Beedster

Sorry, did I mention that this was now resolved? I wish. I finally sold my Ovation 12-string yesterday, the buyer paid immediately by PayPal, and PayPal in turn sent me an email saying that the money would not be in my account until 27th of June as the transaction is considered 'High Risk' by them. So, I called (not easy to get through) and apparently this is on account of the previous eBay buyer having raised a claim with PayPal as well as with eBay. I don't get the logic of his being able to do both, as eBay and PayPal are surely in effect the same organisation when you buy and pay on eBay, and eBay found in my favour anyway. But apparently that complaint, about which I knew nothing, is still live. Nice one eBay/PayPal

Ha ha, it's long gone I'm afraid, sold (via eBay I might add) within about an hour of listing it to a very nice gentleman in Italy who had the courtesy in buying the bass to apologise for the behaviour of his fellow countryman in leaving such crap feedback. Goes to show that the majority of folks are great, but that it only takes one to spoil it.

Well that wasn't entirely easy to resolve, and taught me a few things about eBay, the main one being that they will listen hardest to whichever party is prepared to shout the loudest (and this was a guy who sent all of his message IN CAPITALS so I'm guessing it was him, for a while at least). Also, and rather alarmingly, the person who eventually resolved it for me - a process which took several long conversations - suggested that eBay doesn't disclose the nature of complaints made, even to the person who is the focus of those complaints. In short, they initially said they couldn't remove the negative feedback because they had evidence from the seller that the feedback was accurate, but they could not share that evidence with me? Amazingly however, not one of the people I spoke to had actually read the eBay messages between me and the seller, and the guy who eventually did said "no brainer, he's clearly in the wrong", my negative feedback was removed and case closed within minutes. I'll be honest though, I found the whole thing quite stressful, the guy was clearly a little obsessed with getting his own way, and the constant messages and accusations just started to wear me down after a while. Anyway, lessons learned.

+1

The old 'anyone can play bass' routine. Let them do it and learn that not everyone can

Keyboard player set fire to me during the gig, City of London Poly, early 80's. Not entirely an act of musical criticism although I suspect that since we were both vying for the lower register at the time some degree of unconscious intent was involved. Lessons learned: (1) never let the stylist use a whole can of Elnett to get your hair in place, even if you are the bassist in a hair band, and (2) don't let the keyboard player flick cigarettes across the stage in your general direction when trying to act cool.

That 'feeling' has been with me the whole way through this, trying to anticipate exactly what the angle was. He was definitely up to something, I suspect he's just a bit greedy and perhaps not the sharpest knife so telegraphed it to me well in advance (which was nice of him), whereas a good conman would be gone well before I'd even noticed. But yes, that unease that sometjing was wrong was there all of the time.

The 'buyer' refused the eBay refund I sent and insisted that I send the bass, so I have refunded him directly through PayPal (and have an acknowledgment from eBay that he has now received it). I'm guessing from his tone that he'd already sold it (eBay listing closed early), had seen a nice £600 pay-day coming his way, and is now rather miffed. What goes around comes around eh

Having still not resolved this I tracked back through messages, and not only does he have multiple ebay IDs, he has multiple real IDs also. I insisted I would only send to his registered PayPal address and he eventually agreed. I didn't realise it at the time, but the postage labels he had earlier emailed me (after I'd told him I was not going to let him arrange the courier), had a different name to that with which he had paid for the bass, and from which his PayPal account is registered. I still can't escape the feeling there was a scam here that I've ducked out of, but in true 'Burn After Reading' style, I've no idea what it was

Ha ha, quite happy to keep it to be honest Harry, it's bloody lovely, just doesn't get used that much any more. But I've re-listed it as I kinda need the money, which was the reason for listing it in the first place

Thanks for the above folks. eBay is an interesting one, I suspect that we all still remember the days when the occasional Pre-CBS Precision popped up and sold for £450, when buyers and seller were generally polite, helpful and honest, and when it was largely full of used and interesting items. Wow it's changed.