[meteorite-list] Meteorite Auction Days Numbered?

From: MexicoDoug <mexicodoug_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 30 Sep 2011 13:38:38 -0400 (EDT)
Message-ID: <8CE4DAEEB5EB5FF-874-27A51_at_Webmail-d115.sysops.aol.com>

Well: at risk for looking for a conspiracy where it doesn't exist, this
phrase eBay told you caught my attention:

"However, we had to remove International Site Visibility from your
listing. Of course, we won't be charging you the fee for it."

Specifically the "fee" comment, as if a fee had any logical place
whatsover in that comment! Considering that eBay policy of charging
for extra pictures, second line titles and whatever else, it's a small
wonder they haven't charged for additional country visibility.

That small wonder may be due to fear eBay will lose its established
"unmatchable wide visibility worldwide network" which is the de facto
monopoly it has if it touches who can and can't see your sales page.
But, it isn't too different in concept from the additional cost for
listing in more categories, so I am suspicious.

Suspicious that ... all these rules that eBay has never been concerned
about before and with such difficulty when you need them, are just a
huge smokescreen to somehow introduce the idea of paying for additional
country visibility. They probably got the idea from exorbitant
international excess baggage each time they go from SFO to their
European branches. It wouldn't be without justification, though to
charge for "additional countries" since eBay has additional overhead
costs for each of those sites that are now in question for listings.

Kindest wishes
Doug



-----Original Message-----
From: Gary Fujihara <fujmon at mac.com>
To: Adam Hupe <raremeteorites at yahoo.com>
Cc: Adam <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Fri, Sep 30, 2011 11:30 am
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Meteorite Auction Days Numbered?


Ebay turned off international site visibility on most of my auctions
too as I
posted a few days ago. Nothing changed in my listings or in my
descriptions
other than weights and prices, but ebay chose to change some kind of
policy
without warning, which thereby resulted in the action they took. I
spent
several hours trying to deduce what was going on, and received
suggestions from
several list members, to whom I am thankful.

By trial and error, I removed lines of text from my descriptions until
I no
longer got ebay's message, which I have copied below. Apparently they
don't
like Big Kahuna Meteorites, scale cubes, my shipping information or
country
names in my text descriptions, and when they found them would send me
this
message and turn off international site visibility. With the text
deletions, I
now retain international site visibility, but have had to cull most of
my text
descriptions, in some instances down to a single sentence!

I apologize to any of my friends who visit my auctions, for the sparse
descriptions you now see, but at least now you know the reason behind
the
change.

gary

> You recently created or revised this eBay listing that included the
International Site Visibility feature:
>
> 330619432797 NEW! NWA 6927 Diogenite 2.76g Fresh Crusted Full Slice,
>
> However, we had to remove International Site Visibility from your
listing. Of
course, we won't be charging you the fee for it.
>
> Because the laws and eBay policies vary by country, sometimes items
that can
be listed in your country can't be listed internationally. It's also
possible
that the listing itself violated an eBay policy in another country. In
situations like this, we automatically remove the International Site
Visibility
feature from the listing.
>
> We're sorry for the inconvenience this causes.
>
> To find out about our global selling requirements, visit:
>
http://pages.ebay.com/help/sell/questions/sell_international_requirements.html
>
> For more information, contact customer support by clicking the "Help"
link at
the top of any eBay page and then clicking the "Contact Us" button.
>
>

On Sep 30, 2011, at 4:58 AM, Adam Hupe wrote:

> You are not kidding. EBay turned off the international site
visibility option
on most of my auctions. I am going to have to go to fixed pricing,
buy-it-now,
store type sales soon or suspend eBay sales altogether. International
bidders
can still find these auctions by going to ebay.com instead of ebay.uk
if this
helps.
>
> Best Regards,
>
> Adam
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Gary Fujihara
Big Kahuna Meteorites (IMCA#1693)
105 Puhili Place, Hilo, Hawai'i 96720
http://bigkahuna-meteorites.com/
http://shop.ebay.com/fujmon/m.html
(808) 640-9161

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Received on Fri 30 Sep 2011 01:38:38 PM PDT