eBay is teh suxx0r

11 March, 2010


eBay – Customer Service
2145 Hamilton Ave.
San Jose, CA 95125


Sirs:

A few days ago, I began the process of closing my eBay account. As I have received no inquiry to date as to why I would choose to take such an action, I am taking the liberty of writing this letter to advise you as to my reasons.

When I first started using eBay nearly fifteen years ago, it was a wonderful resource for anyone wishing to save money on items they wished to purchase. For a number of reasons, I've been obliged to establish and use several different log-ins on eBay, but have been a fairly frequent buyer.

The last few years, however, the eBay experience has become progressively less pleasant. Recently, I found myself sufficiently annoyed and aggravated with it to come to the conclusion that it simply wasn't worth the bother using eBay any longer:

• Sniping has become a much greater problem on eBay as time has passed; it's now at the point that there are actually Firefox web browser plugins to facilitate the process. This, despite the fact that I offered a simple and direct suggestion that would make sniping an untenable activity: if a bid is received within some small time (I suggested 30 seconds, as I recall) before an auction ends, then extend the auction time by some small fixed amount of time to give the non-sniper time to respond. While my suggestion was acknowledged with a generic platitude, I doubt that it was ever given the consideration that I believe it should have. I can only wonder at how many people have given up on using eBay when an item they had legitimately bid on and “won” went to someone that “sniped” them in the last two seconds without them having an opportunity to re-bid.
• Mis-listed items are now a much greater problem than they were when I first started using eBay. Some weeks ago, I reported a grossly mis-listed item and (again) got a generic non-committal response. Annoyed, I then took the time to submit roughly a hundred such instances in an effort to get somebody at eBay to realize how aggravating it is for us users to have to try and wade through all the inappropriate items in a category. I wasn't surprised in the slightest when absolutely nothing happened regarding the items that I reported; they remained in a patently wrong category for the entire duration of their respective auctions. Clearly, I can't know how many warnings a seller may get before being penalized for mis-categorizing items; what seems fairly apparent is that the number is too high to be effective, and that the actions taken by eBay lack sufficient impact to prevent recurrences. I would think that if eBay were to implement a graduated scale of punishment, such violations would drop dramatically: a first offense simply has the item de-listed with a warning to the seller. A second offense, and the item is not only de-listed, but not allowed to be auctioned again for some fixed period of time (a few days, perhaps). If there should be a third violation, ALL listings by a seller are removed. A fourth results in all listings being removed and the seller being blocked from posting new items for several days. Finally, a seller that commits a fifth offense could have all listings removed and banned from eBay completely. Please note that such a progression gives sellers ample opportunity to learn from honest mistakes, and greatly discourages DIShonest activities.
• The ability to customize my eBay activities is something that I greatly miss. For example, I refuse to purchase items sold out of China and Hong Kong; each time I search for a tech or computer item, I have to explicitly go into an “advanced” search and indicate a maximum distance for sellers to try and block results from those areas. Sadly, eBay does not provide any mechanism by which I can set any kind of baseline criteria to be used for all my searches.

The above is not an exhaustive list of my reasons for closing my eBay account, but rather just examples of the most egregious.

I don't have any reason to think that eBay will change any of the above just for me; all I hope to accomplish with this letter is to bring the matter to the attention of someone that might accidentally have the power and authority to see that the issues are looked into, and perhaps even addressed.

In addition, I will be closing my PayPal account, as well. My reasons for taking such action is simply that I wish to express my objections to the gross lack of openness, fair play, and responsibility demonstrated by the mishandling of the situation that cropped up with Cryptome.

Finally, I would like to say that while established policies and procedures are good things to have, they are best supplemented with common sense and good judgment.


Sincerely,



David K. Merriman

How to lose customers and win enemies...

Back on March 31st, I placed an online order with a company that I've done business with before -- an outfit called All Electronics that sells surplus and discount "stuff": mostly electronics components, but also the odd bit of gimcrackery (miniature tripods, cell phone cases, and the like). It wasn't a big order, coming out to a grand total of $30.
The confirmation email I got from them consisted of two lines of text: one line said "Plain text email", and the other simply said "customer invoice". I immediately responded by adding a series of question marks to the end:

On Tuesday 31 March 2009 15:46:57 you wrote:
> Plain text email
> customer invoice
??????

I never heard anything back from them.

This past Sunday (5 April), I checked my order status on their website, and it was shown to be "Processing". I sent their customer service email address a brief note, asking for clarification:

From:
Dave Merriman (A loose affiliation of sub-atomic particles)
To:
allcorp@allcorp.com
Date:
2009-04-05 09:56

Signed by dkmerriman@gmail.com. Show Details
I'm curious to know why my order ( W448808 ) hasn't shipped yet.

