posted on January 4, 2003 11:03:08 PM new
On one of my auctions that closed last week, I got one with an email address that kept coming back "email name unknown", I have tried it 6 times. Buyer has been registered for a year, but 0 feedback. I have had 3 emails from them via "question to seller" and the email address is just the same as the one provided, but when I try and send a reply to it, it come back "email address unknown" just the same. If they are sending it from that address, why can't I reply to that same address? I live in Canada, and it is only a 3.99 sale, and not worth an expensive phone call. Any advise?
posted on January 4, 2003 11:31:34 PM new
Amber...I had this same problem last month. The buyer would send me an email and when I tried to reply, I got the "user unknown" error and a kicked back email. What was happening was the the senders server was inserting a small "x" in front of their email address making it impossible to reply. I have no idea why they were set up this way. Check the registered email address carefully with what you are receiving, making sure that they are EXACTLY the same. The only other thing I could suggest is to either pull their contact info and phone them, or report them to ebay as having invalid contact info. Life is too short to babysit with people who don't set their filters correctly or who choose to use fly by night ISPs.
The light at the end of the tunnel will turn out to be an oncoming train.
posted on January 4, 2003 11:45:04 PM new
One of my FLD sales closed almost the same exact way that you just described. The buyer has an AOL email that says 'unknown user' when you email him. His last feedback is from 17 months ago so his email ISP has obviously changed. Yet I got an 'ASK THE SELLER A QUESTION' form with the dead email address. At first I thought "how could the dead email send an email?' but then I realized that ebay merely attaches the email address on file to the 'ASK THE SELLER A QUESTION' form. To prevent an unwarranted bad feedback you should advise ebay of the bad buyer email info. That's what I did.
Select A Topic: > Transaction problems > I am a seller > My buyer's contact information or email address is invalid > Press 'CONTINUE' button > Press ' CONTACT SUPPORT' button on next page > put bad ebay user ID in the Other Member's User ID: box > place pertinent info in 'Message' box > Press 'SEND TO SUPPORT' button and you're done.
Ebay will email them and temporarily suspend their account and force them to straighten out their bad email situation to get back on ebay. You can get your FVF back this way and not risk a bad feedback.
If you sold them a Ming vase from China I'd advise a potentially expensive long distance call. Otherwise just report the bad bidder to ebay.
posted on January 5, 2003 05:14:18 AM new
Thanks for the advice. I think you are right Tooltimes, the old address must come up when they send "ask seller a question". They did say on one of the messages that they have updated their information on eBay, but the email address doesn't come up when you bring up contact info. I'll just have to inform eBay I guess.
posted on January 5, 2003 11:09:37 AM new
I hate the frantic " I need this thing right away " messages with a dead email address. You can almost feel the negative feedback coming from them about ' not replying to my emails '.
Now you know why more and more sellers will not accept bids from dormant ebay accounts. It's a waste of time to them.
