GarBage Sale

Have you ever heard of eBay?  It's a website that allows people to sell their junk to other people who probably don't need it either.  eBay is, in fact, a lot like the garage sale we held a couple weekends ago.  There's a bunch of crap on display with each crip (singular for crap?) marked with a low, low price.  Several people mill around deciding if anything is worth their pocket change.  And then there's always someone who throws a fit about something. 

At our garage sale, among the rest of the things for sale, I laid out a GameBoy Advance (GBA) and a GameBoy Advance SP (GBA SP).  A few hours into the sale, a man came up and seemed concerned that the GBA wasn't worth the giveaway price of $20.  I went inside and found batteries and a copy of Super Mario Bros. and installed both as the man looked on.  Finally, I proceeded to turn on the GameBoy and showed him that it worked perfectly.  The man decided to buy it and I removed both the game and the batteries.  He went on his way a happy buyer...or so I thought. 

An hour or so later, the man drives up and says harshly, "doesn't it come with games?" I groan to myself as I assure the man the system needs separate game cartridges to work...as I demonstrated to him a short while ago.  He looks at me, expecting I "do something" and finally stomps back to his car like a 5-year-old denied a tasty snack. 

Now, this guy couldn't have been more than 40 and I know GameBoys have been around for a measly 16 years, but unless you've been locked in a chest near the bottom of the ocean, how does a person not understand how a GameBoy operates?  Wouldn't the vacant slot in the back draw the thought "something must go there" from even the simplest mind? 

Now, I am no newbie when it comes to eBay.  I only have a feedback rating of around 50, but that's only because I don't have that much detritus to sell, nor do I have the cash or desire to buy more of it.  Despite this, I hold honest auctions.  I have never inflated shipping costs and I don't promise more than I can deliver.  I don't want to be ripped off myself nor do I have a desire to cheat anyone else. 

Unfortunately, eBay is less like a friendly, weekend garage sale and is more like dealing on the black market.  You can't trust anyone regardless of their rating or the cuteness of their username.  This is why I try to cover my butt with a very specific and enforceable item description.  Even with all this, I still find myself plagued with people trying to take advantage of me and eBay's business model.  Every time I find myself adding more steps to ensure I don't get screwed.  Maybe you can learn from my mistakes:

• A buyer stated the computer game I mailed never showed up.  I ended up returning the money with no proof the package was not delivered.  Therefore, I add Delievery Confirmation to every package I ship.
• Another buyer emailed almost 2 months after the auction to say a package mailed Priority Mail (2-3 day delivery) with Delivery Confirmation never arrived.  I had thrown away the tracking number a while ago but when I told the buyer that I had used Delivery Confirmation she never bothered me again.  The lesson is to never get rid of tracking numbers.
• A third buyer offered to buy an iPAQ but was located in Italy.  I have never shipped outside the states but decided to try it this time.  He told me in an eMail "when you sent the pack to me, you must write over "GIFT", otherwise i can wait many day at the duty".  All of his several dozen eMails were in broken English so I wrote GIFT all over the package.  On top of this, I spent 15 minutes at the post office filling out customs forms and global mailing forms.  Once the package arrived, he complained about paying $60 in taxes "because they think was a new product".  I did everything this guy wanted and I get "Some problem with duty" in my Feedback.  I now resolve to never ship overseas again.

To further my pain, I decided to auction the GBA SP that didn't sell during the garage sale. 

Now, anyone who knows me, knows I probably treat my Nintendo products better than I do my own son.  This GameBoy was in perfect shape and I stated that on my eBay auction.  My wife, who is my unofficial eBay proofreader, even asked me as I wrote the description if the system really was "in excellent shape" and that there were "no scratches or scuffs on the screen or the case." She looked over the system and said, "What's that then?" I flipped over the GBA and scrapped off a millimeter sized piece of dirt and said, "Dirt." After checking over the rest of the case, she handed it back to me and said, "Okay."

This morning, I get an eMail from the buyer saying, "the top is loaded with scuffs and scratches and the bottom is scuffed up." She continues saying, "Something needs to be done about this" and "I can take close ups for you and send them to you".  I replied telling her even my wife says the system was a step below immaculate and I would like pictures (if they are of the same GameBoy I sent her).  Her reply hasn't landed in my mailbox but when it does, I'll post the pictures here for you to see.  The moral for this longwinded story is don't be descriptive in your eBay descriptions or take a cat scan of your items so you can prove the condition of your items to your buyers.  Damn, this makes me sick.