Recently I needed to replace a hose for my vacuum cleaner. As a result, I registered an account on ebay providing the requested information and began my search. I had previously had an account with ebay several years ago but in the interim I had moved, changed email addresses, phone numbers and credit cards.

When I found an acceptable hose on the ebay site I ordered it through paypa.l After several weeks with no hose received I contacted the seller who replied that the hose had been delivered via ups and left on my porch. This was interesting in that I had no porch and lived on the upper floor of an apartment building.

After contacting the seller once again, I discovered that the hose had been sent not to the address supplied in the recent account registration but to one linked to the old/dormant account not used in several years. At the same time the current billing information was supplied, and I was charged the selling price of the hose.

After contacting the seller, he informed me that he had fulfilled his responsibilites as directed with information provided by paypal and ebay (which was true). He then informed me that he had nothing to do any further with the transaction. After once again asking him to run a trace on the package, he refused. I then reviewed the transaction on paypal as unsatisfactory providing the facts fo the case. The seller then sent me several emails calling me a jerk and threatening to ruin my "100% ebay" reputation which he did with a flourish of postings to ebay calling me the biggest jerk he had ever met and a ripoff artist.

Following the trail backwards, I then contacted paypal noting that the transaction as completed included several discrepencies which should have been noted. The shipping address transferred from ebay to paypal was clearly other than the one registered with both ebay and paypal. Paypal responded that they only ship to addresses provided them and registered to the users account. I then replied that the address which they provided the seller had been given neither to paypal or ebay by me and that they shipped to an address other than that of the account holder of record. Guess what? They once again informed me they ship only to addresses provided them.

Following the trail to its origin, I contacted ebay informing them that they did not forward the information for shipping as provided. I provided them with information that they utilized information which was not provided by me in registering a new account and that they had no right to link the new account to the long dormant account. Nothing other than my name was duplicated between accounts.

I did not authorize or direct them to utilize outdated and inaccurate information from the old account. And I inquired why they would supply inaccurate shipping information from a dormant and unauthorized account but provide the correct billing information from the current account.

At the same time, I entered my ebay account utilizing the username, email address and password provided in the recent registrationl. There I discovered that the account information provided was not that supplied in registering and reflected that provided in the old dormant account. After attempting to correct the information and leaving the ebay site, I discovered on my return that the information reset to the old/inaccurate account information.

I once again attempted to change the information--apparantly successfully. However, when it came to changing the email address--an address which I used to enter the ebay site--the system refused to make the revisions informing me that the new email address was registered to another user--me. After several attempts the ebay system refused to let me change the email address to the one used to enter the system.

In the interim, I communicated via email several times with ebay informing them of my dissatisfaction with their oversight of the transaction, the fact that they divulged private and outdated information which I had not authorized them to divulge and the fact that their errors caused me a significant financial lose. They once again replied stating they do not divulge private information and only utilize information provided by them.

Again I noted, they did not use the accurate information I supplied in registering the new account and that they supplied the seller information from a second and separate account. Again ebay replied with the run around contradicting the facts of the case.

I finally stated clearly:

1. That I was totally dissatisfied with the role of ebay in overseeing the transaction

2. That in the process of completing the account ebay released private information from a second separate account without authorization

3. That as a result of ebay's negligence in this case I incurred a financial lose

4. That I wanted to be informed of the internal process for adjudicating this case

5. That I wanted information to contact ebay customer service, the name of their vice president for customer service and the appropriate contact information him/her

6. That I wanted information regarding regulatory commissions overseeing ebays operatins and the means for filing complaints with those commission regarding e-bay's negligence in this manner.

E-bay promptly responding that they only provide information supplied by the ebay member and do not violate the privacy of its members.

So here I sit without the hose, with a $50 charge on my credit card, unable to correct my ebay account to reflect accurate information, with private information from a second/outdated account being divulged by ebay and being insulted by the original seller who though originally only completing the transaction following inaccurate information proviided by ebay and playpal has now taken it upon himself to slander my good name rather than complete a simple ups trace. And clearly, clearly with no sense of confidence in the continued business practices of e-bay.

The only thing e-bay in this case did was make a simple purchase far too complcated.

Edward

avon, Indiana
U.S.A.

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7 Updates & Rebuttals

Tracy

Brocton,
New York,
U.S.A.

Response

#2Consumer Comment

Mon, April 10, 2006

Hey, I have to agree with one of the people who posted here. If you created a NEW ebay account, there is NO way for them to confuse the 2. I know this because I did this when my husband and I split up. I also created a new PayPal account, samething. PayPal uses email addresses, if you used the old email or any email connected to your previous PayPal account, then you would be linked to the previous PayPal account. This is not true with Ebay. Sorry dude, have to agree with the person who said that you have a box that pops up with your registered shipping address with PayPal. You didn't pay attention. My PayPal was linked with my former address, when I bought something from ebay, and paid thru paypal I noticed my former address, I corrected this by clicking the link to remove the former address and added my new address. Its all common sense. They didn't rip you off, you ripped yourself off.

