eBay works well until something goes wrong, then it fails totally. The reason is that it is totally automated. When you received a “letter” like the one you got it is natural to assume that there is someone behind it who knows what they are doing. In fact it is a bot.
You cant ask a bot “why” it did something. It doesn’t know. eBay is a much too early version of machine “intelligence”. In fact it is not intelligent at all. This makes life easy for thieves.
The whole business model assumes that no one will ever have to be paid wages to sort things out. There is no budget to do so. The complaint process is just a bit of theatre to disguise the fact that you are being gaslighted.Time spent on getting a reply is time wasted. “They” don't care. In fact “they” don’t exist.
Your eBay account has been suspended
41–50 of 154 posts
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#42My wife got kicked out of PayPal for no good reason 15 years ago. I think she could have reinstated it if she sent a fax but she wasn't about to send a fax. If you want to know why people aren't adopting 2FA, it's because we know it's just a matter of time until the hole that attaches your Yubikey to your keyring wears away, your Yubikey disappears, and with customer service that amounts to "talk to the hand" at many…
On the flip side, if you're putting enough money through your account PayPal will give you a VIP account manager who will make sure everything is great and will go to any lengths to keep your account working for you, regardless of whatever the fuck it is you are selling. Even if you were running one of the world's largest TV show torrent sites. PayPal would ask for an account so they could look around and then they would be like "All good! Keep going!"
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#43ebay answers the phone, call them. the "call me back" option works fine too.
Paypal doesn't, however. I wanted to switch bank accounts associated with PayPal and just... couldn't. That account is now dead, and I've switched to carrying a checkbook with me to settle up dinner with friends.
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#44There is such a thing for payment processors, which includes PayPal and maybe eBay; it's https://www.consumerfinance.gov/complaint/.
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#45Somehow tech companies have normalized "no recourse" decisions, as well as dark patterns (or straight up impossibility) to prevent actual interaction with a person to resolve your issue. I agree with you that part of the anti-monopoly legislation updates that are needed for platform companies is mandated visibility of a way to contact a person to resolve issues, and fines for exceeding a response time (maybe 20 minut…
> Somehow tech companies have normalized "no recourse" decisions Yep. > I agree with you that part of the anti-monopoly legislation updates that are needed for platform companies is mandated visibility of a way to contact a person to resolve issues, and fines for exceeding a response time This would solve several problems that exist. What if legally-mandated customer support came to, say, 30% of Google's operating co…
I definitely see your point. At the same time, I think a lot of "tech" has really derived value by circumventing regulation and norms - easy examples are Uber and Airbnb which seemed great and legitimately "disrupted" tired industries, but it turned out a lot of stuff in those industries was the way it was for a reason, and when companies mature and end up putting that stuff back, their competitive advantage evaporates. That could also be true for ecommerce (broadly defined) - if they can't viable run a business without having x% of customers get shafted because they have an issue where they can't even talk to a person, is that still OK? Maybe it is. Is it OK that a company is able to destroy any competition by not offering personal service, so the people it screws have nowhere else to go? I'm not sure. Maybe it's not 20 minutes (I picked that because I know that if the regs just required a phone number companies would have a 30 hour wait time, or an infinite one pretending you're almost there) but there needs to be some standard - or a credible threat of competition that isn't there with platforms
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#46I posted this in another thread on the same subject: Not exactly related but: a couple of weeks ago I suddenly had my account 'restricted' on eBay and told I could no longer sell or receive payment for anything I'd sold until I uploaded a load of personal ID documents [passport / driving licence, etc] to confirm my identity. This, after I'd been buying and selling on eBay for 19+ years. Browsing their 'community' for…
> until I uploaded a load of personal ID documents [passport / driving licence, etc] to confirm my identity.
I don't use anything that I'm totally dependant on, so this hasn't been a problem for me (getting an account closed - might have happened with Facebook, maybe), but your post made me think of what I'd do with such a request:
First, I'd say something like "Well, since you're asking for *very* personal and confidential info, first I will need you to confirm *your* identity by you sending me [unredacted ID card|License|Passport] as well as proof of employment such as [Complete unredacted paystub|Complete unredacted employment contract] to ensure you really are who you say you are before proceeding".
To which they would invariably reply "Well we can't do that because it would violate the privacy of our employees (oh, the irony!), but rest assured we will keep the info you provide strictly confidential, blah blah blah".
At that point I'd fire back "Seriously?!??" along with samples of past leaks/privacy violations from that company, along with a blurb about how I can't talk about this request anymore since I'm now in the process of forwarding this to my local Attorney General (or "on the advice of my council"), etc.
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#47This happened to me after I sold some AirPods. Not just with Buy It Now, but after I waited a week for the auction to end, and was literally about to post them in the mail. After being suspended I could no longer access the listing. I managed to reach their customer support line and had the most arrogant agent I've ever had in my life. Like someone who genuinely felt like I was some kind of evil hacker, and actively…
Hope you'll edit and include the name of the app. If they've solved a problem for you then they deserve the mention!
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#48ebay answers the phone, call them. the "call me back" option works fine too.
Paypal doesn't, however. I wanted to switch bank accounts associated with PayPal and just... couldn't. That account is now dead, and I've switched to carrying a checkbook with me to settle up dinner with friends.
paypal also answers the phone for me; you need to set the phone call up from the web. the only time I call them is when I'm having a problem with ebay. So happy that I can use ebay without paypal now.
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#49I have had the exact same thing today. I got an email informing me my account has been permanently suspended. I haven't done anything wrong. I've managed to contact them a few times via email but get the exact same email reply each time. It sucks. If I'd done something wrong I'd understand, but nope. Unless buying a new phone case is a violation? I was looking for a solution and it brought me here. I hope you sort it out. Also, I made an account purely just to add a comment. Haha
Re: Your eBay account has been suspended
#50My email client is also my RSS client. I just panicked a little bit.
It took me a moment to parse the headline on the HN front page, because there was no domain name but also no "Ask HN:" or similar.