No answer.

Yesterday, the 7th, I tried again:

From:
Dave Merriman (A loose affiliation of sub-atomic particles)
To:
allcorp@allcorp.com
Date:
2009-04-07 11:36

Signed by dkmerriman@gmail.com. Show Details
I would be interested in knowing why my order # W448808 is still showing a
status of "Processing". This is a second request for an update.

David Merriman

I gave them (roughly) 24 hours to respond before sending the following:

From:
Dave Merriman (A loose affiliation of sub-atomic particles)
To:
XXXXX@allcorp.com [person I'm given to understand is the HMFIC]
Date:
2009-04-08 11:12

Signed by dkmerriman@gmail.com. Show Details
Since placing an order (W448808) on 31 March, I have noted that the status on
it continues to show that it is "Processing".
On April 5th (and again yesterday, the 7th), I sent an email to the customer
service address, politely asking why my order hadn't shipped yet. As I have
received no response of ANY kind, I see no reason to continue thinking that
your company wishes to actually sell me the products, you may cancel the
order. You may also take my name off your mailing list, as I will not be
troubling you by trying to purchase anything from your company in the future.

David Merriman
Billings, MT

What I got back was:

From:
"YYYY"
To:
dkmerriman@gmail.com
Date:
2009-04-08 13:04

Spam Status: Bogofilter 0% probability of being spam.

Full report:
Ham, tests=bogofilter, spamicity=0.000000, version=1.1.7
Dear Mr. Merriman:

We are sorry for not responding to your emails; unfortunately they are
answered at the first available opportunity.

In regard to your web order we have researched this matter and found
that your order was not processed properly causing this delay. If you
would like to give us a chance to rectify this problem, we will gladly
send out your package 2nd day UPS at only the standard $7.00 cost. Or we
can ship standard if you prefer at no charge for shipping.

We hope you give us the change to resolve this matter to your
satisfaction.

We are sorry for the inconvenience.

Sincerely,

YYYY [name of drone that (apparently) screwed up]

And I responded with:

From:
Dave Merriman (A loose affiliation of sub-atomic particles)
To:
"YYYY"
CC:
XXXXX@allcorp.com [HMFIC]
Date:
2009-04-08 13:42

Signed by dkmerriman@gmail.com. Show Details
On Wednesday 08 April 2009 13:04:57 you wrote:
> Dear Mr. Merriman:
>
> We are sorry for not responding to your emails; unfortunately they are
> answered at the first available opportunity.
>
> In regard to your web order we have researched this matter and found
> that your order was not processed properly causing this delay.

That isn't going to fly, even a little bit. After I finished placing the order,
I got a "confirmation" email from you that simply said "Plain text email" and
"customer invoice". I responded as indicated:

-----------------------------------
From:
Dave Merriman (A loose affiliation of sub-atomic
particles)
To:
All Electronics
Date:
2009-03-31 15:52

Signed by dkmerriman@gmail.com. Show Details
On Tuesday 31 March 2009 15:46:57 you wrote:
> Plain text email
> customer invoice
??????
---------------------------

As you can see, the SAME DAY I placed the order, you were given some
indication that something was awry -- and did nothing about it.

> If you
> would like to give us a chance to rectify this problem, we will gladly
> send out your package 2nd day UPS at only the standard $7.00 cost. Or we
> can ship standard if you prefer at no charge for shipping.

I would like the order canceled, and my name removed from your mailing list.

They essentially had no less than three chances to address the problem, and availed themselves of none of them. Too farookin' late now...

Customer Dis-service

Since LeeAnn has posted her Lowe's tale, after getting prompted by Dogettes tale of woe, it seems like kind of a meme thing to post customer unappreciation stories. So here's mine...

I was living and working in Los Alamos (yeah, that one), working as a contract electronics engineering tech on part of Reagan's Star Wars program. Now, Los Alamos is a small town, with only a Sears catalog store for your shopping inconvenience. If you want to actually SHOP, it's off to Santa Fe for you -- a good 35 miles away, down a mountain, across the Rio Grande, then back up a smaller mountain, all on State roads. M'kay?

So, I have a JCPenneys catalog, and decide I need a new computer desk to replace the one that had been beat to death during an assortment of moves. I fill out the order form, get all my part numbers, sizes, colors, and so on filled in, then call their catalog order line. I get my order in, and we're talking a couple hundred bucks by the time I'm done. The nice Catalog lady at the other end of the phone tells me my order should be in the following Wednesday. Cool.

