eBay Seller Suspended Over 20 Year Old Art With No Receipt

Liz Morton
Liz Morton


Comments

UPDATE 11-3-22

It's sad that it takes so much to get eBay to do the right thing sometimes, but I love a happy ending.


eBay sellers are increasingly finding themselves in a no win scenario being flagged by automated systems resulting in accounts being put on hold indefinitely with no ability to appeal.

From last year's bots gone wild mass banning event to my own personal experience with having my account shut down for "being a risk to the eBay community", it's clear eBay is relying more and more on automated systems and not providing their support reps any leeway to actually assist sellers to resolve situations once a restriction has been triggered.

An eBay seller recently reached out to me with a difficult scenario - he had sold a painting originally purchased at an art fair 20 years ago and eBay is holding the payment and restricting the account until he provides a receipt, which, understandably, he does not have.

The most troubling part of this story is at no point did the buyer lodge any complaints with eBay - they are perfectly happy with the transaction and have even left positive feedback.

Importantly, the first message the seller received did not ask for a receipt, it simply asked for proof of delivery for the items that had been sold. That's a reasonable request and understandable action to be taken, especially for a newer account.

The seller complied with that request and provided eBay the requested delivery information.

Then eBay asked for more - wanting to verify the seller's identity and address and requesting receipts for the purchase of all items recently listed for sale.

Verifying the identity and address is also reasonable as far as I'm concerned, again especially for a newer account.

I know a lot of sellers are uncomfortable with providing ID documents and don't trust eBay (some with good reason) but given the rampant fraud I've seen on the platform using hijacked accounts and stolen identities, it's an unfortunate reality that eBay does need to verify accountholder information. There are also anti-money laundering and payment handling regulations in play that may require eBay to verify sellers' identities.

For the record, this seller had no problem complying with the ID requirements and provided that information to eBay in his appeal.

The last part of the request is the sticking point. The item in question was a piece of art purchased at a street fair 20 years ago - unsurprisingly, the seller does not have a receipt to provide.

Again, this action may have been reasonable if the buyer had complained of non-delivery, questioned the authenticity, requested a return for not as described etc. but that's not what happened.

The buyer left positive feedback and has even been in communication with the seller and offered to contact eBay directly to let them know there were no issues with the transaction.

So it's a bit perplexing that eBay has now permanently restricted the account to "reduce negative buying experiences on eBay" when in fact according to the buyer, the experience was anything but negative.

It's also a bit confusing that eBay has now changed their tune and said the original restriction was due to a policy violation when it was previously presented to the seller as a security check to verify identity and make sure the buyer actually received the items sold.

eBay used the same vague language here about "behavior that posed a risk to the eBay community" that they used when they suspended my account in June - an account which had not been used for buying or selling and which eBay later confirmed had been taken down due to their automated systems flagging the account in error.

Is Value Added Resource A Risk To The eBay Community?
The eBay account I’ve used for over 2 years to participate in the eBay community has been permanently suspended with no warning or explanation.

I was eventually able to recover that account but eBay themselves admitted that was only because of my "social presence."

It's clear that many innocent accounts are getting caught up in the automated dragnet and eBay typically provides no way to appeal. Quite simply, that isn't good enough.

It's one thing for eBay to step into disputes between buyers and sellers and make determinations on cases based on policies.

It's a whole other thing for eBay to insert themselves in the middle of successfully completed transactions and put seller funds on hold indefinitely when there has been no complaint or dispute raised about the transaction.

This is not the first I've heard of consumer sellers being asked to provide receipts for personal items they may have bought long ago. That's going to pose a particular challenge as eBay CEO Jamie Iannone says he's leaning in to second-hand goods and collectibles - precisely the kinds of items sellers are unlikely to have manufacturer receipts for.

Ebay pins hopes on second-hand luxuries and collectibles
Chief executive bets focus on high-end reselling will help turn round the online marketplace’s fortunes

If eBay wants to win in the consumer selling recommerce space, they're going to have to figure out a way to balance trust and safety issues with enabling frictionless commerce on the site - and that needs to start with scrapping the automated systems and putting highly trained human reps who are empowered to actually assist sellers on the job.

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Liz Morton is a 17 year ecommerce pro turned indie investigative journalist providing ad-free deep dives on eBay, Amazon, Etsy & more, championing sellers & advocating for corporate accountability.


Recent Comments
Avatar PlaceholderConcerned14 hours ago
It is Slowwwwwww and is more expensive to the buyer. In the past items I have ordered will sit at the hub for around 2 weeks. I avoid ebay unless I cannot get it elsewhere.
Avatar Placeholdermarks304718 hours ago
Hi, I have a friend who had an interesting experience recently that fell under this issue. They sold an item, packed and dispatched to the UK Ebay hub, this was midway through the period as the pause occurred. They then received a message from the buyer that they had checked tracking and discovered that the item had disappeared on ebay, no advice. It then turned out that the tracking had been fudged and the package was with them but not forwarded on to the USA. A few hours of to and fro to get the answer that it was due to the tariff dilemma. NO fault of the buyer(who had paid) or the seller ((who had been paid) and a strange response that the item could not be delivered. The buyer would be refunded in full, the seller would keep payment and the item would not be returned. Strange, Ebay must be hurting paying our both sides of the deal+
Avatar PlaceholdercwiYesterday
  1. Start building out the brand and promoting the heck out of Canadian sellers to our domestic market. Work with Federal/Provincial level governments in the push to build a strong presence here in Canada.

  2. Add other calculated shipping options than Canada Post UPS/FedEx for domestic shipping - partner with couriers nationwide, leverage agreements and software integrations with courier reseller platforms such as Stallion Express. Build out a crowd sourced network using national/regional retail locations as drop points for rural regions, leveraging transport networks to move packages to courier pickup points, akin to the UK courier model but adapted to the Canadian realities.

  3. Create a centralized international shipping clearing house to aide micro businesses with affordable shipping rates and customs clearance to avoid pitfalls and complexities (akin to US eIS).

  4. Bring features forward to the platform from other localizations, such as prepaid best offer acceptance, etc.