great for things you can't get anywhere else (ebay.co.uk)

Member Name: candykim

Product:	ebay.co.uk
Date:	09/07/09 (76 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: easy to use, loads of choice

Disadvantages: you can never be 100% sure of who you're dealing with

I have bought and sold everything from a car to video games on ebay and the majority of my experiences have been positive, however I can see that there is potential to get caught out by less than honest sellers.

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the good
There is so much to choose from and the search criteria makes it really easy to narrow things down and find exactly what you want.

The majority of other buyers and sellers are just normal people and I have had loads of pleasant communications about all manner of things. If you want to ask a question about an item this also gives you an opportunity to see what they are like and decide whether it's a good idea to deal with them.

The ebay team themselves are pretty quick at answering questions and in the past they really helped me out when another member didn't pay for an item they won in an auction.

Selling is also easy to do and you usually get an ok price. Have a look at other similar items that have sold to get an idea of how much you can expect. However see the point below on video games.

You pay (and are paid) through paypal which is a really fast payment method once you have set up an account.

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the bad
There are many items that seem too good to be true so you really have to keep your wits about you. I usually only buy from uk sellers and you can use things like feedback, photos and even grammar to help you spot potential rip offs. That being said even if you do pay for something and it doesn't arrive there is a degree of protection so you can claim your money back.

Because of the high volume of users some popular items become devalued, for example, I have found that I get a better price for books and video games on Amazon.

I have heard other people say that you have less rights as a seller and it would be possible for a person to say there is something wrong with what you have sold them even if there isn't. In addition, as a buyer you can choose who you want to deal with but you don't really have any control over who buys your item.

In conclusion I still regularly use ebay, especially for hard to find items, and as I said at the beginning I have never had a bad experience after 50+ transactions.

Summary: like a car boot sale without the rain!