Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

[Nos4r2]

I'm quite annoyed. Ebay have just suspended my account for insisting that they stick to the Direct Debit guarantee when taking my sellers fees from my bank account.<br /><br />Basically, the direct debit guarantee is this(taken directly from the UK financial ombudsman site):-<br /><br />The direct debit guarantee applies to all banks and building societies taking part in the direct debit scheme. It says that:<br /><br /><br /> If there is a change in the amount to be paid or the payment date, the person receiving the payment (the originator) must notify the customer in advance. <br /> If the originator or the bank/building society makes an error, the customer is guaranteed a full and immediate refund of the amount paid. <br /> Customers can cancel a direct debit at any time by writing to their bank or building society. <br /><br /><br />Ebay UK have twice attempted to take the wrong amount at the wrong time from my bank account. They have also cost me £32 in bank charges by doing this. Now they've suspended my account as I have insisted they arent allowed to do what they are doing and have recalled both of these illegal debits. <br /><br />Anyone else ever had any problems like this with them? I'm quite pissed off now...I had 75 positive and 100% feedback-and that aint easy when you're selling boat bits and engines.Looks like I'm gonna lose my account.

 

[Boomyal]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

I find it hard to believe that they will not resolve this issue equitably. Does Ebay UK have 'live help'?<br /><br />If they don't, I'm sure you have the equivalent of Small Claims Court in the UK. I would file immediately. You'll need to find a registered representative for ebay in the UK before you file.

 

[Nos4r2]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

Unfortunately they have no live help here.All I seem to get is some moron on the end of a pc who trots out the same claptrap every time-and what they say isn't even related to the problem I'm having with them-and it takes them 12 hours to say that much via email. Ebay UK isn't even based here in the UK either. It's based in Eire..

 

[Boomyal]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

Originally posted by Nos4r2:<br /> Unfortunately they have no live help here.All I seem to get is some moron on the end of a pc who trots out the same claptrap every time-and what they say isn't even related to the problem I'm having with them-and it takes them 12 hours to say that much via email. Ebay UK isn't even based here in the UK either. It's based in Eire..

Yeah but they would still have to show up in court. Keep a copy of your emails to show that you have tried to remedy the problem with them. <br /><br />I hate it when these company representatives do not even hear what it is you are saying. That happened to me once, with a telephone provider. I finally went to the Federal Communication Commission and they got me someone who had their hearing aid in.

 

[roscoe]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

Fortunately, you can recall the debits, we can't do that here.<br /><br />Next time, make the payments manually, and do not allow them access to your account.

 

[BoatBuoy]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

I make the payments via VISA and those charges can always be contested.

 

[Homerr]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

BoatBuoy has a good idea... Use a credit card (preferably one that has a real low credit line)<br />If there any contested charges, your credit card company's dogs will go after them.<br /><br />Personally, I keep a seperate checking account for all of my EBay/PayPal transactions. I only deposit what I need. If they try to charge the wrong amount, or the card is breeched, they won't get much (if any)<br /><br />If you do it this way, make sure you DON'T have over-draft protection... otherwise you get nailed with the fees if you over-draw.<br /><br />H.

 

[Tinkerer]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

eBay in my experience (810 FB 100% positive) and that of other sellers on a few non-eBay boards I follow is a dictatorship run by dummies who act in the most arbitrary and inconsistent fashion and who just spew out canned responses that often have little or no bearing on the issue. They don't care about individual users because there's millions of others to replace them.<br /><br />They also have no understanding or or respect for local law, nor will they carry out their part of their contract with local users, until someone rubs their nose in it. http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/disp.pl/au/cases/vic/VCAT/2001/49.html?query=^+ebay <br /><br />If you've got nothing to lose you might as well take them on.<br /><br />Does your financial ombudsman have power to deal with them, even though they're based in Ireland?

 

[rodbolt]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

dont know aboput all that. but I do keep getting emails to update my ebay account to prevent future problems or they will cancel my account. problem is I dont have and have never had an e-bay account.<br /> but in the past year or so I see a lot of my friends haave problems with transactions on e-bay.

 

[Kenneth Brown]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

Those are scams to obtain information Rodbolt.

 

[Nos4r2]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

Thanls for that link Tinkerer-that's quite enlightening. I think this might well go all the way to the courts.<br /><br />I'm not sure if the financial ombudsman can deal with them or not-I assume that they will be able to as they are trading as a UK site and service. will be interesting to find out.

