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The eBay Watchdog has noticed a further decline in the customer service standards at eBay over the last 12 months. We have been monitoring eBay closely and have investigated a number of general and personal complaints which required eBay's attention.
Many of these personal complaints were serious enough to jeopardise the safety and legal rights of consumers. We also investigated a great many general complaints and issues which undermine the eBay marketplace experience for eBay members in terms of usability and fairness.
One of our general complaints concerns seller listing violations, whereby sellers have either purposely misrepresented items or are avoiding seller fees by using inflated postage packaging charges. We have dealt with the later complaint in the past and have put significant pressure on eBay to address the issue of P&P overcharging as this has had serious implications in the past for buyer refunds due to PayPal's previously illegal business practise of not refunding P&P charges.
After ignoring our complaints regarding inflated P&P charges and sitting on the fence for over a year they eventually decided they were going to put new rules in place on P&P overcharging. However as our investigation shows, these rules are not being enforced and complaints about this kind of practise by sellers are still being ignored, particularly if the seller is an established high volume seller.
Over the last 12 months we have reported many sellers to eBay who are either misrepresenting items or overcharging on P&P. We receive the usual standard responses from eBay assuring us they take complaints seriously and will investigate. However so far, to our knowledge, not a single complaint has been investigated and all of the sellers we identified are continuing the same practises several months after our complaints were brought to eBay's attention.
Other more serious complaints concerned sellers who are blatantly acting illegally by denying consumers their legal rights under the Distance Selling Regulations 2000. We have discovered a great many business sellers who are not registered on eBay as businesses and yet are carrying on trade without displaying their business address and contact details which is illegal requirement under British and European law. The responsibility for enforcing this law and making sure sellers are fully in compliance rests firmly with eBay. We understand that eBay can't check every seller listing to enforce compliance, however when either the eBay Watchdog or other eBay members identify a seller trading illegally, eBay has a legal responsibility to act. Clearly they are not carrying out their legal duties, as sellers we have reported are still trading illegally months later.
Another more worrying issue concerns business sellers on eBay who are trying to avoid their legal statutory obligations regarding returns and refunds under the Distance Selling Regulations 2000 There are a great many sellers on eBay who are displaying illegal terms and conditions concerning refunds. Examples include charging a "handling fee" on returns (often as high as 20%) which is deducted from customers refunds, not allowing customers to open and examine goods, or not allowing returns on goods which have been opened. Another illegal practise which is widespread on eBay by sellers concerns the deducting of P&P charges from refunds. Many business sellers openly state on eBay listings they do not refund P&P charges which is illegal. eBay has done nothing to stamp these practises out and it's current seller policy rules which clearly state sellers legal obligations are not being actively enforced.
We have also pointed out to eBay that their current returns interface on the eBay website is contrary to the law, as it requires buyers to request permission from sellers to return items, and sellers can decline the right to return items. This is hindering and obstructing consumers legal rights.
All eBay buyers have the legal right under the Distance Selling Regulations 2000 to return an item purchased on eBay's "Buy It Now" format listings within 7 days of delivery for a full refund. There are very few exceptions to this rule and businesses cannot decline returns, charge handling fees, or withhold P&P.
eBay has the legal duty to ensure these consumer rights are protected and enforced on eBay.
Anyone who has had cause to contact eBay will no doubt be aware of how difficult it is in the first place to contact them and secondly, how they deploy standard scripted responses which are designed to look "personalised". eBay regularly carries out "Customer Service Questionnaires" which they claim are intended to improve their customer service experience for eBay members. We looked closely at these questionnaires and discovered they are nothing more than a tool for eBay to assess how well it's doing at avoiding providing customer service and fooling customers into thinking they are getting personal customer service.
Quite frankly, we are appalled by the lack of concern and conduct from eBay over these issues. It continues to demonstrate that eBay are avoiding their responsibilities towards customers and are continuing to put profits ahead of fairness and the interests of members.
In a separate article, we describe in detail a recent investigation into an eBay buyers incredibly bad experience of eBay/PayPal's so-called "Buyer Protection" after the customer made a "Item Not As Described" return claim on an £800 purchase which was not refunded by the seller. This makes for scary reading and makes us question just how safe purchasing on eBay with PayPal really is.
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