posted on September 24, 2005 08:32:11 AM
Ok, so I was helping out my parent's church sell tickets to a festival coming up in October. This is the sixth week I've been listing them, always with a Buy It Now.
In the ad, I put a link to the website for the festival so people could get more information and see pictures of last year's festival. At first I was worried about putting a link in the auction listing, but since you can't buy anything off the website, and it's just there for additional pics and info, I figured it was fine.
Today, after I've been listing that auction every week (7 day auction each time), they decided I was in violation for inappropriate links and cancelled my ad & refunded my listing fees. Tsk, whateva! I've emailed them back about this, but I'm not counting on getting a reasonable reply. And the joke's on them, we haven't sold any tickets through eBay!
How about this? Using the same logic, I should ask them to refund my fees for running the exact same listing for the last six weeks. I don't think they'll be amused. Should I relist the auction and just take out the link to the festival's website? Maybe put in "contact me for a link to the festival or find it on google."...
posted on September 24, 2005 09:46:31 AM
it was the outside link in the listing that did you in, just took them awhile to find it or someone ratted you out.
you can have a clickable link to the outside on your "about me" page, if you've got one. a work-around might be to say something in the listing about "for my information, see my about me page." then the potential buyers go there and see the outside link.
posted on September 24, 2005 09:59:48 AM
Ah, that's a good idea, I might try that "about me" page idea.
Some heartless person must have ratted me out. I hope he or she is happy that they've hurt a church fundraiser. The link to the website was just for extra pictures and information so I wouldn't have to make a super long auction listing and didn't appear, to me anyways, to be in any violation of eBay.
[ edited by powerwebmedia on Sep 24, 2005 10:00 AM ]
posted on September 24, 2005 01:07:49 PM
You can link to an out side page:
"Members are permitted to include one link to a page that further describes the item being sold in that listing. The primary intent of the link <b>must be</b> to further describe the item and the link must conform to eBay policy."
It all depends on the page you linked to...If there was any mention of the raffle tickets' price and or contact information re buying tickets then, yes, you would be technically in violation.
I've used direct links for product reviews w/o problem.
But I agree, it does smell like you were ratted out by a vigilante.
Best,
Michael
---------------------------
Internet Talk Radio
Everything eBay...and More. E-Auction-Air
posted on September 24, 2005 01:10:04 PM
yes, but the eBay staffers determine the "intent" of the link. so it's luck of the draw that way, as to which staffer might see an auction and make a determination. no problems or risk if using the link from the "about me" page. http://stores.ebay.com/postcards-postcards?refid=store http://www.vintagepostcards.org
posted on September 24, 2005 01:23:14 PM
I wonder if I should just try relisting it again with the link? Chances are if it lasted six weeks the first time, it might go for another six weeks (actually, it only has to go another two weeks, the festival is in three weeks and I was going to stop the listings one week before the event anyways.
But, I don't want to risk getting my account cancelled either by some overzealous eBay employee.
posted on September 24, 2005 01:32:35 PM
hmmm...i wouldn't put the outside link in and run the risk of repeating the same "offense" with another overzealous employee. who wants an extra "black mark" on their record at eBay, esp. for the same "offense"? in the long run, not worth it, imho. http://stores.ebay.com/postcards-postcards?refid=store http://www.vintagepostcards.org
posted on September 24, 2005 05:54:26 PM
glassgrl,
nope, i called eBay stores one day on the phone to ask that question. you can't put stuff like dotcom or *com or _com, etc. if they happen to catch it (or someone rats you out), it's an "offense."
posted on September 25, 2005 12:45:43 AM
Vintage - that change was actually made in the fall of 2002. We had it as part of our name in Feb. 2003 and we were instructed to change it after someone turned us in for the violation. That was in May of this year. We had it for more than 2 years before someone let us know. You would think that if it wasn't to be used, they wouldn't have allowed us to create it that way in the first place.
That being said, I think they've probably set things up that way now - not allowing the creation of a UserID that violates that policy.
posted on September 25, 2005 05:10:14 AM
Sounds like eBay doesn't mess around with this. It's like they "shoot first and ask questions later." Not sure what happens if you wrack up a few "offenses" but I don't want to find out.
Later today I'll relanch that auction and just put a link to my "about me" page (which I'll still have to create) and there will be a link to the church's website.
I used to use my email address as my eBay user ID, back in about 2000 or 2001. Then I changed it, before eBay banned email addresses and domain names as user IDs. But I still see people creating user IDs to get around that, like this:
These people are just asking for trouble. The worst thing is, if they get away with it for a while, people get used to thier user ID and might look up by seller. If someone doesn't check for a couple of months, and the user ID has been changed, they probably won't find you (unless they remember the email address and look it up that way).
