Bah, Humbug! Auction site annoyances

This may amuse some of you more than it does me but I've started to compile a list of things which annoy me about a certain auction site especially when it comes to obtaining obsolete Panasonic Toughbooks.

1. Excessive shipping and handling fees. I've seen dozens of ridiculously cheap Toughbooks being sold with postage at the very least doubled (and sometimes quadrupled) for anyone unwise enough to click the "Buy It Now" button. I've now started reporting anyone and everyone who charges $39.99 and above for "economy shipping" when the good sellers are sticking to $15-20 which is what "standard shipping" really costs.

2. Jumping a bid from $30 up to $130 in the final 2 seconds of the auction. How is that even possible?

3. Toughbooks being sold with more than just the hard drive and caddy missing. To some extent the lack of a hard drive is understandable given the nature of secure data disposal especially as most of the Toughbooks come from government agencies but what is the point of selling them without power supplies, keyboards, or even screens and then listing all those parts separately? Can't people just put a whole Toughbook together and sell the thing rather than creating some kind of jigsaw out of what was probably an intact computer to begin with?

4. Broken Toughbooks for "parts or repair". Basically if you have a laptop that is missing the keyboard, screen, all the port covers, the motherboard, RAM, hard drive, caddy, optical drives and looks like it has been blown up, THROW THE DAMN THING AWAY and don't list it on ebay. Who in their right mind is going to repair a completely trashed and gutted CF-25 for instance and for what purpose?

5. "Drivers can be downloaded online". Well, if you had enough time to post the link to them, why didn't you just install them before trying to sell your Toughbook?

6. "Will not ship, local pickup only". Yeah, I really want to spend hundreds of dollars on a plane ticket and taxi fare all the way to the other side of the country when you could stick the thing in the mail for $20 which I'd pay for anyway!!!

7. "Does not boot, does not POST, buy as seen". So it's dead then? Why is it even listed? Throw it away and sell me one that works.

8. "Screen has some minor blemishes". Since when do scratches right through to the lid become "minor"?

9. "Rare". Yeah, right, if you discount the other 5 million Toughbooks in existence with exactly the same specifications.

10. "Sold as is" accompanied by a stock photo of a complete Toughbook which is totally unlike the one you will receive.

11. "Internet Ready". Of course it is if I want to add my own wireless card but the fact that this Toughbook comes without one means that it isn't ready for anything except sitting like a lump in the corner.

12. "Untested/have no way of testing it". Except that the seller did test it, found that it didn't work and then decided to sell it without a battery or AC adapter so that the buyer wouldn't be able to test it either.

13. "Massive 6gb Hard Drive". 6gb, massive? From what century was that then?

14. "Some covers might be missing" meaning that it really only has one left which the owner couldn't pry off to sell in a separate auction.

Do any of you have any more to add to this?

 

Wow , this is going to be a great thread


We can go into detail on all the crappy deals that we have had over the years so that others can laugh at our stupidity

 

Speaking of Bah! All the extra ads with additional buttons to push to go where I asked to go in the first place.
Telling me what I looked at before. Additional graphics=slow.
No operating system but the programs may be available at no charge. Or words to that effect. Saw it yesterday.
Not posting the model number. How long we been doing this?
Advertising a 1.4 as a 1.6. I called one guy on it as the total hours were not visible on the screen. "Oh thank you" but the listing remained the same until end of auction.
EDIT Hitting the [Post Quick Reply] onna accident. That's alright I'm better now.

 

I'm just tired of trawling through pages and pages of unrepairable junk, Toughbook parts listed in the wrong categories, and 600mhz laptops being sold at over $1000 just because they have everything intact but the AC port cover which you can buy in a separate auction from the same seller for another $100 if you really want to.

 

Here is an example of the seller taking advantage on the shipping charges
USA shipping is OK ,but I don't quite understand why I would have to spend $260 for shipping to Canada
Seller even states that it is Economy Int'l Shipping
What sort of economy is that

 

A friend of mine makes a living doing farm auctions for equipment. His best quote is people 'bidding themselves stupid'.
Those are the people these dealers are waiting for. I've passed up many auctions for over priced shipping. Didn't need it that bad!

