Yes, eBay never fails to find ways to piss me off ..

[Vroomfunkel]

Just got this email through - for an item that had already finished, mind you :

Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2006 17:36:52 PDT

Dear joelthejester,

We appreciate that you chose eBay to list the following fixed price listing(s):

150003559896 - Playstation 2 PS2 160GB HDD Hard Disk, Eyetoy, 2 Gun


However, your listing was in breach of eBay's Safe Payments Policy policy and has been removed from eBay. We have credited all associated fees to your account and notified eBay users associated with the transaction that it has been cancelled.

We would like to take this opportunity to let you know what part of your listing is not permitted.

Your listing(s) contains the following information:

US $/ UK£ / Euro cash (sent at buyer's own risk!).



Sellers may offer to accept PayPal, credit cards including Mastercard/Visa /Amex/Discover, debit cards and bank electronic payments online for eBay purchases. Sellers may also offer to accept bank-to-bank transfers, often known as bank wire transfers or bank cash transfers. Sellers may accept COD (cash on delivery) or cash for in person transactions. Sellers may offer to accept personal checks, money orders, cashier's checks, certified checks and other negotiable instruments.

Sellers may not solicit buyers to mail cash.

How fricking ANAL can you get? I've been selling on eBay for years, and in all this time I have offered buyers the opportunity to pay however they wish - because THAT'S THEIR PREROGATIVE! I have never recommended that people send cash - but sometimes that's the best and easiest way for people to deal with me, so I am happy to allow it as long as they understand the risks.

But noooo .. that's not good enough for eBay x_x x_x

There really needs to be a decent competitor in the market, because eBay have got to the point where they are just abusing their effective monopoly left, right and centre.

/rant over

[Kuros]

As soon as it picks up more:

Google Checkout.

[Mayhem]

I'll note that next time I sell stuff, as I usually offer cash as a payment method as well...

[ALAKA]

Just be happy you are not trying to sell pornography on there. Talk about restrictions then.

[Steven]

sounds like someone decided to be a prick and ratted you out man. I mean, eBay doesn't go around looking for that shit... it's some asshole prick who looked at it, happened to find a SMALL loophole, and decided to frustrate you for fun and kicks at your own expense... literally.

In the beginning my auctions were ratted out on... you really have to word everything so that it is legal or some random prick could just decide to be a dick and screw you up.

[Darth Sensei]

At least they didn't suspend your account. Mine was suspended for 24 hours because I unwittingly sold a copy of The Guy Game.

The funny thing is that I used their system to automatically import the information about the game when I listed the auction.

If they didn't want it sold, wouldn't they throw up a red flag when I imported the info?

[jajaja]

It seems more like it was picked up by Ebay's filter and somthing went wrong. I guess you did accept other payment methods too? Ebay rules say this:

eBay does not recommend paying with cash. While sellers may offer this option, they cannot require you to pay this way.

So you should be allowed to accept this kind of payment, but it cant be the only method avalible.


One funny thing i found checking Ebay rules. They listed this as "disadvantages" under Money Order, creditcard and bank transfer payment methods:

Extremely difficult to recover in cases of fraud.

Funny thing is that its extremely difficult to recover funds with Paypal too if you're getting scammed. They dont mention this of course since they own Paypal hehe :P

[Vroomfunkel]

Yeah, I am kind of confused about it - I don't remember ever seeing anything where they have said that you can't accept cash payments at all. Even the email above is not very clear:

Sellers may not "solicit buyers to mail cash". Obviously they can't actually say people aren't allowed to pay in cash, because that's impossible to govern ..

But I would hardly say that I was 'soliciting' people to pay cash - it was one of a long list of options.

And, quite frankly, what the hell is the point of disallowing cash in the mail, if you are going to still allow cash on delivery, cheques and bank transfers. Idiocy!

Vroomfunkel