My standard Ebay rules of acquisition
1. Bid only on items from sellers that are located in your own country.
2. Know the items value. How much is it worth if you bought it through normal retail channels?
3. Only bid on items where the shipping cost is clearly indicated, and deduct that cost from your top bid.
4. Seek out sellers that aren’t pros. They are more likely to undervalue the cost of their own labor.
5. Be careful about bidding on high value items. Usually I find it worth the extra expense to deal with a local merchant, just in case there’s a need to return the item.
6. Paypal sux. It is, however mighty handy for small payments. Don’t get “verified”, don’t associate your Paypal account with any bank account. Fund your Paypal purchases via credit card.
7. Check the seller’s terms to be sure that they are willing to take your unverified Paypal payment. If not, see if they will take a money order or bank check. If it’s a low value item, however, it may not be worth the special trip it takes to get a money order. Buy elsewhere.
8. Use Ebay’s saved serches email or RSS feeds and save yourself some searching.
9. Realize that Ebay will rat you out to the feds merely on their request, no warrant needed. If you buy a CO2 regulator, hydroponic gear and a HID grow light, don’t be surprised if that’s enough evidence for some rubber stamp judge to issue a no-knock warrant for the ninja-fied police to inspect your indoor basil plants and your kegerator.
10. Seek out the misspelled auctions. If you are looking for a good used PanaVise, make sure you search for panavice and ?pana vise? and ?pana vice? too. If no one else finds/bids the auction, you can frequently get stuff dirt cheap.
11. USPS shipment tracking sux. Expect your purchase to be in “Electronic Shipping Info Received” limbo until the item is actually in your mailbox.
12. Expect a few idiots. I’d generally report them but be wary of burning up too much time over a low value purchase. Cut your losses. (That’s the plan at least, I’ve never been cheated. Even Tuan refunded my payment, eventually.)
13. Always leave appropriate positive feedback, but only after you have the item in your hand and you are satisfied. Think twice about leaving negative feedback.
14. Snipe everything. Expect your successful purchase ratio to increase. Expect to win those auctions frequently for less than your top dollar all the time too.