 

But TC57....it's " BRAN NEW".

 

How about a picture of a completely different Mark in the auction? How about asking generic questions and getting a slew of "I don't knows" or "as is, if I didn't list it it's probably not there". I didn't ask if screw J was properly torqued down behind the motherboard or what flavor of thermal paste is on the CPU. Craigslist is far worse.

"Yo son I got a unopened Acer Aspire One notebook Wal Mart sold out $600 Firm No trades CASH ONLY!" <---no pictures

"We have lightning fast 2.7 GHZ Pentium 4 Off Lease Desktops $315 no monitors, no keyboards, no mouse. See my separate listing for those. Copy Pasta same exact web addressed image for all the towers.


The automotive listings there start off like Cars runs great and has no performance issues and the last sentence says it fails emissions and I don't know why the check engine light is on.

Dr. Blood I'm also victim of the $20 auctions going Rouge in the last 9 seconds. I wish they didn't guess my exact max bid to the "T"

 

LOL was the economy that bad he had to Copy Pasta the entire website he stole the info for it to include the

"Portions of this page Copyright 1997 - 2010 CNET Channel. All rights reserved."

 

"2. Jumping a bid from $30 up to $130 in the final 2 seconds of the auction. How is that even possible?"

"Dr. Blood I'm also victim of the $20 auctions going Rouge in the last 9 seconds. I wish they didn't guess my exact max bid to the "T"

If you don't know the answers to these two questions you need to learn how to use eBay. It's called "sniping" and utilizes a third party service which will place a bid for your highest price in the last 5 seconds of the auction, you can't beat them manually, and it works no matter where you are when the auction ends. You place your snipe and the service does the rest for pennies. Its perfectly legal and eBay knows all about it. The only way you don't get the item is if someone has a maximum bid in higher than yours. I probably shouldn't post this, but I'm old and there isn't much I need.
My first direct contact with Rick (TB) was when he contacted me after I sniped him on a sweet MK2 CF-28 way back in the day
CAP
Accepting rep for letting this cat out of the bag.

 

Well I agree on the excessive shipping and misinformed sellers, but on the flip side of that. I have gotten some really sweet deals from sellers who didn't have a clue what they had.
If they threw away all of the so called junk, I would not be able to afford any Toughbook. I have to buy 2 of someone's junk and make 1 usable laptop.
Stock photos due irritate me. I pass on those auctions and any with ridiculous shipping. BTW the reason that is done is because fleabay charges the seller based on the sale price of the item, not shipping. It is cheaper to post and sell a .01 item with 39.99 shipping than to post and sell a 35.00 item with 5.00 shipping.
Being an informed buyer is the best plan for me. If I read the ad and read between the lines I can usually figure what is up. Bad, junk parts or clueless operator. Sometimes I have been burnt. Sometimes my excitement gets the best of me and sometimes it's a fraudulent ad. I have no problem filing a claim.
Fleabay is like dealing with every sleezy used car salesman you have ever met. I roll my eyes, put on hip waders and dive in to the muck.
I can't really fault the sales tactic of trying to make it sound great.
I guess I expect used to be used, sometimes well used. If I want something without defects or clueless ads then I go to Best Buy.
I admit I am one of the sniping weenies. I do it to avoid the I will outbid you at all cost mentality. People get into a urinating contest. Truth is though, if I decide I will pay max $5.00 for something, then when I bid doesn't matter.
I don't put in 27 bids in .25 increments. That irritates me. Bid 5.00 the first time and be done. Fleabay won't make you pay the whole 5.00 if the highest other bid was 2.25. They only charge you the small increment over that bid. In this case it would be 2.50, not the 5.00 of my MAX bid.

 

My particular dislike to add to Dr Blood's list is the one that goes along the lines of "ask any question you like, but we don't know anything about computers"

So - ok - what's the meaning of life, the universe and all that?

 

Forty-Two

 

I use ebay to source out of production items in new condition. Things like tools I use every day, can't get anywhere else, and want to build up enough stock of to last me the rest of my life. I bid more than anyone has ever paid for the things and wait for the "you win" email. I love the saved search function. Every time something on my list comes up for auction I get an email. If the seller is a clown like the OP is finding, I move on. That's never really an issue with NIB items though.

 

I bid what I feel it's worth and use the sellers tools to see what something like it sold for and if it was near a holiday. One guy was selling used mufflers and gave the link to the place he got them online. This one guy outbidded the used ones beyond new with shipping. Same thing 3 months ago when I was bidding on a Q9550 to replace my Q8200. I left the bid and went to micro center. Even with gas and taxes, it was still climbing past that amount in the bid. Seller also got it from micro center.

Ahh that's why I either never win or get the exact max bid. I always thought the seller had a alternate account to post the price last minute. If they won they could pay themselves or just cancel since their alter ego isn't gonna give em 1 stars.

 

I can explain the "very expensive" $39.99 shipping charge...

1) If you were in the business and actually understood what the bills look like for the overhead to run a company with 6 employees, TIME IS MONEY! It takes TIME to take EXTRA special care to box these things up so that UPS/Fedex/USPS/Insert crappy shipping company here doesn't DESTROY IT! Even though they are toughbooks, I've STILL seen broken screens, destroyed keyboards, dented this, dented that and the works!

Back to my original rant: TIME... EVERYTHING TAKES TIME! The added shipping cost is to pay my employee $9/hour to box the damn thing so it can survive a nuclear holocaust! On top of the fact that it takes TIME to print out labels, TIME to ORDER THE PACKING MATERIAL, MONEY for packing peanuts, foam and bubble wrap, and TIME to take delivery on these things. On top of that I need to make sure I'm shipping the correct laptop to the correct person (which I personally ship out THOUSANDS of laptops yearly).

One more thing: I have noticed that if I just increase the cost of the laptop by $40 and offer "free shipping" that these people seem to think that they're getting a better "deal"... hmmmmm, logic dictates that they're paying the SAME PRICE... In the end that "expensive" $39.99 shipping cost is negated by the TIME it takes to do business!

 

Yes, but why do we ape-descendants spend so much of our time wearing digital watches?

mnem
*Things that make you go Hmmmmm...*

 

I last wore a watch in 1992. For four years I asked others what time it was. Since 1996 if the sun was up I work sun goes down I sleep.
If the mail carrier stops it's either Tues. Thurs. or Saturday. If the garbage cans are empty and the mail comes it's Thurs. for sure.

In my "real" business I agree with Rob. Time is money and I haven't spent much less than half and hour packaging, weighing addressing a package yet. My shop rates are $25/hour plus material and I am the employee. BUT if I am shipping something that cost $1.50 how can I charge $12.50 to ship it? So I write it off as advertising. Maybe next time they will buy a saddle.

Moral: low shipping costs are advertising.

 

My take on this is just walk away the good bid will come along sooner or later
I have gotten into who's are bigger on a couple of bids and it cost me big time
so now it's this is what i'll pay and walk away.sometimes it pays off,sometimes not.

 

Heres one for the list.

People selling toughbook parts for 4 times the price you can buy them from at Heartland. Like the port covers for 15 a piece I've seem one listing for 50 for a DC prot cover. Heartland sells them for 3 bucks.

 

That's my world! I've been watching deals on CF-51's lately, I have bought three and have made two working units. Gave one to a friend who was still using a P-III laptop someone gave him some time back.
I enjoy the hunt and have fun when I score! I like rebuilding these Toughbooks!
Another place to consider when looking for deals is local Hamfests! There is a quite large one here in Ohio in the spring at Dayton, runs for three days.
I got my 51 Mk3 there. Just had to add a hard drive. He had stacks of them! Had power available to test and look for yourself. I'll go back next spring and see if he comes back!

 

Thats the best advice I know of for bidding on Ebay. Don't 'bid yourself stupid'!

 

But Heartland also charges $25 to handle and ship that "3 buck" part.

