time of purchase (this included phone#, address, and email).

Also...did ebay ever confirm that Jason Shwartz was actually an ebay employee? I've heard of a lot of things on ebay, but I've never heard of a power seller rep call a customer on the seller's behalf.

thegolfingdolphin · Joined: 13 Jan 2009 Posts: 617

surplusdealdude - you got this correct that this Mr. Jason Schwartz is not with eBay at all, but the actual seller or a friend of the seller.

as Stockmiser said seller everyday relist items after they are sold, and this is more than likely the case here. The seller just messed up on your order, and it got buried somewhere until the feedback you left.

If this is still bothering you, you could look up the phone record and see what the number was that called you, and call it back to see who answers. There does seem to be a bit of fraud here, but I am not sure of the seriousness of it. with the phone info and the e-mails you could probably get something done.

armourereric · Joined: 25 Aug 2008 Posts: 116

I have been selling medieval armour, hand made by me, on ebay for 11 years. About 3 years after I started, around 2003, several armour sellers popped up on ebay that were selling poor quality imitations made in India, or Pakistan. I ran into one seller based in Conneticut at a medieval tourney in Yuma about 4 years go, he told me that he did have an ebay employed account manager, it was a perk resulting from the $12K in montly seller fees this person generated. The seller told me about all kind of special programs ebay made available to him for generating such fees, one of which especially caught my attention: He was having my items blocked from search in New England for an extra $1 per my listings :(.

Eric

Stockmiser · Joined: 03 Jun 2006 Posts: 1146

LOL

I think that other armor selling is feeding you a line of BS.

I know sellers a LOT bigger than that, and believe me, that kind of service could not be kept a secret.

What he probably was alluding to was some of the old "add ons" you could use to get higher placement (like the old featured plus).

Far as PS account managers - they have always had them.

elpereles · Joined: 15 Dec 2006 Posts: 1398 Location: Puerto Rico

I don't understand something. I have some questions. How you can leave Feedback after "several" months? Why so interesting in being remove from the block list?

In my case, I don't receive an item in a month. I will begin to send e-mail to the seller asking for it until I get an answer. If he doesn't answer in a week I will made the process to get my $$$ back. But i will not spend "several" months. If the seller is a "bad one", I will think twice or more before buying again from him. So I don't care if I'm in the seller's block list. :wink: