eBay has never been a huge attraction for me as the idea of entering into auctions on-line just wasn’t something that I was that interested in.  However after hosting me on campus last year, I was convinced that eBay was trying to be more like Amazon in terms of buying experience and they were showcasing an interesting additional step of providing apps that could point you to stores that had products you might want to buy. In other words, they were moving beyond actions and into consumer-focused commerce much more aggressively.

Towards the end of last year, I bought my wife an old 1997 Jaguar XK8 that was hers to drive, but a project car for me to fix up. I figured I’d use both Amazon and eBay for my efforts and found that while Amazon remained great for new products, eBay was vastly better with specialty sites for the Jag and with used parts, which come with risks, but have a fraction of the cost of new parts. However, on Monday, eBay came off the rails and what had started to be a love affair with the service turned into a nightmare. Let me explain.

Amazon vs. eBay: Buying

Amazon is still vastly easier to use since their one-click buying option makes it easy, sometimes too easy, to get through the purchase process. Undoing a one-click purchase requires you go into your account history quickly and delete the item which is several clicks away. If you think before you click, it doesn’t happen that often.

eBay requires that you have a PayPal account or that you use PayPal to handle the transaction. This requires a second log in for every purchase if you are going to use PayPal. PayPal isn’t that user friendly either; for instance, you have a set limit for a credit card only account and when that limit is reached, you have to input your bank routing information. I’m not a fan of sharing this information because, if PayPal was hacked, someone could drain your bank account with it and, unlike credit cards, recourse can take weeks or months to correct.  If I had a choice I’d never provide my bank information as a practice.

Once in place PayPal prefers a bank transaction over credit card and you have to go into PayPal and change preferences. If you don’t (and I don’t) want to pull from your checking accounting. Recently, another step came in-between me and the purchase and that was an offer for a PayPal credit card. They don’t seem to like to take “no” for an answer and this does get annoying after a while. So, instead of the one click you get on Amazon, you get to spend a number of clicks navigating eBay and its offers.

Amazon vs. eBay Rating

Amazon is aggressive about rating transactions and will send you reminder emails so that you participate. I’ve often avoided third party stores that were listed as questionable. eBay has a rating system as well, but they don’t really drive it and comments appeared less often when I was shopping and never really relied on them.

Product Quality

In terms of the quality of what I received, I’m generally happy with both Amazon and eBay, the third party sellers have generally been great and I only had one eBay problem, which, given the part had the same issue as the part I was replacing, was likely due to the seller not realizing it was a problem. (The bracket on a side marker light was overly bent causing it to rattle, likely the cause is that the light was not properly removed from the car at one time). What I got from Amazon was mostly new and what I got from eBay was mostly used, but that was as expected. I’d use both services again, even though there was one big hiccup.

 

The E-Bay Soup Nazi Customer experience

Up until this point, I’d recommend Amazon for new, because they provide a simpler experience and are more aggressive with the social aspects of vendor rating and eBay for pre-owned or for anything you can’t find on Amazon, because they are more difficult and, with the PayPal experience, potentially more risky, in my opinion. Last Sunday evening the train came off the track.

I was shopping for a used front seat for the Jag, and I clicked on buy and got a notification that my account had been suspended and that all moneys owed were immediately payable. At the same time, my email filled up with notifications of cancelled transactions, each of which I’d already paid for (later confirmed through my bank records) and for a number of things I’d already received. In looking in my account there was the same cryptic cancellation notice but no cause and no defined process for resolution. It reminded me a lot of what happens in World of Warcraft when they suspect you are doing something their rules don’t allow.

Figuring this had been a mistake, or that maybe eBay had been hacked, I looked up the call-in support number and called in. The guy initially answered very politely, he was never really rude, and initially listened to and said he would look into my problem. Then, after a long hold, he came back on and said that after looking at my record eBay wanted to part company with me implying I’d done something wrong, but not sharing what it was.

I’ll admit I got a little huffy and did the “how-dare-you-do-you-know-who-I-am” thing and he wasn’t impressed. I should point out that this approach rarely works with someone at this level and that I should have known better. I asked for his name and to speak to a supervisor and he said his supervisor would agree with him, (I call that the “psychic response” and he wouldn’t give me his name (probably wise at this point as I was in a nasty limerick mood). Finally, he thanked me very much, wished me a good night and hung up. I then did my best imitation of a crazy person ranting at walls, the pets, a few plants, and anything else that couldn’t hang up on me (I might add this wasn’t particularly effective).

Later, it reminded me of “The Soup Nazi” Seinfeld (best of here) show in the 1990s, where, if you crossed some invisible line, the proprietor would give you back your money, take away your soup saying “no soup for you”. No eBay for me, I guess. Banning of sellers happens so often there is actually a book on how to get back on, and a nice web site, but buyers getting banned are far rarer, evidently. This hopefully suggests my experience was unique and not endemic.

I have since contacted eBay’s PR folks for resolution, they use the Edelman PR agency, which is considered to be one of the best firms in the world and they were very understanding, and eventually I got a call from eBay.

Resolution: Banned no More

Now as I was finalizing this article, I got a call from eBay and my account has been reinstated and, where possible, the stuff I’d ordered was either already on the way or resent. The trigger for my problem apparently was that I had two accounts on PayPal, one was restricted because I hadn’t provided my bank routing information (something I don’t think it is wise to do given how many security breaches we’ve had this decade). Upon seeing the duplicate restricted account coupled with a lot of buying, an eBay employee decided I was likely a crook and pulled my plug.

Let’s just say I’ve expressed my opinion that this process should be revisited and I will leave it at that.   Amazon, in the end, comes off as more refined, but they came up a different way and they are a full retailer and have more control as a result. In the end, though, I think PayPal’s compromised arm’s length relationship with eBay leads eBay to accept practices from them that I doubt they would except otherwise and I’d look to this relationship as the likely place to find a permanent solution to problems like mine.

Wrapping Up

Both services are way too fun to use and now that my account is fixed, I’ll go back to using both. However, were I to pick one over the other, Amazon provides the most consistent and fastest user experience and given they’ve never banned me, I’d put them at the top of this list. In the end, if you are looking new, then Amazon is likely your best bet, but if you’ll accept used and want to save a ton of money on eBay. Good hunting!

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.