Hi qualitycatering...nice to see you around...interesting debate..hope you don't mind if I contribute.
You said: 1. It's the buyers responsibility to know the total costs and conditions of an item before bidding (caveat emptor is a fundamental principle of all commerce) ; 2. A buyer is obligated to pay at the end of the auction
Actually, that's not entirely the case....consumers do have rights when a contract of sale is breached and you'd be pushing it to obligate a buyer to any contract of sale that was misrepresented (very grey area that is). We don't have 'trader protection' laws against dodgy consumers, but we do have 'consumer protection' laws against dodgy traders. The greater risk being for consumers.
You said: A buyer can only be "ripped off" if a seller charged more than the quoted price.
Absolutely, and it happens so often it would make your head spin.......I can give you numerous examples of this very conduct. It's put me right off buying altogether, when a seller then tries to argue and impose ebay's laughable contract of sale, that they themselves have already breached.
It does nothing for buyer confidence or satisfaction, and gives decent and FAIR sellers a bad name....... But...when it happens, the only redress Ebay afford buyers is to leave neg feedback, against these dodgy sellers....which then gives rise to extortion of the reputable sellers.
This being a two way street, and Ebay claiming to be a 'Venue' only, they should STOP interfering with the balance of power in the buyer seller relationship and concentrate on making ebay a safer marketplace. Get rid of the shonks........Sellers are anonymous....bidders are anonymous....customer service and dispute resolution is absent entirely, as is accountability. Even Paypal as their only solution to consumer fraud, is completely up to their discretion in terms of refunds.... and from what I've read, it gives rise to a new phenomenon called chargeback rorting ???
Frankly, as a person who uses bank deposit, and with sellers thinking that buyers should bear all of the responsibility, ...for me, its just not worth shopping on ebay anymore. Bit like consumer Russian Roulette. Particularly when Ebay allow anonymous sellers access to a nation wide pool of potential victims.
If Ebay installed a modest $250.00 buyer protection program such as they are doing in the states (for other payment methods), then this would give bank deposit customers the confidence to shop, knowing that they have at least some dispute resolution process and redress available to them. If the buyer has to take such a risk all the time, they will stop shopping on Ebay as I have had to do under the circumstances.
Even if bank deposit/money order customers had the option to elect an insurance fee based on a sliding scale (i.e. depending on value of goods) on each purchase to protect them from being defrauded..that would at least help, in the absence of any verification of sellers or fraud mitigation strategies from ebay.
