Ebay / Xerox VeRO-d me and I need some insight and advice? HELP!!!

You know the answer. Good to admit you’re getting too emotionally involved here.

–Yes, you can relist.
–Yes, you risk eBay punishing you.
–Maybe you get away with it.
–Maybe not.

Xerox has every right to send out VERO’s on their items. It’s not great for us resellers, but Amazon has a similar system where some major brands have agreements that only authorized sellers can sell their items.

Re-listing with the model number would be a good compromise. I personally wouldnt kill the golden goose to get one nice egg.

Usually, when a VERO is discussed here on the forum, the general consensus is to find another website to sell it on. When someone has relisted the item that they were told not to sell, that is when suspensions happen.

eBay will look at addresses, both physical and computer, to determine that you and your wife are connected, so I’m not sure whether that would be a good idea. I mean, it might be OK, but I can’t really say.

You do have the correct idea in listing it without the brand name in the title or item specifics.

Maybe Facebook Marketplace?

Big companies are getting more and more strict about the use of their brand name, to the point of being ridiculous from our point of view. I imagine the check for Vero is done with a script and if so then using a different account will also be caught eventually and not a good idea.

I think the first thing is to try to get some clarity on this from eBay. First level support probably can’t help but you can ask for a specialist or for the department responsible for this and see what happens.

I’ve run into Vero issues with car parts automobile brands in the past and the solution was to state that it fits [brand] [model]. In the past when this happened I was able to relist with the modifications, but it’s been a while and may not apply to your situation. Maybe something like, “New Sealed OEM Color Toner Pack for Xerox J75 and C75” and stay away from using Xerox as the Brand in item specifics.

My 2¢

Don’t relist. Flip locally. You’re talking about a $1k loss vs. a lifetime of never being able to see on eBay.

Xpost to Craigslist (or your regional equivalent) and FB Marketplace. OfferUp/LetGo. Be prepared to take a lower deal, but you should be able to move them fast if the right person gets a hold of your listing.

Like others, I don’t recommend simply relisting some other way without getting it specifically blessed by eBay.

In the past I have listed new items as pre-owned rather than new, which gives the manufacturer less legal basis for a VeRO takedown and has worked for me. In the description I’ll say the item is unopened and unused. However I’ve never listed any Xerox items (nor have I ever listed any designer brands that aggressively VeRO for counterfeits among pre-owned listings). And just because it has worked for me doesn’t mean it will work for anyone else. YMMV.

This is related but slightly off target but still may give you some insight or things to think about.

As Jay says, any corporation that has a brand and products they mfg. own all the rights in most ways to any words, phrases, images, slogans, mottos, even color combinations and partial pictures of their product. They have every right to go after whomever they think has infringed. And in todays world of e-commerce as Jay also says you are not an authorized reseller.

An Authorized Reseller can use, say and show parts of a product because they have a written contract and included in it is permission to promote the OEM product or company according to the way their contract says they can and also included in the contract is the rules is the things you can’t say or do.

You can go to any site, any place Craig’s list, Mercari, Bonanza, even a news paper ad locally and post your ad to resell and you are in violation of the laws that protect a larger company. Even if brand new in the package never opened. They want you to throw it away before they would see you resell it and make money from it.

Buying yours stops them from getting money from the buyer that would go to then. They get touchy, so any larger company that has the money to hire a staff or whole department, these days are searching, trolling and digging for those who try to resell.

We have had a few VERO’s before and certainly we have all talked about it here on SL. Even Jay and Ryanne had to change their name some years back because Ebay reached out to them and told them to take the word Ebay out of the Blog’s name. Jay can tell you more about that, but Scavengerlife was not what they started out with back when Mike and Wendy were around.

Our last episode was from a company that we used to use when I owned a spray foam insulation company. The spray gun had several parts and filters that wore out quickly and were very expensive to buy original replacement parts from the OEM company. So, I went to a machine shop, had a few parts reversed engineered and started making my own after-market parts.

We only said that our parts fit this company’s spray gun. It didn’t take long before we got a letter from their legal team to cease and desist. So, I went to our lawyer and said I have a right to sell a copy of their parts. He said I really didn’t but if I was going to persist then he gave us the following, which we have in our listings for about 24 parts to this day.

I also wrote to the OEM Mfg. a polite letter, told them my story and included the following. Got a reply with a very specific list of what they would not allow us to say in our ad and a reminder that if we try to make money from parts that mentions anything about them or their patented parts, we would be drug into court.

They said their research, their development, their costs to bring their gun and replacements parts and the ordering of replacement parts could not include anything about them and they frowned upon us doing this.
Well since we included this blurb, we haven’t heard anything from them again.

* Brand names, Trademarks, Copy Rights and Patented Products: Any use of any Trade Marked names, brands, products or words that refer to those products and their respective companies are by reference only, and by reference does not imply that we are associated with them in any way or any of the items we list or mfg. are derivative of their mfg. or marketing processes. For any industrial parts we sell, they are aftermarket parts and are offered as an alternative to the OEM parts as a cost-effective alternative. Any and all words of trade marked products and uses of such, either alone or in combination, are intended only to refer to the original company and-or its products for comparison only and not intended to create an impression of our company being related to, our items created by or we being licensed by any such company or legal distributor of said products or manufacturers.

So, if you think once you own something and think it is yours, you have the right to resell it think again. You don’t own anything except the right to use the product yourself as it was originally intended by them and not sell any new unused product or any partially used and remaining product.

Think about it, legally we are not supposed to be re-selling anything, clothing brands, shoes, perfumes, camera’s, used cars, anything unless the company is out of business [old vintage like Jay says] or they don’t care. That is the big question. WHICH ONE’s of them CARE! Obviously, car mfg. do not [I guess] but they do have authorized or certified used car selling going on, but what about the person to person sales. Do your own brake job, the brakes fail, and it is proven, who gets drug into the claim, the car company along with the seller.

Finding out is by trial and error and thus how many of us has learned the hard way by and even gotten VERO’s and direct letters from companies.

There is a link on here [SL] that will take you to Ebay’s list of hundreds of companies that have registered with Ebay and I assume other platforms about their concerns and displeasure with sellers re-selling their products. Reselling anything by those companies is as stated by others above is taking a chance, which we here on SL and millions of other sellers do every day.
Who gets caught as Jay says is just the luck of the draw, just like getting a speeding ticket? Most do it but who and how many get caught is a random luck of the draw.

It is a quandary and tough to decide what to do. Relist and include a disclaimer like we did, relist without a statement, ignore and proceed, or deal with any legal matters when you get caught just like paying your speeding ticket, even if it a second time getting caught speeding.
Good luck hope you figure it out.

This as always is just my opinion and that and $1.75 will get you a half a cup of coffee these days 🙂

Mike at MDC Concepts, Inc.

• This reply was modified 6 years, 6 months ago by MDC Galleries & Fine Art.

way to go!

Just curious, what did the California print shop use to pay you? PayPal?

In this case, it all sounds legit, but with other items/clientele, this is always the question when dealing long distance outside of eBay.