Kim

Astoria,
New York,
U.S.A.

You Have Recourse; Don't Stand Alone:

#3Consumer Comment

Sun, April 09, 2006

Your state attorney general will be very helpful in bank matters, and may be useful concerning business accounts with Ebay and Paypal, also. The postmaster general might be able to help, since this involves misinformation about your address and postal deliveries (so it could constitute mail fraud.) The SBA/FEMA is now associated with Ebay (providing a multi-billion dollar funding source to Ebay and new entrepeneurs.) It might be a good idea to phone your local SBA director and ask for constructive solutions. (They might not like their name being associated with bad business practices and be willing to help you.) Media is powerful. Getting on a TV news consumer complaint segment (or paper, or e-zines) will get wider coverage and a more favorable outcome. Making the incident very public allows others to know how you've been treated, allows public officials to document their effectiveness, and allows 'offenders' to be publicly scrutinized and penalized. (Often, companies will refund a consumer's losses in time for airing/publication.) Take heart; you're not alone; use the system.

Edward

Avon,
Indiana,
U.S.A.

implications for the ebay consumer

#4Author of original report

Sat, April 08, 2006

In the big picture, I am out only $50 but there are some real implications for the consumer. First as has been noted above ebay seems to divorce themeselves from quality of service issues. Forget that someone at the wrong address to which the vacuum cleaner hose was sent stole it. Forget that I can not access the chain of shipment from ups because I am the purchaser at the right addresss instead of the one on record at the old address. Forget the fact that the seller refuses to cooperate and is abusive. You would think ebay would show some concern for the overall process and interest in securing customer satisfaction. This is a transaction gone wrong and all I have gotten from them is statements of policy. That is simply not acceptable business practice. The seller has my money. The resident at the old address has a hose they did not purschase and ebay does not show any interrest in the fact that they compromised a customer's private information by mixing and matching two separate accounts. For any one reading this think about this the next time you purchase from ebay. Is there someone out there with your name who also has an account on ebay. Ebay had no right to assume that the old information on the old account was linked to me in any way. I could not even access the old account because I had in the interim simply forgotten about its details. I knew I once had an account but I did not know what the user name was or even the password. By all rights that account should have stayed separate and dormant. Furthermore ebay continues to confuse the two accounts. After experiencing this disaster, I have attempted to purge all personal information in the new ebay account until I can get some closure from ebay prior to closing it out completely. Yesterday I accessed the current account using current information and once again the errant/old address appeared as the default shipping address. I have seen ads advertising the security of ebay and ebay certainly does have a loyal customer base but this should be a point of real concern. Ebay may decide that the fault in this case is mine (even though the evidence is to the contrary). If that is the case so be it. But to date they have made absolutely no attempt to investigage the facts fo the matter. Information that has been relayed to me by them is simply blind statements of policy that could have been output by a mailboot. If, however,there is in fact some flaw in their it framework which would put customers at risk, one would think they would make an attempt to investigate it. To date they have made no attempts to do so. I frequently purchase over the internet and I have had purchase go wrong. But whether an error on my part or on the part of the seller, at least the selling organization has showed some concern and follow-up. Quite frankly a similar event occurred shortly after moving from the residence cited in this example. I purchased a thumbdrive from Buy.com and it was mistakenly sent to my old residence instead of the residence on record. Not only did Buy.com attempt to trace the package, they contacted the postal service and initiated the investigation. In the end the drive was never found and no definitive determinaton made concerning what went wrong in the chain of shipment; but buy.com did conmpensate by crediting my account. Guess who I do internet business with from here on in?

Charlottesville,
Virginia,
U.S.A.

