ebay ... & kilted Doctor

**ozmeath** · 23rd March 06, 09:44 AM

Originally Posted by KiltedKnight

Being a married man I would have no reason to bid on this doctors offer, however, I would have no qualms about writing a letter in protest to e-bay and giving them a piece of my mind and telling them how much lower they have sunk in my eyes for denying needy children this gift.
Something like this might have spread like wildfire and been a fantastic source of funds for many a charity benefiting childrens causes. Think of the doctors and Research Fellows at places like the City of Hope or the Mayo Clinic that would surely have donated their time to dine the highest bidder?
Anyone have any idea where I can direct my letter?

Chris.

Good luck with that Chris,. I just had a good look and it seems that ebay prefers to be yet another faceless corp that answer to no-one...the old tar-baby trick for wont of a better metaphore. this was a quote from there complaints centre:

"...the Answer Center and Discussion boards are on systems owned by another company hired by eBay, called LiveWorld. They arent really eBay, but work as an eBay partner."

Maybe just maybe they have an office and heaven forbid a phone number in the book.

**GlassMan** · 23rd March 06, 10:09 AM

This isn't about denying children the charitable donation. This is about getting them their donation through the proper channels.

eBay has a method of doing an auction for charity. The charity must provide eBay with proof that it is in fact a charitable organization. Then the seller creates his/her auction with a portion of the proceeds (from 5% to 100%) dedicated to the registered charity.

eBay strictly prohibits auctions that claim to be raising money for charity but that have not gone through this system. There is not charge to the charity to be registered and there are no extra listing fees if your auction benefits a charity. So it doesn't hurt the charity or the seller at all to follow eBay's regulations. However, those regulations do protect bidders from scam artists who try to increase profits by posing as charities.

I'm not saying that this doctor was doing a scam, far from it. I believe he was actually trying to raise money for a charity. But you have to do it the right way. If a rule designed to protect charities and bidders from crooks isn't applied all the time, how can it be enforced at all?

The proper response to all of this is for the doctor and the charity to redo the auction but do it according to the appropriate regulations. Then everyone is happy and everyone wins. It may seem picky, but it undercuts the legal standing of the regulation if it is applied in some cases but not in others.

**Alan H** · 23rd March 06, 11:35 AM

Originally Posted by GlassMan

The proper response to all of this is for the doctor and the charity to redo the auction but do it according to the appropriate regulations. Then everyone is happy and everyone wins. It may seem picky, but it undercuts the legal standing of the regulation if it is applied in some cases but not in others.

Hear, Hear. I know someone who used an e-bay auction done this way to raise money for a charitable cause. It didn't work all that well, in that he targeted a couple hundred thousand bucks and he raised ten thousand, but still and all, if there's a system in place to do stuff like this ebay should stick with it.

That doesn't change the fact aht a lot of ebay "buyers" are deadbeats, but that's not ebays fault. I got stiffed by a seller once, fortunately only for about $20...it was 3 yards of New Brunswick tartan too, dangit. Why HER? Why couldn't the guy who sold me the stupid BAROMETER have stiffed me, instead? laughing, here

**Mattg** · 23rd March 06, 12:25 PM

That's funny

My buddy got stiffed on a $1000 laptop off of ebay! He wasn't laughing!

**TimC** · 23rd March 06, 01:13 PM

Let's face it, ebay has issues and it's not looking like they are in any hurry to fix them....but we'll continue to use them anyway because when it works, it work out to our benefit.

Hope the DR. finds away to raise teh $ his looking for.

**GlassMan** · 23rd March 06, 10:46 PM

Originally Posted by Alan H

Hear, Hear. I know someone who used an e-bay auction done this way to raise money for a charitable cause. It didn't work all that well, in that he targeted a couple hundred thousand bucks and he raised ten thousand, but still and all, if there's a system in place to do stuff like this ebay should stick with it.

That doesn't change the fact aht a lot of ebay "buyers" are deadbeats, but that's not ebays fault. I got stiffed by a seller once, fortunately only for about $20...it was 3 yards of New Brunswick tartan too, dangit. Why HER? Why couldn't the guy who sold me the stupid BAROMETER have stiffed me, instead? laughing, here

I get stiffed by buyers on eBay usually once or twice a month. As a seller you can always request a "Final Value Fee" credit and get some of your money back and at the same time give a warning to other sellers. I have all my auctions set so that if anyone has had a "unpaid bidder" strike against them they can't bid on my items.

I haven't been stiffed on any items I've purchased off eBay yet, but just in case I always use PayPal for my purchases. I don't buy anything from a seller that doesn't accept PayPal. Why? Because at least with PayPal I can dispute a charge if I don't get the item. And any buyer that gets stiffed should also file a "Unsent Item" report with eBay so that the seller gets penalized, often losing their selling privileges.

If you use the tools eBay provides there are still lots of ways to stay protected.

**KiltedKnight** · 23rd March 06, 01:58 PM

Originally Posted by GlassMan

This isn't about denying children the charitable donation. This is about getting them their donation through the proper channels.

eBay has a method of doing an auction for charity. The charity must provide eBay with proof that it is in fact a charitable organization. Then the seller creates his/her auction with a portion of the proceeds (from 5% to 100%) dedicated to the registered charity.

eBay strictly prohibits auctions that claim to be raising money for charity but that have not gone through this system. There is not charge to the charity to be registered and there are no extra listing fees if your auction benefits a charity. So it doesn't hurt the charity or the seller at all to follow eBay's regulations. However, those regulations do protect bidders from scam artists who try to increase profits by posing as charities.

I'm not saying that this doctor was doing a scam, far from it. I believe he was actually trying to raise money for a charity. But you have to do it the right way. If a rule designed to protect charities and bidders from crooks isn't applied all the time, how can it be enforced at all?

The proper response to all of this is for the doctor and the charity to redo the auction but do it according to the appropriate regulations. Then everyone is happy and everyone wins. It may seem picky, but it undercuts the legal standing of the regulation if it is applied in some cases but not in others.

A very enlightening post and something I hadn't thought of, thank you GlassMan for the education, I stand re-educated and e-bay is back on my Christmas list.

Chris.