demonizing the web auction site

[mike1003]

ebay local is free//nofees etc

[Indianna]

Thanks for starting this topic, Rasputin! 

I feel that ebay provides a good balance between buying and selling.  Buyers are well protected against most problems - there is even a new paypal feature that I really like where you can "pay after delivery" meaning that the seller receives the money right away but the buyer is not charged for 2 weeks which should be plenty of time for the item to be delivered and inspected.  This is great for high cost items so that you don't have to worry about having your money tied up waiting for a large refund if something goes wrong.  I recently used this feature to buy something on my son's behalf (parts for his car) which cost over $100 but after a few days (and even providing a UPS tracking number) the seller cancelled the deal saying that he was "out of stock" (even though he was still offering multiples of the same item!) so I am glad that I didn't have to worry about getting my money back (and of course I will never use that seller again.)

Sellers do have some ebay costs, of course, but I always think of those costs relative to the overhead if one had an actual brick and mortar store or if one were selling at a consignment store.  I think the ebay seller costs are pretty reasonable in comparison.    

[hauden_lukas]

The bad thing is not the fees - it is the sellers who offer spare parts at outrage prices. In general, ebay prices are renowned for being way over the top. Of course, bargains are always possible.

[Pynedor]

The rationale is - if you snipe and snipe the highest amount you win. If you snipe and it is less than the next highest bidder you lose.

That's just the truth.

I think if you want access to the services, you have to pay the price (either the monetary price or the skill of the bid price). I still enjoy buying things in person more than over the Internet though.

[bonniebeth]

If you want to sell for no fees, that pretty much limits you to a garage sale or a local classified ad if you have a free ad section in your newspaper. But that means you have a narrow market, not likely to contact other collectors, and you're not going to get what it's worth. Yeah, some sellers charge too much, but if you don't like the price, you don't have to buy it! If everyone is charging that much, and people are buying it at that price, then face it, that rare part or set is worth a lot and you're just going to have to pay accordingly. That's just the law of supply and demand. And none of it is ebay's fault.