 

That's because Heartland ships everything standard overnight. That might be a Panasonic thing. Either way, it's a happy thing for us Spock babies.

 

THANK YOU!

I pack mine with such care that it takes me close to an hour to get everything ready. But then anyone who has recived one that I have shipped knows this. EVERYTHING costs money.

No doubt there are copycats and ripoffs on eBay... Rub some dirt on it and walk it off... Or... Learn and bid. Am I going through this one by the numbers... Nope...

I RARELY buy Toughbooks on eBay any more. I have made so many contacts through the years that I rarely need to buy on ebay. Mostly I buy caddies and other hard to source stuff. I personally watch the item and then bid... Where and when is my secret... Not bid sniping though... And I have a 90% success rate. (Don't EVEN ask!)

Cap... I forgot all about that... That was years ago! (I owe you one!) HA!

What bothers me most about eBay is not the bidders, buyers or sellers... It is eBay itself! Yeah I get ticked about the VT guy making $10 on every $1 part he buys from Heartland... But eBay's seller ratings have been WAY skewed! It used to be based upon common-sense stuff. Now you need to work it out with a slide rule. I have to sell 100 products per (whatever) now for me to be a Power seller. If my items are costly (and I wish I could sell 100+) then how am I to compete against others who sell $10 stuff? As they changed I went from Gold to Silver to Bronze to not being a power seller at all. (I really don't care much now but it used to REALLY get my goat!) My only way out (and I SERIOUSLY thought about this!) was to buy a TON of plastic port covers and sell them for cost plus a minuscule shipping charge. This, of course would tick off every other seller of those parts on ebay... But to me... It is the principle. If I did that... The buyer would get a GREAT price, the other ripoff artists would be out sold and would wither on most part sales AND eBay wouldn't make much over $1 per month off my sales because of the low sales prices... Who knows... maybe I'll still do it.

The whole point is that you need to have a little more patience and educate yourself... Either that or get even....

 

I've just thought of another thing that annoys me - dirty, sticky stuff which the seller just conveniently forgot to mention.

When I sell things on ebay, no matter what it is, I clean it all up as far as is possible and try to sell it in as close to complete and new condition. Obviously there must be something wrong with me to expect other people to be the same way because whenever I do win or buy something myself, often when it is described as "as new", I find sticker residue, hair, fur, grit and all kinds of other nastiness when I finally get the item.

When I joined ebay back in August 1999, it was mostly made up of individuals and collectors who all thought the same way but since all the businesses and wannabe businesses have taken over the whole site has really fallen apart and turned into the world's biggest car boot/yard sale. People seem to be pulling things out of bins and rubbish tips with no attempt to disguise the origin of what they are selling, wrapping it in newspaper (if you are lucky) and sticking it in some old box that fish came in or something and quadrupling the postage charges just to make a quick buck.

The only sellers I deal with now are ones which take photos of everything and highlight any damage. In some cases even though I know that I should wait for a better version, I still go with these more honest sellers.

I now have over 367 transactions on ebay and have only been really ripped off once (gritty, hairy, dirty stuff reeking of fish aside) by somebody selling a tube of "Polywatch" for $7 which never turned up and, in spite of getting ebay involved, I never did get the money returned through Paypal which he said he had.

So that's another annoyance, "ebay buyer protection" does not work and the sellers know it.

----

- Who would buy this? Ewwwww!

 

"Some yellowing on the head" OMG! Nasty!!!! lol

Well coming from having almost 10,000 feedback on eBay and being with my company since day one, I can say a few things:

1) The BIGGEST complaint we've had issues with in the past was that our products were dirty. What did I do? I cracked the whip on my employees, fired someone and personally cleaned EVERYTHING that went out. Our sales went up as news got around that all my products were clean and NICE. It really isn't hard to clean everything. We bought about 8 spray bottles and a few gallons of simple green, diluted it 100:1 and viola... Clean computers

2) I do agree that eBay has gone to the crapper with the crap that people sell these days. eBay recently raised there rates by 1000%. YES, 1000%!!! !!! our ebay month cost to have 3000 items in our inventory went from $60/month to OVER $600/month. It was then that me, my co-workers and my boss decided to stop the junk garage sale and pull down all the garbage that has been listed for the last 4-8 years (since it OBVIOUSLY won't sell). We now carry a much smaller 300 item inventory to get back to our $60/month range.