Wednesday rolls around, and after lunch, I call the JCPenneys in Santa Fe to see if my order is there. First, I'm told that the truck is there, but not unloaded yet.

I call back a couple of hours later, and the truck is unloaded, but they haven't got everything checked in yet.

Right before I get off work at 5, I call again, and they can't say whether my shit is there or not. The drone at the other end asks when it was supposed to be delivered, and I tell them that day. He tells me that it's probably there, and to come on in -- even after I tell him, a couple of times, that I'm in Los Alamos.

I get in my car after work and make the drive; damn near an hour, what with the speed limits, getting through the miserable Santa Fe traffic, and all. I get into the store, head back to catalog pickup with my copy of my order form (complete with order number issued me by the Catalog Lady) to get my stuff.

Two people in the Catalog area: an office drone that apparently isn't allowed to deal with the public, and some management-looking type. I finally succeed in getting his attention, and offer up my order form and tell him I'm there to collect my shit (I didn't say it that way, of course -- I try to be polite and helpful in such situations). He deigns to accept the paperwork, and wanders off. Some fifteen to twenty minutes later, he's back, and tells me my order wasn't on the truck.

Now, I'm not happy about driving all the way into Santa Fe, but they hadn't told me that my order was definitely there, either. Staying calm, I ask him what happens next. He tells me that my stuff might turn up the next day, or maybe Friday, and that I should call them again to see when it's there. I ask, and he confirms that the truck arrives pretty close to the same time every day; when I point out that they hadn't known my order status until after I'd left Los Alamos, then I wouldn't really know if they had my order until the day AFTER they got it -- essentially making me wait an extra day. He just shrugged at me, which didn't sit well(!!) with me. I asked what JCP was going to do about getting my order to me, since they'd had me drive in without KNOWING that my order was ready.

He tells me that they wouldn't deliver something like that -- particularly not all the way out to Los Alamos. If I want my order, I'll have to drive in again. Wrong answer.

I told him that I had driven in, because THEY had said my order "should" be there; since they were wrong, I figured it was up to them to get it TO ME. He said that wasn't going to happen. That was the last straw, and I told him that I wasn't making another trip in because he and his crew didn't have their shit together -- that when my order finally turned up, they could just put it out on the floor and wait to sell it. He said they wouldn't do that; if I didn't come in to get it, they'd just ship it back. Restraining the urge to tell him what he could do with my computer desk and other items, I balled my order form up, tossed it over the counter, and walked out.

On the way home, I stopped in at a couple of chain discount places (anyone remember Value House?), got reasonable substitutes for what I wanted, got it all in my car, and headed home.

I was seriously pissed the entire drive, but by the time I got home, I'd calmed down. I was still pissed, but I was calmly pissed. I sat down at my computer and carefully crafted a nice, polite letter to JCPenneys headquarters in Georgia; I told them the sequence of what happened, the gist of my conversation with the Catalog Cretin, and that I'd purchased other items instead of dealing with them.

I also pointed out that I was about to spend several hundred dollars on "winter" clothing (7000 feet up in northern New Mexico, wintertime tends to get a bit nippy), and some other things -- all of which would be bought through the local Sears catalog outlet. I went on to suggest that the Catalog Cretin should maybe spend some time helping load and unload the truck, so he'd get an idea of what was supposed to be going on; I finished by telling them that not only w0uld I not be shopping with them any more, I wouldn't even go into their store to use the BATHROOM.

The page-and-a-half single-spaced letter went into the mail the next day.

A couple of weeks later, I get a phone call from JCP corporate customer service -- my letter has gotten their attention, it seems. The CS weenie in Georgia finally gets me to agree to talk to a regional manager. When I get off the phone with her, it isn't but a couple of minutes before it rings again; it's the RM, who finally gets me to agree to talk to the Area Manager -- who calls me minutes after I'm done with the RM. The last person to talk to me is the store manager, who talks me into accepting a 50% discount on my next catalog order; when I tell him I threw their catalog away, he says he'll have one hand-delivered to me. The next afternoon, after I get off work, there's a knock on the door. I open it, and it's the Catalog Cretin with my catalogs - not just the main catalog, but ALL of them. He's apologizing profusely, and all but grovelling before I take the catalogs and send him on his way.

A few months later, I finally used my 50% discount -- on a metric buttload of furniture (new bed, matress, box springs, headboard, dressers, and a bunch of other shit; I was getting married, and wanted new stuff). That 50% off cost JCP quite a bit more than my original computer desk order was worth...