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Selling OEM software
 

I recently sold an OEM operating system on eBay. After it was sold, eBay sent a MC019 notice:

This item was ended for violating our Original Equipment Manufacturing (OEM) policy. Bundled or recovery OEM software may not be listed on eBay unless it is sold with the motherboard, hard drive, or computer originally sold with the software. If you relist this item, you must not only include the necessary hardware, but must also clearly identify the hardware in the listing.

No VeRO member was identified so an eBay competitior *cough* I mean concerned member, must have reported my listing. Too late to stop the sale, but still stuck me with a policy strike. I thought I'd skirted the OEM issue pretty well in the description, but the snitcher must have recognized the disk even though no printing on it was readable. That'll teach me not to show the disks!

My inquiry to eBay was answered by this:

Your listing was removed because it is unclear whether or not the software you are selling is or is not OEM software. As this is not clear, you would need to obtain the manufacturer's consent to sell this software.

OK, I guess if someone reports you and eBay is "unclear" whether the snitcher had a valid complaint, they pull the listing anyway. They are certainly erring on the side of caution these days. We have to be extra, extra smart and creative.

Anyway, the MC019 notice said OEM or bundled software can't be listed unless it is accompanied by a computer, hard drive, or motherboard. I see lots of people exploiting this provision by loading up old, cheap hard drives with software (many times, I'm guessing) and selling it that way. And some big computer-store sellers are including bits and pieces of old motherboards in order to sell OEM software. This apparently is enough to fend off the MC019 hammer, at least for some large sellers.

Has anyone had luck with this method? Obviously you need access to lots of (working) hard drives and (dead) computer parts. I don't like the hard drive strategy, first because it's just copying (pirating) the same software repeatedly and I don't support that at all. Second because hard drives are heavy to ship and bite into the profit margin. CDs are much cheaper to ship, and I do mean strictly legitimate CDs, although they are OEM.

These are just some thoughts. Any other ideas on selling bundled disks would be appreciated.

On my original (1st) Ebay account I sold lots of OEM software. But I did take several VERO hits and eventually got suspended. The trick that worked for a while was to list on Friday night and pull the auctions on Sunday night on whatever didn't sell. My theory was that the Microsoft's look-outs had Mon. through Fri. work days. LOL

Like I said that worked until Ebay started pulling auctions even after an item sold. Which ultimately doomed all my OEM sales.

just do a ebay search for windows xp home or windows xp pro and you will see the same people selling these day after day year after year...someone should notify ebay about them......they really do not send you any hardware component....they just send you the software, and i doubt any buyers complain, because they need/want the item. this is from personal experience...

i guess you sold microsoft software :)

Yeah you don't really need to send anything, I sold a bunch and still haven't had 1 listing pulled, I usually just a get a bunch of cheap junk from Re-pc like usb adaptors, or mini flash drives anything under a buck then I ran out and just kept selling em without em and I still have %100 positive feedback.

Were you selling new or used OEM software? They leave the new stuff alone.

do you still sell them?

Yeah i just sold my last 4 today and was supposed to have another shipment here by now but they got seized by customs, pissed, at least they were nice enough to send my iphone cases that were in the same box.