 

Yep the chances of getting a complete brick "literally" are high. Craigslist has become a safer route. If it doesn't post thanks for wasting my time goodbye.

 

I agree on the shipping costs from heartland thats why I wait if possible and order abunch of stuff together. If I call in the morning I have it the next day, not a week likemost Flee-bay stuff.

Have had a few good deals via flee-bay but that is getting harder over the years. Everyone thinks a CF-28 is worth 300 bucks.

Do alot of Toughbook sales here in Europe from used to new and have built up a good network for parts and compleet toughbooks outside of flee-bay and for alot cheaper.

Also this forum is an excellent resource for info and everything else.

 

You really don't know what you are getting sometimes
Take this listing for an example
PANASONIC CF-29 CF 29 TOUCHSCREEN LAPTOP - eBay (item 200555053513 end time Dec-17-10 21:40:00 PST)

Listed as a cf-29 1.2 GHz , but there is conflicting info here lol

 

And back to the DOA guarentee once you find the right power supply to verify it powers on. Most of us here have at least 2 power supplies or a means of charging that battery but still...

 

This looks like someone watched the CF-29 get ran over by the H2 YouTube video.

Panasonic ToughBook CF-51 Intel Centrino Duo XP Pro COA - eBay (item 270677282806 end time Dec-15-10 12:39:47 PST)

 

Refurbishing , A can of blue spray paint and some chewing gum won't cut it here ,when it does not even boot

 

W TF?!?! Did that stupid seller even THINK to look at the damn computer and see that is says CF-28 on it?!?!?! W TF!?

 

I have to say that I have found a lot of really good deals on you-know-what-bay. Though there are not always great deals, I have regularly seen very nicely priced TB items. I noticed that just recently someone was selling a bunch of new W8's for about $500 each. I didn't buy one, but that's a good deal by any measure.

I've foud that the less new and complete the system, the more responsibility is put on the buyer to understand just what he's getting - and, often, the better possible deal.

Dave

 

Google image fail. If you are new to toughbooks 27and 31 look the same. Funny thing searching for a Fujitsu Tablet one review has a CF-18 pictured.

 

Rob

The cf-28 pictured is a 13.3" Mk-3, but in the description it states 12"
It's anyones guess if he is selling a cf-29 mk-1 , a Cf-28 with either a 12 or 13 inch screen or a lump of coal
Reminds me of the $1 candy grab bags

 

Well hopefully it's coal... I can then use it to heat my cardboard box...

 

Talking of which, I just bought an Apple Ibook for my cats' early Christmas present and when it arrived they preferred the box and packing materials to the "computer" itself.

I'm now looking at all the broken CF-29s again...

 

For a special treat you can play choo-choo train by putting the cat in the box and pulling them around in it

I did this with my 18lb cat ,she looked so funny

 

I asked him about the picture and description not jiving and he sent me the Model Number of the unit being sold:

CF-29CRKGZKM DESCRIPTION:
Pentium M 1.2GHz ULV (Centrino), 12.1" Transflective touch screen, 40GB HDD, 256 MB RAM, 56K/LAN, FDD, Intel PRO Wireless LAN, Windows XP Pro

He also apologized for the incorrect picture being posted.

 

I used to stock up on a specific Dewalt drill that was improved by making it weaker and less convenient. That was an adventure. 80% of the ebay vendors whose auction showed a picture of the older version were in fact shipping the newer one. After the first wrong drill showed up I learned to ask. One guy sent me a worked pos that was listed as new. He did appologize and send the correct new drill along with some freebies for the inconvenience. Despite all the weirdness, ebay is still the go to place for out of production stuff.

 

Has this made it to ebay?

YouTube - Fire Damaged Toughbook