Bitcoin Forum

eBay DELETED my auction for Avalon Miners because I accept Bitcoin!

I only mentioned in the auction description that I accept bitcoins and they pulled my auction citing a "violation of payment policies."  They claimed that buyers and sellers "aren't protected" because transactions can't be proven.

I beg to differ! The blockchain is public proof hat a transaction occurred, and the buyer (or seller) can easily prove they own the address. In the event of a dispute, if eBay would just require sellers to post their receive address, a buyer can prove they own the address that sent funds to it.

I think this policy is simply an anticompetitive strong-arm approach to further secure PayPal's dominance in the payment processing industry.

If anyone is curious, the auction in question is here (I had to re-list it):

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Two-2-AVALON-ASIC-Bitcoin-Miners-160-GH-s-Mining-Machines-NO-RESERVE-/111315935934 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/Two-2-AVALON-ASIC-Bitcoin-Miners-160-GH-s-Mining-Machines-NO-RESERVE-/111315935934)

I mentioned in the revised auction description to contact me with questions about "alternate payment methods." Do you think they'll pull my auction for that too?

The bigger issue is the lack of buyer protection.

I would never buy on EBay with BTC.
The risk is too high compared to paypal.

EBay, and Apple thinks bitcoin as there rival and uses what ever they can to suppress it. And yours is just a case of the same,.
Mentioning alternative payment methods won't get your listing removed. But you'll have to talk outside the eBay personal messages. They might be watching it.

And as mentioned by priest ... You might also have to use escrow as well to support the purchase, because only then the buyee will be able to have trust. As we all know bitcoin payments are not reversible

It's true, buyers aren't protected with bitcoin purchases.

They have zero recourse if you scam them, and as far as proving you own an address, that's very difficult if you use an address once.

So do they have people screening every auction? Or is there some automated process that just sniffs out keywords that violate their payment terms?

How do they filter out stuff like this?

Just follow the terms of ebay, isn't that hard to understand? If they don't accept, they don't. Easy as that.

no they dont have the man power to screen every auction. Its automated word filter that flashes the red light then they go on to work to screen that auction.
or someone might have reported your aution. That can also happen.

Ebay owns paypal and you want to sell your miner on ebay for btc..
They will delete it obviously as bitcoin is not in thier payment systems list and sellers can not accept money from other payment modes. Main issue is scams and bitcoin doesnt comes under their fraud/scam protection (escrow), so its possible that they will remove your ad again if buyer complained about it, probably you will get banned too.  If you want to sell something for btc use some other classifieds site..

You can also use bitcoin associated sites for auction. It will gove you more targeted audience and will help you sell faster without worries.

Can you recommend some?

You had went agaisnt  TOS they dont support bitcoin as a payment method

This site is great:
https://cryptothrift.com/

Easy as that. Obviously they have restrictions on how you can get payment. You must use their approved payment methods. I understand we all want them to include BTC as payment method. But until they do it (or not do it; BTC is their rival, right? They own PayPal.), we have no option.

ToS violation, cry me a river.

consider yourself lucky they didnt ban your account outright.

Guys, I'm not disputing that eBay doesn't allow Bitcoins, or that I was caught trying to accept them for payment. Guilty as charged. You got me.

My argument is simply the anticompetitive nature of the PayPal regime and how implementing a simple integrated bitcoin escrow service (with an escrow fee) would not only be beneficial to the bitcoin ecosystem, but it would be lucrative for the eBay empire as well. An integrated bitcoin escrow service woven into the eBay auction payment process could be accomplished with little effort, and the payments would be just as secure as any online escrow service, if not more so. It would remove the need for trust. Seller could provide tracking number to prove package was sent, buyer can prove they paid the escrow.

eBay's/PayPal's policies seem NARROW MINDED and anti-competitive, and everyone defending eBay's ToS fails to see the bigger picture that can come for eBay if they embraced this technology, not fought against it.

It is thinking like this that holds down widespread adoption.

Look, if you guys are all fine with big corporate conglomerates limiting consumer freedom of choice, de-neutralitizing your Internet, forcing you into antiquated pigeoned-holed financial fee-laiden commerce, then I'm sure you'd all be happy with living in a place like Communist China.

For the rest of us, there is BITCOIN.

The costs associated with accepting bitcoin in escrow would, at this time, most likely be greater then the benefit. I have doubts that it could set it up with "little effort" for a large company like eBay.

OH NO A COMPANY DID SOMETHING I DIDN'T LIKE THAT THEY ARE TOTALLY WITHIN THEIR RIGHTS TO DO! DAMN YOU REGULATIONS!

It's a free market.  Check into using cryptothrift.com, and let ebay and paypal die.

