EBay or Not to EBay....

[Just1Moe]

Does anyone here use EBay to buy things? I've had a bad experience with it some time ago and never looked back. Anyone have any tips or insight on EBay?

[mturnernyc]

I've made a few purchases off of eBay for hard to find items and fortunately never had a problem. One is better off buying from those that have lots of previous sales and excellent reviews from other eBayers (that info is available for every auction on eBay).

[Djeban]

I have used eBay for buying loads of stuff. Have just bought a mountain bike. I never buy from anyone with less than 98% positive feedback - more if possible.
Have got loads of bargains and a couple of duds. I would never spend serious money on there! If in doubt about an item ask the seller a question! I reckon they get sick and tired of my questions!
Djeban

[diziet]

Always ask any questions you have - that way you'll know upfront - no surprises. Make sure you see detailed pictures. Try and keep purchases to people who've got decent feedback rated. I've bought bikes/snowboards on there. As long as you really know what your looking for and ask its usually ok - if in doubt - go to a store and check out comparable stuff and ask instore staff questions. For the snowboardI bought it from a NY based person so we met to see it...that can be good. I think its great....

[drummerman77]

ebay is not good for several reasons. one you cant talk to anyone cause their customer service center is email based and you cant call. Also on their site they have no phone number you have to "google" ebay phone number to find it, and i had a refund coming or shall i say partial refund and it took a long long time

if you must use ebay make sure they accept paypal, if they dont run run run away!!!
i promise you paypal is the best idea with buying from ebay

[ruamax]

I have to say my experience of ebay is not so good, some of the stuff i did off chinese scam artists. never again. total crap. I bought my last car there and sold it at a profit, so ebay like anything in life has its good and bad points.

[RobbiLynn]

I just recently bought a Singer sewing maching from Ebay. I had a great experience and got the machine at a good price, with no problems with shipping.

I also suggest using sellers with a 95% rating and above. Also the paypal is a good thing. I have found that the sellers have responded very quickly to emails I sent when I had a question about the item I wanted to buy. So I think it just depends on who and how and what per each situation.

[michael_sean]

When judging ebay sellers
1) high percetage of positive feed back.
2) significant percentage of feed back on acutions where individual was a seller (you don't want to be somone's first buyer, even if he's been a buyer for a long time.)
3) lots of feed back.

For high ticket items consider escrow services:
http://pages.ebay.com/help/tp/payment-escrow.html

I've bought hundreds of things from ebay. I'm ocasionally disapointed (something wasn't as cool as I thought it would be), but on only two occasions did I feel ripped off.