After porn and online gambling, the best thing about the internet is eBay. Whenever I needed to buy something, I've always checked eBay first. Granted, a lot of things could be expensive on eBay. But for many items--for those who knew how to shop--eBay housed many great deals...and I absolutely love a bargain.

I have been using eBay since the 20th century (member since '98, baby!) and have never had an unsatisfactory incident. Don't get me wrong: I've dealt with bad sellers and impatient buyers. But during my nine years of experience, I have never walked away from an incident feeling like I got screwed--we've always been able to work out a satisfactory conclusion.

Until now.

I bought a KVM in mid-December on eBay. It was something I greatly looked forward to because it was gonna make my computer network hella cool. It took about three weeks to get the thing and I noticed problems from Day One. But instead of immediately complaining to the seller, I tried to find a fix. There's always a fix. I can't tell you how often I've bought something on eBay that didn't work out of box--especially computer stuff. Most of the time there's a software update or hack needed to get it right. After searching and trying, I found none and contacted the seller. After two weeks of unreplied emails, he finally agreed to let me exhange the item for a different one. three weeks after I sent it back to him, I still hadn't heard from him. he kept ignoring my emails and that's when I realized he was screwing me over.

eBay is like the rest of Corporate America: they don't want you calling when there's a problem. Sure, they'll gladly take your money. But they don't have the slightest interest in talking to you when something went wrong.

I tried contacting eBay through their suggested dispute methods. I sent emails and filled out forms and the responses were all the same: eBay was unwilling to help me because I purchased the item longer than 60 days ago and that's their "policy." I thought their policy was garbage. The seller was jerking me around for 60 days. Not to mention it took three weeks to get the damn thing in the first place. I knew if I spoke with someone they would see that my situation was unique and I would be allowed to proceed in filing a dispute against the seller.

eBay, much like Amazon, Yahoo!, and numerous other websites doesn't freely give out its phone number. Unfortunately for them there's this thing called Google and one can find anything on Google (my theory: if it isn't on Google, it doesn't exist). I found a number for eBay on the internet and called them.

I told the operator that I was looking to speak with someone regarding filing a dispute against a seller. The little prick transferred me to a voice recording that told me how to do it. When the message finished playing, the call was disconnected. This information proved to be useless to me since I already tried those steps so I called back again. Again, he transferred me to the same message. I noticed that he didn't say he was going to transfer me to this message--he just did so. He probably does that for every caller. And eBay tells him not to tell people that they're being transferred to a message--they just do it (probably because they know the caller is gonna get pissed).

I tried using eBay's instant message help. Instead of conversing with live people, eBay offers an instant message exchange with one of their people. They call it Live Help but it was neither live nor helpful. I tried talking to the guy but he just offered the obvious and useless suggestions (one of which included small claims court: yeah, like it's worth the airfare to sue the mofo for 29 bucks). We argued online for 45 minutes. He stonewalled every request. It wasn't so much his fault--that's what he was trained to do. He even suggested I send detailed letters to eBay? So I promptly pasted the two extremely detailed letters I sent eBay earlier in the message window. Eventually, he must've realized that arguing with me was getting nowhere. All I wanted was to talk to a person who had the capability of helping me. Since he clearly didn't and wasn't allowed to let me talk to anyone who could (my repeated requests to talk to his supervisor were denied), it was obvious the conversation was going nowhere. Without leaving me remotely close to satisfied, he closed the window--the equivalent of hanging up the phone on someone.

I called the eBay's corporate number again and spent a great deal of time arguing with the phone op. I demanded to speak to someone--anyone--who could help me. He insisted I try the Live Help or send them an email even thought I repeatedly told him I had been down that road before.

"Let me talk to someone--anyone," I pleaded.

"I can't transfer you to someone unless you give me their name," he said. It was a line he said to me repeatedly before.

"Fine--let me talk to your supervisor," he said.

"I can't transfer you to him unless you tell me his name."

"I don't know his name--he's your supervisor."

"I can't transfer you without a name."

"Fine--what's your supervisor's name?"

"I can't give you that information."

"You don't know your own supervisor's name?"

I can't. I can't. I can't. It's all so negative and so frustrating. Even though this happened two weeks ago, I'm getting furious thinking about it all right now. I'm helpless thanks to their policies. I was stuck because they were unwilling to try. I understand eBay has millions of users and many complainers. But you'd think when someone is as adamant and frustrated as I was, they'd be willing to try.

We did the "I can't transfer you without a name" dance for quite a bit. Finally, I gave him a name--the only name I knew: eBay's CEO Meg Whitmore (I see her name all the time in tech magazines). Of course, the first time I made that request I was "accidentally" disconnected.

I called Meg Whitmore two or three days in a row and left messages on her voicemail. I never actually expected to talk to eBay's CEO--but I was hoping if I was persistent enough, I might be able to talk to someone.

Eventually I got an email from eBay. It was strongly-worded, with the suggestion that I should leave them alone. They didn't forthright suggest account suspension, restraining orders, or a lawsuit. But they did make it clear I was being a nuisance and wanted me to stop before it escalated too far.

I don't think I've ever accepted defeat before--not when I felt I've been wronged. I normally stand up for what I believe in and will fight for whatever I think is right. But this case is hopeless--I can tell already. eBay doesn't give a damn about me or any of its customers. I'm screwed and there's nothing I can do about it.

The irony is at this point, I'm more angry at eBay than the crooked seller. I'm more interested in receiving satisfaction that my $29.18 back. I am so annoyed and fed up with eBay's polices that I'm fairly certain I will never buy anything from them again 'cause now I know I have no course of action when things go wrong. I'll sell stuff 'cause it's easy to screw over my buyers, but I'm sure as hell never trusting anything I buy on eBay again. Most of the sellers are fine--it's just a few bad apples. But if eBay isn't going to help me when I get one of those bad apples, I want nothing to do with them. I've boycotted stores for far less. I don't appreciate being treated like garbage.

© 2007 siknerd.com