ebay and paypal are great ideas but have poor/non-existent customer service

#5Consumer Suggestion

Sat, April 08, 2006

Dear friend, I'm wondering that since paypal and ebay each require separate user names and log-in if it is possible that your address was still listed as the old one when you paid via paypal. What I don't understand is why ebay's system kept changing your address back. I personally have been both a buyer on and a seller through ebay with modest success and hopes of building a nice trickle of steady income eventually. However, I have noticed that when an issue arises on either ebay or paypal it seems barely worth bothering to try and contact customer support. They seem to either have the attitude that that ebay and paypal are only a "vehicle" and it isn't their problem: and/or the people sending out the form letter "help" emails are there to do just that and are powerless to offer and real help beyond an attempt at placation. Personally, I have enjoyed using both ebay and paypal (which was bought by ebay) for the most part. However, along the way I have had little annoying things come up which make me keenly aware that very big problems could occur. Do I think they are corrupt? No. Do I think they are at times inept, poorly organized and could down right cause and individual serious problems because of it? Yes. I'll give you two brief examples from my personal experience: Paypal #1: I funded my paypal account using my check card, which has a credit card logo. However it was strictly a bank/check card which could be used as either credit or debit but had no limit above which my account contained. Having always used it simply as I would a check I funded my account with this card. I ended up returning a purchase I had made with hopes of dividing and reselling on ebay. It was a rather large purchase of 2,880.25. The money just faded off into "limbo" for a few days. The response I got from paypal was: "Due to credit card policy, credits to credit cards can appear up to 30 days after the refund was completed." I emailed them back and forth which seemed to resolve nothing. By the time I got nowhere bothering with that the payment materialized and "all was well". However, I can see how missing close to $3,000 for a few days could have easily caused a small business all sorts of problems. From this I can see why paypal would draw a lot of flack and I'm sure some of the complaints are well justified. #2 ebay: Ebay has this funny way of billing where they tell you how much you owe for the month but then they don't actually take it out of your seller's account for about a month. Well, that sounds like a good thing, right? One month I realized I was going to be just about broke so I went ahead and sent the payment in before they auto-drafted it in order to get that bill taken care of. Sounds good on my part, right? Thinking ahead and being responsible, right? The thing is they went ahead and took the payment out again. It wasn't much, less than $100 but it caused my account to overdraw. The bank covered it but penalized me with a service charge for that. When I emailed ebay and complained they basically told me tough crap with the bank, and something about how they invoice in the thousands and they are not necessarily updated..la de da da and so on. I went to the bank and complained about the service charge. I told them ebay should be responsible for it since I had already paid that bill once. The teller at the bank misunderstood and cancelled the payment they had covered so now ebay also tried charging me a service fee for that. After emailing back to ebay, they did say they'd refund the service charge since it was my "first time" or whatever. But even then the billing lagged behind so I believe I still had to pay it the next month but then it was credited back in a later month. The bank also was kind enough to refund the service charge although personally I think they should have made ebay pay it. All this because I tried to pay a bill early???? I mean ebay and paypal are multi-million dollar corporations aren't they? No I take that back. I just went over to moneycentral.msn.com and their market cap is in fact a staggering 53.72 Billion. I mean come on is it really too much to ask that they have efficient customer service that actually could resolve a problem or glitch before it causes a cascade of problems for a small business? Is it too much to ask that they use some basic accounting software and keep their records up to date? I mean come on when I go to the store and buy groceries the debit is already on my bank account by the time I get home. Should there really be a three-month lag on it? In my opinion the model could be much better executed and the management must be very poor. They are riding on their names instead of trying to make themselves better. I also feel that since ebay now owns paypal that they should offer a discount for ebay customers who order through paypal. 2.7% doesn't seem like a great deal but when you add it together you have to pay about 6% to sell something through paypal on ebay. That makes it more than sales tax would be in most areas and kind of defeats the whole purpose. Still, there are surely some good things to be said about ebay and paypal. They could both be a whole lot better though. Or better yet someone could come along with something better and starting really dipping in to their market share. Sorry if I went off on a bit of a tangent. I'm just letting you know I feel your pain. If you'd bought from me I would have certainly been willing to help you locate the item. I'd get the tracking number and go through the delivery service. They shouldn't have left the package without someone signing for it. You should be able to either track it down or get a refund that way. Did you pay $1.30 for insurance up to $50?

Holly

Taylorville,
Illinois,
U.S.A.

Just an FYI to help you in the future

#6Consumer Suggestion

Sat, April 01, 2006

Just an FYI to help you or anyone else. I have a home based business that ships via UPS. You can log on to UPS (just provide you addresss and e-mail) and you can track your purchase online and with e-mail alerts. You can also check that they have the correct address this way. I am not affiliated with ebay, paypal, or ups but just wanted to provide some assistance. Good Luck in the future.

Denny

Honolulu,
Hawaii,
U.S.A.

In all of this convoluted story, why did you just not use your old account?

#7Consumer Comment

Thu, March 30, 2006

just because its outdated, you know you can update your informatoin on your old account? As far as the seller is concerned, he delivere the product to the address that was supplied him. I dont know where in your story how ebay could have given him your old address unless YOU DID Use your old account and didn't bother to update the account with your new information. that's where it gets confusing, because there is no way that Ebay can mix up two different member id's addresses and information, UNLESS you inputed the old information from your old account onto your new one. YOU did say you made a new account with ebay right? Did you also make a new account with paypal? confusing story at most.

Dave

Jacksonville,
Florida,
U.S.A.

Now Wait a Darn Minute

#8Consumer Comment

Thu, March 30, 2006

I have done hundreds of Paypal transactions. When you buy something, and you pay with Paypal, there is a little window that comes up with your SHIPPING ADDRESS INFO. It clearly states what Paypal has as your current address, and if you click on it, it will drop down with other addresses in there. It appears that you didn't verify your address before completing the transaction. Every time I use Paypal, I send a message in their box with my Shipping Address, just in case. This sounds like your fault here. Plus, the seller already traced the package, he fulfilled his end of the transaction, he didn't deserve negative feedback for your mistake!

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