Ebay, my opinion (ebay.co.uk)

Member Name: Drewster_Rooster

Product:	ebay.co.uk
Date:	11/11/09 (27 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: for buyers its excellent...

Disadvantages: ...but not for sellers

Probably the most famous auction site on the internet, Ebay has been around for years, and because you are reading this review online I bet you or someone you know has either bought or sold something on there.

Having had Internet connection for a number of years I first found Ebay when I was looking to increase my Madonna memorabilia collection as record shops only ever had a limited stock available and I pretty much had bought everything I could from them. To say I was like a kid in a sweet shop was an understatement when I first discovered what I could find on EBay, picture discs, rare limited editions, autographs, anything and everything that I could possibly want I could find there.

Not only Madonna items but videos, cd's, books, games, you name it, it was there, and I was in my element! Living at home at the time my mother used to tell me off for embarrassing her in front of the postman who made daily deliveries to our door with one parcel after another, she was sure that the neighbours were talking about her and wondering why we were having so many parcels delivered.

After leaving home to move in with my girlfriend the deliveries continued, but to my new door, in the end we were on first name terms with the postman and he knew where to leave parcels if we were not in, all this because of Ebay. I remember staying up until the early hours watching items that were ending and hovering over my keyboard waiting to "snipe" them at the last second. I got very good at grabbing a bargain but also ended up feeling disappointed when I missed out.

Over time though your life changes and other priorities have to be made, so my buying prowess slowly diminished. My Madonna collection was extensive and I had bought every film I ever wanted to see but I was fast running out of space, so the only logical thing to do seeing as how I had bought from Ebay was to sell everything on Ebay.

So started another manic chapter in my life of selling everything I could lay my hands on, as is the case with me and my addictive personality if I do something then I do it wholeheartedly. I was constantly listing items and selling them, sometimes for a huge profit thanks to buying cheap and sometimes I made a loss, but like buying it became very addictive and I loved it.

This is what I used to love about Ebay - it was fun. You could buy what you wanted, when you wanted and when you got fed up with it you listed it back on Ebay and sold it. I say it was fun because it isn't quite as much fun there anymore now, changes have happened over the years that have made it go from being something that anyone could enjoy to being all about the money for Ebay, from the fees to sell your item to the fees they take once an item has sold.

They don't encourage new ordinary people to sell preferring online businesses to use their site and to me it's a shame. I know that they are a business and a profitable one at that, but it has come to the stage now where I just don't bother anymore. I do still occasionally buy from there, but there is no point in selling anymore, there are rules, guidelines and procedures now that make selling far too restrictive.

If you want to sell a DVD for example you have to pay to list it, pay when it sells and cant charge your buyer p&p, then they encourage you to use PayPal who again charge you for using them, so you end up with very little once everything else has been paid.

For buying though it really can be a good place to pick up a bargain, the site is very user friendly and is split into buying categories so whatever you are looking for you will be able to find.

The only thing really to be careful of is scammers, but they seem to be few and far between now. You can check a buyer's reputation with their feedback, the higher percentage they have the more likely they are to be genuine, but there are safeguards in place with PayPal if you do experience problems.

I would recommend Ebay if you are wanting to buy but wouldn't anymore for selling due to the reasons I've already commented on.

A few years ago I would have given Ebay 5/5 stars and would have recommended it to anyone, nowadays though it only rates 3/5 with me because of all the restrictions in place for selling.

Summary: see review, thanks for reading