The real reason why they hate bitcoin is probably because you won't get dinged with the hefty Paypal fees. They even fee you for shipping costs!!

When eBay was just starting, the reason why I joined them is because they would accept transactions in cash, or check, or credit card... Seems things have changed now. If I were looking for a bidding website today I would not join eBay, based on the very reason why I joined them back when.

All those forms of payment are still acceptable, it is a matter of merchant choice.
Some merchants are paypal only, others will accept cash/checks via mail.

I personally would never accept snail mail payments.
I would never accept a check either.
I would accept a large bag of pennies before I would accept a check.
Why people keep using them is beyond me.

Why people would send a stranger a check is beyond me (or use them at all for that matter)... giving them your routing number and account number.... not smart in the 21st century.

That has happened to a lot of people in past. They're OK if you are selling mining equipments and accessories, but you can't sell Bitcoins.
And you have to use one of their specified payment methods.

Plan B: someone creates bbay!

Same issues with Amazon as well, they're not tolerant towards Bitcoin. Just read the terms and conditions for once, you'll see why

My acount never got frozed I guess I was lucky but I have since stoped

Ebay owns paypal and that says it all.

Conventional payment processors are deeply terrified by the phenomenal popularity and usability of Bitcoin.

Only question is when they will realize that banning members is not going to help because the alternate market is already shaping up well which accepts Bitcoins with a smile..!

ebay + paypal = mafia based organisations.

I have lost over 5K to them over the last 6 months because of cryptos. They make up rules for themselves and just DO NOT CARE about the seller or anything that has to do with btc/cryptos.

I had a similar problem, already complained in the german section. Apparently they
have a filter which checks for "Bitcoin", "BTC" etc. My auction was not terminated,
but I got an error message when trying to start one with one of these buzzwords.
Even "B*T*C" was filtered..
Also they started to filter email-addresses from messages within the ebay messaging
system. This is really getting ridiculous.

Once upon a time, security for ebay auctions was managed via the rating system.
If I pay x$ to someone with 80% positive ratings, no matter which payment method,
I knew that I take a considerable risk. Now ebay took over the job of providing security
for buyers, and what a funny coincidence that this means paypal almost exclusively
and thereby fees for ebay/paypal. I liked the old system better. Plus: I hate paypal from the
deepest of my heart. I will really search for alternatives for ebay..

Industro, Don't sweat the small stuff, just sell them here  ;D

also 'bpal' ?

Well, if anybody wants them from here and would rather pay with bitcoins, just win the auction and we can arrange a bitcoin payment in lieu of GayPal. I have 100% positive feedback on eBay, so I'm a trustworthy seller, and we can do escrow if you still want added security, but you have to pay the additional escrow fee.

The auction is only up to $200 on eBay (that's 160 GH/sec for $200 - you will ROI in a month). Somebody's gonna make out pretty well. 8)  All the others on eBay are being offered/sold for a LOT more.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Two-2-AVALON-ASIC-Bitcoin-Miners-160-GH-s-Mining-Machines-NO-RESERVE-/111315935934 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/Two-2-AVALON-ASIC-Bitcoin-Miners-160-GH-s-Mining-Machines-NO-RESERVE-/111315935934)

I'm not making any money on these. I paid $5,000 for these Avalons and then lost all their earnings to Gox. I'm just trying to offload them to someone who wants to get into mining. My wife wants them out of the house. ::)

I see so many auctions on eBay that openly accept bitcoin payments (mostly for miners). I may try use a JPEG or GIF of an image that says "PayPal Accepted Here" to avoid the keyword filters in future auctions. Do you think that would work (unless the auction got manually reported?) I'm just not good a taking "No, you can't use bitcoins here" for an answer! I wouldn't last a day in China. :P

You ought to check out cryptothift.com.  F' ebay.

Just sold a 7 day mining contract on eBay for my first time, just experimenting.

Rented out a piece of my mining equipment, it is currently mining on Eligius for the winner.

Accepted PayPal or Bitcoin, payment was via PayPal.

No problems at all...

Then, day 8 comes around, CHARGEBACK!!!!!
Paypal/ebay will not stand by any bitcoin related transaction.

Why dont you guys Just COD with USPS so you have to worry about chargeback and the over priced paypal fees.

Well, as far as they are concerned its not a Bitcoin related transaction, its the rental of computer equipment. Buyer seems very happy so I think a charge back is unlikely, I guess I'll have to wait and see. The Payal fees are high, not sure if I'll do it again....

Dont waste your time on paypal, just find other alternatives, from escrow to COD like I said earlier.

why aren't the buyers protected with bitcoin purchases?
 

You can't put in any 3rd party payment instructions inside ebay listings that get around paypal, since they offer no buyer protection. True, ebay could if they wanted create a bitcoin escrow system but of course they won't since they'd rather hang on to their monopoly on payments.