 

[Nos4r2]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

Well I've emailed them an extra 3 times now, requesting read receipts each time.<br /><br />Guess what-now they aint even reading my mail and my account's still frozen. Add to that the fact that they appear to have a whole load of stuff on my bill now that was never in the listing charges (special durations etc that I was never informed of) then I think it's time to write that letter to the UK financial ombudsman. I've also forwarded copies of the whole lot to the BBC current affairs programme 'Watchdog'.

 

[Tinkerer]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

Originally posted by Nos4r2:<br /> Well I've emailed them an extra 3 times now, requesting read receipts each time.<br /><br />Guess what-now they aint even reading my mail and my account's still frozen. Add to that the fact that they appear to have a whole load of stuff on my bill now that was never in the listing charges (special durations etc that I was never informed of) then I think it's time to write that letter to the UK financial ombudsman. I've also forwarded copies of the whole lot to the BBC current affairs programme 'Watchdog'.

They often don't read much after the first email, if they even read that. They just spew out responses from templates. Once the decision is made it sticks.<br /><br />I got slapped on an eBay board once and challenged it. The end result was that I got an eamil acknowledging I hadn't broken the rule but some people might think I had so they weren't going to withdraw the slap. <br /><br />I put in a suggestion for a new feature once. Response:<br /><br />"Hi, my name is Boofhead and I'd like to help you.<br /><br />Unfortunately that feature is not available."<br /><br />Gee, could that be why I was suggesting it could be introduced?<br /><br />That's about the level of service you can expect a lot of the time, especially on anything that is vaguely out of the ordinary.<br /><br />I just realised what your screen name comes from: Nosferatau

 

[Nos4r2]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

wonder if they'll even bother chasing me up for the money they say i owe them? I know that legally I don't owe them at least half of it-in fact I'm not sure if legally I owe them any of it at all after their blatant disregard for the UK law on direct debits and their blatant disregard for their own rules too...

 

[Tinkerer]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

Originally posted by Nos4r2:<br /> wonder if they'll even bother chasing me up for the money they say i owe them? I know that legally I don't owe them at least half of it-in fact I'm not sure if legally I owe them any of it at all after their blatant disregard for the UK law on direct debits and their blatant disregard for their own rules too...

If you've given them an authority for direct debit or credit card details they'll probably pull it from there. You may be able to cancel the authority with your bank or credit card provider but you'd have to check with them.<br /><br />You need to tread carefully if there's any prospect you want to buy or sell on eBay again. They're perfectly capable of banning you for life, and if there's one thing they hate it's not getting paid. Lots of us hate them but it's the only game in town if you want to sell on internet auctions.

 

[Nos4r2]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

They can't pull anything from my bank account-after the 2nd attempt to debit an incorrect amount I have blocked them from having any access to anything they can take payment from. I believe they have no redress for the money they say I owe due to the UK direct debit guarantee- the most relevant part being:-If the originator or the bank/building society makes an error, the customer is guaranteed a full and immediate refund of the amount paid. <br /><br />but I guess they aint going to abide by that...<br /><br />I'm not too worried at the prospect of one of their "life bans"- lets face it if the scammers can get 10 new accounts a day then I won't have a problem getting a new one-I'd rather not lose my feedback rating though. I've sold quite a lot of 2nd hand boating gear on there and got 100% positive for it.

 

[Nos4r2]

Re: Ebay and Direct Debits...anyone else having problems with their conduct?

I have an outcome to all this (I'm quite surprised!)<br />Bear in mind I haven't paid them ANYTHING-<br />Ebay have reinstated my account and sent me this email:-<br /><br />Thank you for your payment on your eBay account. We have received and posted your payment<br />today.<br /> <br />Your account has now been reinstated, and is now available to use for bidding or listing activity.<br /> <br />Please be advised that when you incur charges on your eBay account, you will be sent an invoice<br />by email once a month. Your invoice amount is due in full by the next invoice date of the<br />following month. These are the payment terms that you agreed to in the eBay User Agreement. You are responsible for making payment whenever you have a balance due, even if eBay's invoice is not successfully delivered by email. You can use this link to check your account's balance due and transaction details at any time<br /><br /><br />does this mean I've won?!<br />