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Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

From now on.

I honestly can't remember the last time I answered a legitimate question where the answer wasn't clearly written or displayed via pictures in the ad. Actually, it was probably never. And it's not like I have 100 photos and 50 paragraphs of stuff to sort through. Descriptions are a reasonable length, neatly sorted and everything needed to know is to the point. Not only is it just annoying, but as some of you may know, these types of buyers usually cause the most problems. On the contrary, I absolutely love the buyers who quietly bid, pay, you ship, and done. Not 1 message. Feedback from them is just a bonus at that point. Whereas with these buyers who ask a question (or 2 or 3 or 10), positive feedback feels like an enormous accomplishment.

Last time I checked, I believe there is a feature to turn off messages/questions to everyone except for winning bidders which you have to allow. Does anyone else use it? I'd like to, but I just feel like it would seem a little suspicious (IIRC if someone tries to send a question, it gives an error saying how the seller doesn't accept questions at this time or something along those lines). And I'd be a little worried it could also lead to someone who realizes they can't contact me unless then win the auction, so they bid, win, then bombard you with questions until they may or may not pay.

re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

Feel the same. I block a good amount of buyers who ask me questions about an item. Especially considering I take multiple pics with various angles and make a real good an accurate description of everything. Including measurements, etc for most applicable items. If they ask multiple questions then I for sure block them.

Found out years ago I use to try to get every sale and all that. Every time I dealt with one of these buyers it always ended up with some kind of problem. The money lost from having to take a return or work something out with these people and stress of potentially getting poor feedback etc. Just made me say F it.

Would personally rather lose out on multiple sales than have to deal with one of these. I would rather block them and hopefully one of my competitors decides to deal with them. Because I would rather not.

re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

I have found that the more questions someone sends the more hassle they tend to me, especially when they ask lots of questions to which the answers can be found in the listings.

These sorts of buyers tend to get promoted to the block list.

re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

Yep I agree there James , I don't need the aggrevation and there's another buyer right behind them.

And the way we are cutting the Risk out of our Business by Blocking buyers over a question is the same concept eBAY Takes with all of us the sellers the slightest risk we get Blocked orRestricted

Re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

Here are the instructions for blocking questions from buyers:-

Go to "account information" and from the drop down menu

Account > manage communications with buyers

Scroll down page til you come to “manage questions & answers”

Allow buyers to contact you yes/no

If a buyer tries to contact you they get a message which says something like "Due to volume of business this seller is unable to accept questions at this time"


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My experience has mirrored that of the above posters. The more questions buyers ask the less likely they are to purchase anything. If they do purchase they are likely to be a pain in the ass when they do get the widget. I too have blocked many buyers who ask too many (dumb) questions.

On other platforms (like Etsy) where you cant block buyers I deal with unwanted communication by being "away from the computer" (you will be amazed the number of serious operations I have had which require a long period or recouperation) and the message is dealt with by one of my "virtual" assistants who are just minding the store.

They are very polite but dumb. The have no technical knowledge or authority to act.


I LOVE my virtual assistants. They are on call at any time day or night and dont have to be paid!

Re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

I would not want to block questions.

I would like to know when I have a possible problem afoot.

Blocking questions can lead to more headaches.

You can get a knit picky buyer who just feels like screwing you over and you will never know.
They buy your item(s) then they start with their BS after sale.

Ask your obvious questions, then give me the chance to avoid the transaction all together.

Re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

Has to be a case by case choice.

Today's dumb question maker may be the difference between profit & loss tomorrow.

I go for profit

Besdies, you can always use that line from Taxi Driver......

you talking to me???? are you talking to me?

Control the transaction

:juggle:

Re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

Blocking only works with members who are not in a transaction with you.

Once the buyer has purchased something they can contact you.

My feeling is when you get a fussy buyer who wants to ask a lot of questions and finds they cant contact you then they will move on and get their claws into someone else.

Another thing is to make sure any conversations take place on Ebay messages and not via private email. If a buyer contacts me via private email (rather than on Ebay) with a message that looks like trouble I "bounce" it back to them as a mail transmission error so they then have to contact me via Ebay.

I use my own domains for email so I can set up a "postmaster@mydomain.com" to bounce messages back as "mailbox full" or "mailbox unavailable". You can have a lot of fun that way with real troublemakers or abusive messages.

Over the years Ive had some pretty nasty and threatening messages - not necessarily from customers on Ebay. I just bounce them back. The sender must get really pissed off thinking none of their nasty messages are reaching me.

I also have a "legal@mydomain.com" for sending scary messages from my "legal" department. Sent a few cease and desists like that.

Re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

these are the types of buyers that are often referred to as the one "bad apple." Though, it's typically the ones that don't ask questions which give me the most problems. Just yesterday I had one buyer complain that their used and worn down item had a tiny dirt streak on it from storage. The item was described only as "good," using the ebay scale of acceptable, good very good, like new, and brand new. Needless to say that this small mark was the very least of the problems with the item, but the buyer has made an issue of it for whatever reason because it wasn't specifically stated in the auction description.

I will agree with the one statement that buyers who ask questions don't typically purchase your item. This used to happen a lot more when I sold a completely differentcategory of product on ebay. It got to the point where I would simply ignore questions sometimes.

Re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

Agreed. I used to block many bidders

Re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

I don't block but often delete or ignore nonsense questions.


I've gotten to the point where I have good feel on which folks aren't serious or will be a problem post sale. I did cancel one guys bid that was a PIA with questions then bid.

Re: Dealing with buyer who asks questions
 

Also, I've found that buyers don't typically ask questions. They usually ask questions after they bid, paid, received the item then ask you something and/or file a NAD.