What you can do is run ebay ads instead of auctions that link to your 3rd party website and sell your miners there for bitcoins. I wouldn't in a million years accept paypal for a bitcoin miner. A machine that churns out basically money is going to be the #1 scammed item and there's criminal forums that sell drops for ebay by the hundreds. Not only that but there's amateur scammer methods to reverse a paypal transaction such as claiming your kid authorized the transaction while you were out of the room, and didn't even realize anything happened until the Asic showed up to your doorstop. Of course you will "promise" to return the item, but in the meantime they will reverse the transaction and seller is fucked.

You can also drop hints in regular listing about bitcoin related things that you have miners for sale offsite, be creative, write an ebook how to mine for bitcoins and fill it with links to your site to actually get the miners.

you could put a BTC address in there "payment accepted via 1xxxx..." they can hardly filter that can they? too many addresses possible :-)

But really I am not surprised, Painpal is a criminal org, and part of the Ebay empire, of course they are against bitcoin, bitcoin makes Painpal obsolete, and Painpal only exists because wire transfers are so expensive in the US

die Painpal die  >:(

+1 :D

Or just : "If interested:  1xxxxx"

I disagree, Paypal has buyer protection and no fees for buyers.
Buying something safely online with bitcoin is a nightmare.
Buying bitcoin with fiat is a nightmare, and a extra step to just buying the desired item with the same fiat.
Mining bitcoin is a nightmare.
Selling products for bitcoin is a nightmare.

Much has to be done for BTC before it will be anything more.

Don't get me wrong, I am a fan of BTC.
I just happen to live in the real world with the real problems bitcoin has.

Because dreamer like you is still possible, that scammer can use this crap service. Easy to cancel the alleged "buyer protection". And what you think who pay the fee really, the seller or the buyer?

With Ebay adding the new crypto section on their website, I expect them to reinstate the deleted Ebay account. Have you mailed to them recently?

ebay sucks just same as paypal

Ebay dosn't filter anything like Bitcoin and even don't delete after about a word filter. If so, you would not be able to place the auction, because the word filter work BEFORE you place your auction, not after.

All auction which got deleted after place, get reported from other seller/bidder.

Have you forgot that both are owned by the same people?


Paypal was doing just fine, until that fagg0t Persian Pierre Omidyar brought it.

Your english is very hard to read.
I don't sell things.
I know the merchants pay the fee and I feel that is how it should be.
They are in business to make money while I am just trying to buy a product.
They probably adjust their price for the fees, eBay still has the most competitive pricing anywhere.

I appreciate that eBay/PayPal have such strong buyer protections.
The internet has many scams and I've had to open cases against scammers more than once.
It is nice to know that if some merchant uses false advertising I can get my money back.

I don't like Ebay but this is within there rules and it's a reasonable rule considering they own PayPal and they aren't allowing other options since they are within the limit.

And how about this http://www.coinspeaker.com/2014/04/03/ebay-adds-new-virtual-currency-category-to-u-s-site/ ? Really strange blocking BTC payment while accepting crypto )

i think they should accept BTC also  :D why? is it also a good payment method
but i assume they are not

Bitcoin as a payment sees them getting possibly less fees.
Allowing people to sell crypto sees them making money from those sales.

Simple business logic, Do what is profitable, ban what is not.

lack of buyer protection is a reason.

You can add the FRENCH ebay that it deletes all items that it "proposes" the bitcoin as a payment ... the nature of material is not incriminate (i don't sell bitcoin material, it's to sell somes clothes).
 ::)
Since 1 month, i have added "you can pay with bitcoin if you want" (at the end of the item in normal font).

So, now ... yes, in europe too, you can't use eBay with bitcoin (like cash...).
not a surprise for me (I have read all thread about ban paypal/ebay).

dosn't sound right as long as you give the buyer the other standard option's  ???

with normal auction sites I though it was ok to offer things like swaps for other products

check out if swaps with not currency property is ok then I think you would be covered

""provide us with a screen print please of their message all we can see is action ending as per normal""

thats what i though thats why ive asked for a screen print of their message

This is clearly against their payment policies, and I'm not sure why you are surprised about it:

http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/policies/accepted-payments-policy.html

I am sure he got it 1 month ago, when 100 other told him, what he did wrong.  ::)

Ebay doesn't want anything to do with Bitcoin anymore, not surprising.

Not correct. The guy broke their rules actually.

Exactly, read the post above made by murraypaul. It is not surprised to see that auction getting deleted.

And several rules were breached, making ebay not happy.

Thats fair enough I would suppose.

Yep, fair enough. If you trade on eBay, you gotta play by their rules.