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Ahhh the 1980s…When I was a kid there was a rash of news stories about the occult. This was probably because so many poltergeist type movies came out around that same time. This resulted in some local parents (mostly moms) being very concerned that Dungeons and Dragons was satanic or a gateway to satan worship. My brother and his friends played D&D a lot. At one point one of the boy’s moms banned it from their house. They could still play it at our house but my mom forbade other things; tarot cards and Ouija boards. She thought that having them around made the house vulnerable to evil spirits.
I took some lower offers for some quick flips this week so I could pay a large tax bill. I was not able to embed Imgur photos, kept getting a “forbidden” error.
Home Depot Shopping Tote – used to go for big money when an actress used one as a purse a few years back. The demand has died down. Listed for $29.99, took $20 within a day of listing for the fast money. https://www.ebay.com/itm/263594864393
Lilly Pulitzer Holiday Skirt – paid $3, sold within hours for $75. I fully expect to get this returned as the buyer asked a million questions (after buying), sent many emails about why I charged sales tax, etc. https://www.ebay.com/itm/263593362514
10 NWT Orla Kiely Washcloths. I paid $1.99 each and took an offer for $10 each. Buyer bought 10 so it was a $100 sale. https://www.ebay.com/itm/262952002872
I’ve sold a bunch of Dragon Ball Z Childrens birthday loot bags. I bought a ton and have been selling them in lots. So far I’ve made $101.36 from the ones that have sold and have 2/3rds of the inventory still left to sell. They sat at my GW forever until they were marked 50% off. After sitting for a while with no action, they’ve been flying off my shelf lately. https://www.ebay.com/itm/262917873991
Retro – Oh I fully expect to get the skirt back as an INAD. I even told my husband last night to “mark my words – the skirt will be returned as not as described.” It’s crazy how easy it is to spot these kinds of buyers even from just their initial offer. Just thankful I don’t have to deal with customers face-to-face. I can only imagine the customer issues the store manager at any given Wal-Mart on any given day must have to deal with.
Antarestar – How does this work exactly? Do you send her a description of each item or photos or do you give her the actual unlisted items?
Thanks.
MDC Galleries – I listened (or read) that Suzanne Wells story too! I live outside of Atlanta (Rome) and man, would I LOVE to walk through one of that guy’s warehouses. I recall one issue was he didn’t want to sell anything in “lots” so right off the bat she was having to list 100s of individual postcards and all as auctions. A lot of time was being spent on postcards that were selling for 99 cents. At 99 cents each obviously the owner wasn’t going to see a lot of return for all of the time and effort. They should have started with some higher dollar items or at least mixed it up. But a 2nd big issue was the Worthpoint owner’s wife did the shipping and she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to keep up with it. Therefore they greatly limited the # of items they’d allow Suzanne to list in a single day. I also suspect that the guy is a hoarder and couldn’t let go of anything except for a few boxes of postcards. And as with most hoarders he places much more value to an item than what its actually worth. He was never going to be happy. It was a no-win situation Suzanne.
Thanks All,
I offered to cancel in both of my replies to her and I was really hoping she’d ask to cancel. Anyway, after my 2nd reply to her she responded that she didn’t know people had “stores” on ebay (I never mentioned anything about a store) and although she is not a tax attorney she understands I must charge the tax (insert my eyeroll here)…..Then she said she’d pay later. Sighhhhhh… It’s never just 1 issue with these kinds of buyers.Anyway, thanks for this little corner of the forum for allowing me to vent about a customer. It really does help!
I’m a little jealous that Mark and his family moved to Central America for a year. Your kids will gain more from that experience than anything that could be taught in a classroom setting. Good move!
My tax confession – I write down my COGS on a sticker attached to each item (in code just in case I forget to remove it before I ship) and then when it sells I record the cost, shipping, sold price, fees, etc in excel. Therefore, I don’t have a running total of what my inventory on hand is at any given time. Turbo Tax asks what my beginning of the year inventory is versus end of the year. I can’t ever answer that but I found a work around. I guess I may be cheating myself out of an “asset” which would be my inventory on hand. But I can’t fathom ever doing “inventory” so I’m going to keep doing it my way.
