Monday, July 14, 2008

Once Again eBay Robs Its Stores Sellers

The paying customers at eBay are being ripped off again, in my opinion. The Listing Frame is gone; missing in action!

Some time ago, a feature called a Listing Frame was added as an option for eBay stores. Basically a Listing Frame is a left navigation bar in each listing which links to various categories in an eBay store. The idea is to promote other items in the lister's eBay store for multiple sales.

A few days ago, numerous store owners noticed that their Listing Frame had mysteriously vanished. To add insult to injury, in addition to the categories part of the Listing Frame going AWOL, the top navigation part of the Frame has changed. eBay has taken it upon themselves to change the few categories in this top navigation to... whatever.

On the eBay Stores discussion board, one person posts that eBay now has lower-level categories in her navigation rather than the top-level categories which she wants to promote. Sellers are unable to fix any of this because the option to revise the Frame is also now missing.

See the screenshot below for an example of a listing with no left navigation. All that wasted white space looks bad, doesn't it?

ebay-store-broken-listing-frame

As is usual these days, there was and still is NO announcement on the eBay site about this problem. Some sellers contacted eBay and were told that this is another of the never-ending "glitches" and that they are working to fix it. If this is true, why not make an announcement for all to see? Maybe there has been no announcement because this is not, in reality, a glitch but a deliberate testing of a new listing page which will no longer include that all-important Listing Frame.

Members of the Stores board were told that the Frame would be disappearing eventually but this was not supposed to take place yet. Why does eBay have such a hard time being honest with its sellers? Why not just admit that they are arbitrarily removing Frames already, either as a test or for good? Why do they always seem to have something to hide? Where are their ethics?

At present, eBay Stores owners are paying for the Listing Frame through their store fees and they are not getting what they paid for. Maybe it's time to file a report about eBay's current practices and mistreatment of its sellers at Ripoff Report.


say no to sleazebay

4 comments:

  1. Has there ever been a time that eBay has NOT had a glitch or some sort of fraud going on?

    ReplyDelete
  2. You're right. There have always been glitches and fraud at eBay. Lately it seems to be even more prevalent than ever.

    Once upon a time, some things worked. Now practically nothing does. The whole site/company is a disaster scene.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Here is some sleazy juiciness for you...
    From youtube member relaventpc
    "ebay auction site wins"
    www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkMWaRJ7y-8

    From youtube member "Paypalsgoindown"
    "Has Paypal been caught in a counterfeit scheme?"
    www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DJWNP9LKEA

    Please share this everywhere possible. Not sure which is more jawdropping... probably the first one I posted.

    OMFG!!!

    ^ posted by Cappnonymous

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks, Capp! I blogged about the first video. Apparently, there is no end to what eBay is willing to do in the name of padding their bank account.

    ReplyDelete