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General Question about Internet Sales/Ettiquette
idsman75
Member Posts: 13,398 ✭✭✭
I'm not a big seller of goods on the internet. Sometimes I have odds and ends or parts or whatever it is that I decide to sell.
If a seller ships within 48 hours of payment is that considered late?
What do most sellers do when a buyer sends a form of payment other than what was specified in the terms of the sale? I never hear chatter about buyers sending incorrect forms of payment.
If a seller ships within 48 hours of payment is that considered late?
What do most sellers do when a buyer sends a form of payment other than what was specified in the terms of the sale? I never hear chatter about buyers sending incorrect forms of payment.
Comments
Woods
Buyers get nervous when they are fairly certain the seller should have received payment and nothing happens -- I know I do -- why wouldn't I? If I know what's going on I feel a lot better.
The accepted routine is to hold personal checks for 10 days to clear. If somebody sends the wrong form of payment you can either return it to them with a print-out of your auction highlighting the policy, or hold the check until it clears your bank and then send the item. It will cost you a stamp to return their wrong form of payment, but it's worth it sometimes. I don't feel sorry for folks who insist on sending personal checks because so many sellers don't take them that buyers should be reading auctions specifically for that. But I don't automatically ship the instant I receive a money order or even PayPal, since fraud is a game some people play nowadays. I wait until the bank is happy, which only takes a couple days. That's why the 72 hour window from receipt of funds.
And of course if you must return payment and re-post an auction you will want to ask the auction site for credit of their fee, which will require reporting the buyer for non-payment. So be sure you are in the right and your auction says what you think it says.
T. Jefferson: "[When doing Constitutional interpretation], let us [go] back to the time when [it] was adopted. [Rather than] invent a meaning [let us] conform to the probable one in which it was passed."
What do most sellers do when a buyer sends a form of payment other than what was specified in the terms of the sale? I never hear chatter about buyers sending incorrect forms of payment.
I would say it would all depend on the individual circumstances; it's something one has to decide as it occurs.
I sold a Porsche part on Fleabay for a few hundred dollars--I had minimal feedback (all from purchases, no sales) so the buyer was taking some risk buying from me. I specified a Postal Money order; the buyer sent me a "major brand" commercial MO. Since he had significant, recent positive feedback as a buyer (of other Porsche parts too) I "let it slide."
I mentioned it in an email to him, but not in his feedback and still gave him an A+ for the transaction. Unfortunately he never left me any feedback (I sent him one follow up email asking for some, but when he didn't respond, I didn't pursue it further). I thought that not leaving me feedback--especially since I was a new seller--was poor "internet auction etiquette."
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