I have been audited (not on my ebay business). Like Mark said, these days it’s a letter you receive in the mail. The letter doesn’t say “You are being audited!” It pretty much says that according to their calculation, you owe “X” amount plus “Y” in penalties because of “Z”. It’s not a fun letter to receive but in my case it was an easy fix – my former name is listed on my mortgage interest statement. I just had to prove I was the person entitled to the mortgage interest deduction. I mailed in documentation of my name change and the IRS promptly sent a letter back letting me know that everything checked out and to consider the matter closed. After the initial knee jerk heart attack, I realized it wasn’t a big deal and it wasn’t anything that required a tax professional to help me with. I think as long as I have documentation and calculations for everything I input into my taxes, I can answer any “audit.” *Knocking on wood*
I’m in GA but I have no answer for you. Just chiming in because misery loves company?? I was quite perplexed when filing state sales tax. I used to charge 4% base sales tax and later after misinterpreting the law, I started charging 7% (the rate where I live in Floyd county). Now that I read you were told it’s illegal to charge more than what is owed, I’ll have to take a fresh look. I’ll probably switch back to 4% (or whatever the lowest possible rate is in Ga) and pay the rest out of my own pocket (it’s not illegal to pay sales tax out of your own pocket). If you ever have trouble getting an answer when calling GA tax office, I have found that it works to post on their facebook page and to also send a DM through FB messenger. Someone higher up in the office called me within 12 hours when I tried that tactic. Here’s hoping it did not get me on their “People to Audit” list.
I have not been but Jason T Smith has done quite a few youtube videos about and at EBay Open. Here is one that he did titled “Ask Me Anything About EBay Open” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64HavT7vSbk&t=2815s
You can also type into the Youtube search bar “Jason T Smith Ebay Open” and you’ll find a lot of his videos on the topic.
When I tried calling on Monday I did not get the option to leave my number to have someone call me back, which is a first. Perhaps they disabled that feature since they were so swamped with calls.
Like Jay with his experience working for the Census, I have a job that takes me to Atlanta where I hit up thrift stores in the evening. The goal was to find enough items while there to pay for my hotel, which has never been a problem. I find the best clothes in Atlanta! The downside is since I’m working at a non-Ebay job for about a year now, I have little time to list and the unlisted items have accumulated exponentially. This fact was made quite evident while cleaning and organizing my ebay room 2 weeks ago. We wanted our guest room back so I moved a lot of stuff to our basement. I now have the most organized ebay room imaginable. During the cleaning process I found so many great things that I can’t wait to list but I also found that I have almost an equal number of unlisted items as I do listed. My naive husband asked, “so how many things do you still have to list, like a hundred?” HAHAHAHAHA! Dude! It’s more like 1,000 maybe 2,000. At least it’s mostly clothes that are stored neatly in bins. But I need to get busy listing before all of it goes out of style. I’m toying with the idea of hiring someone to photograph and take measurements but I’m not excited about having someone at my house nor am I excited about handing over inventory to someone to handle off site. Decisions, decisions.
No. I waited for 3 hours! I wish I was exaggerating. I had the phone on speaker and just worked while I waited. I finally had to hang up in order to head to the post office. I think the repetitive ebay hold music got to my psyche; last night I woke myself, husband and cat with a sudden scream in my sleep.
Based on everyone’s comments about receiving similar emails yesterday I imagine the switch boards are swamped so I’m going to wait a few days before trying to call again.
My return rate is 3.94%, which is 37 out of 938 transactions. 31 of those 37 were for clothing and most of the 31 were for swimsuits. Darn those swimsuits! They’ve made me a TON of money but the returns!
Still on hold….at 2 hours and 8 minutes now. Working while waiting….
T
Yep, I bet hundreds of sellers who got an email are calling ebay right now. So far I’ve been waiting for an hour and five minutes. This is why I never bothered to call ebay in the past over an unfair INAD. Waiting on hold for this long to save $6 return shipping wasn’t worth it.
Groooaaaannnnn….They need to change their hold music. It’s the same 2 lines of the same song over and over and over.
MyCottage – I have a strong feeling that ebay is going to suggest exactly that when I finally get a rep on the phone. I may stop selling certain types of items for awhile.
It’s one thing to get an email that my returns are high – it’s another thing for Ebay to say that my items visibility will suffer when ebay stated previously that returns are not defects. Now I have to waste my time and ebay’s time to fight unfair INADs.
