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Received a horrible Email...
 

Hi guys,

I have been selling the same product for a while now without any problems. I just received an eBay message from someone, claiming they are the Head Of European Sales from "Autocom" which is the people who make what i sell. He said if i do not remove my listings he will take me to a tribunal!! :O.

I have taken them off, and replied, now waiting for a response.

Two things though:

firstly) is he playing me? how do i know if he really is who he says he is, he could be a competitor, he has 450feedback, lots of buying but also lots of selling (private listings so cannot see what), he currently has 0 listings active...

Secondly) because its a stealth account, how could he get hold of me, if he was going to take me to court

i doubt he will, i only had 1 listed, and there are hundreds of other sellers selling these things...

thoughts please....maybe sel on a different account, and see if he send that account a message perhaps? or is this dodgy?

thanks guys

The alleged Head of a company sends a notice through ebay messages?

As if.

There's a correct standard to serve notice.

He has not done so.:smash:

I smell something fishy.

same, i smell something Fishy. But how would i know for sure :S... scared/help lol

I would relist everyting you took down. It doesn't smell right and that is not how they would contact you. Most likely a competitor.

Why would he not contact ebay directly? Does sounds fishy

defo someone trying to play you man

Did you receive an email or a message?

If it's an email I'm very confused.

you would think if they were the rights owner they would file the complaint with ebay and let ebay take it down for them without having to contact you. then get your info and mail you a certified letter or something.

Not very professional at all if that person is the head.

An easy method to find out i think would be to go on the Autocom main site find a contact email or number and contact them asking if the head really did send you this message obviously don't mention your real name just incase they ask just give a bogus name and even lie about your ebay name if they ask, that should at least confirm it, :thumb:

Good luck!

ok thanks, guys, ye it was an eBay message that he sent me. Im going to ask for his full name and office number, and im going to call the office asking for him, do you think this is a decent ideA?
thanks

UPDATE:

He replied to my message of what i asked, what this about, and he replied with the full address, email and telephone number of the company. I looked on the net and he gave me all the correct details...

However, in his first email, he said, hi Im Mr Louvoir, head of sales in europe...

I phoned the company and asked to speak to Mr Louvoirs the sales manager, and they said they dont know anyone at that company who works for them in that name....

However, i have notcied a reduction of the same items being listed on eBay, maybe because everyone did what i did....

I relisted it on another stealth account, and see what happens with that one...

I replied again asking for his full name and office telephone number (awaiting response)

what do you think :S

"What do you think"...you asked to speak to a person that no one seems to know...sounds bogus.

ye, but on the other hand, i have to be more the 100% sure mark, as i do not want to go to court etc.... :S

i would wait for his reply and then maybe let this company know that someone is impersonating one of there execs

True - you have to know your product well.

I would report him to ebay as its obviously a competitor...

I suddenly just remembered that something like this sort of happened to me. I had the word "beanie" in a title and a person contacted me through Ebay messages saying that I can't use that word unless it's a Beanie Baby.

It wasn't a beanie baby but of course, I didn't know the word "Beanie" was trademarked!

I immediately changed the title and took out the word "beanie". This was back a couple years ago before I knew anything about vero, etc.

I think that was real though...

ok thanks again guys, im going to wait for his reply before i take any further action...

You said this is a steath account? so whats the problem go ahead and list your item. From looking at what is goin on this guy is trying to play you. You would have got a VERO message if this was true.

It's poof which should be obvious by now, best to ignore it and not consume your energy :)

LOL :pound: you can't trademark the word beanie that's ridiculous what about beanie hats?

And this guy is obviously full of ****. Either a competitor or some loser with nothing better to do then to troll you. Just doesn't make sense for a "head of sales" for a large company to be surfing around eB telling small time sellers to stop selling their crap...

ok cheerz guys :), ill update when he has replied *if he has replied

I would stick him on your banned list and also add him to your favourites.

Banned - So he cannot bid on your item you listed on your other stealth account and

leave you a Neg

Favourites - To see if he is listing the items he 'claims' to be the owner of then you will

find out if he is a competitor.

Well, that's not true at all. If you have a name that is trademark and people are using part of it in a business venture that is similar you can try and get them to stop. It's the same reason why when you trademark a business name you don't want it sounding too similar to another business name that does the same thing as you.

Check out this link:

Articles / The Beanie Baby Trademark Wars.

This was in 2003. So I was told not to use the word in 2009 I believe.

It looks like that Ty won and then lost in the appellate court. One of the problems was the guy actually did sell Beanie Babies. If he didn't maybe he would have lost?

the guy never replied, so looks like it was a competitor...

Looks like it then.

Just relist your item in the mean time, this is an obvious ⊗⊗⊗⊗ email. Legitimate organizations will never contact you using Ebay message.

Sent from my DROID3 using Tapatalk

A few things to keep in mind...

If a REAL company representative does not like what you are selling, they would most likely issue a takedown notice through the VERO program. If they did, for some reason, wish to contact you directly, they would most likely do so through their law firm.

And the lawyers wouldn't be hiding behind an eBay account with private listings and feedback. They would WANT you to know they were for real.

Reporting a bogus email to eBay is fine, but be sure you are clean as well. eBay MIGHT end up asking you to provide invoices, etc. to prove your items are legitimate.

In my experience, the best way to handle these people is NOT to respond at all. You cannot win an argument with them, since their goal is to scare you off.

Always check each message or email for misspellings, punctuation and grammar. More often than not, these people are younger, and they do not have the best writing skills. They THINK they are brilliant and have found a brand new, never before tried way to eliminate the competition. The reality is, they are greedy morons - they are not NEARLY as smart as they think they are.

hehe gr8 post jeff

you got to outsmart the smartarse$