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Ebay?

L

lindalo5032

Newbie
Would you be afraid to buy an Optimus V from E-bay? It is shown to be brand new, original packaging, never opened, etc. The seller has a 100% feedback. It is a buy it now price for $179.99 with free shipping. My local stores all have a price of $199.99 plus tax. I did e-mail the seller and asked if it was refurbished (just to make sure). Would I be better off just buying locally & spending the extra $$?
 
I wouldnt be afraid to buy it from an ebay user. Just if anything make sure he has more then 5 buys/sells, otherwise his 100% feedback could be a joke, make sure that you ask him in an ebay message if the phone has ever been opened from its packaging, or registered to virgin mobile, $179.99 is a little bit of a deal I guess if he is offering free shipping, just make sure you get answers to the questions you have, otherwise if he sends you something that wasnt advertised, you can get a 100% refund on his arse. Ebay is nice to buyers, not usually sellers, so just make sure you know the facts about the phone before you send him money. I would also check your local craigslist for LG Optimus V, in my area here in St. Louis, theres been a couple for about $100-150, so you might find one cheaper on craigslist.
 
I bought mine off of eBay for $181 with free shipping. Guy had 99.8% positive and had a good refund policy. I looked at his feedback from other users who had bought the phone and no complaints so I took a chance. Mine works amazingly and glad I got a good deal!
 
Theres a new one for $165 on ebay. Search "virgin optimus", first hit. I bought one from them a week ago. They shipped it right away. No tax too. Great deal. As long as seller has great feedback, theres no reason to be that skeptical of ebay. Ive bought hundreds of items there, never had problem. (not saying its impossible tho)
 
I wouldn't worry too much. I bought a Jeep sight unseen off eBay three years ago and it was perfect. The dealer had a 100% rating on over 200 sales.

Just use common sense and look at the eBay ratings.
 
Personally, I don't think a $20 savings is worth the trouble of not knowing if its new, if it'll be damaged in shipping, no big store to call and even if the phone is insured and covered by ebay policy, the hassle of waiting for the phone and then possibly a refund is a headache and I'm an ebay seller.
 
Got 3 rainchecks at Best Buy for the $129 price. Bought two, kept one and sold one new in the box on eBay. After sales tax, eBay and PayPal fees and shipping costs including insurance, I broke even so did not use my other Best Buy Rain Check at that price. However, I did place the original box in a larger box filled with packing peanuts to be sure it wasn't damaged in shipping. Look at the persons feedback as a seller, both numbers and ratings. I have bought a bunch off eBay the last 13 years and have only been screwed a few times. However, bought 4 motorcycles, one sailboat and one Travel Trailer and all of these high priced items were not as represented. Expensive items should be inspected as many sellers will take a negative feedback if they make a lot of money on it. Most don't want to take negative feedback on low price items. Not worth it.
 
lindalo5032 said:
Would you be afraid to buy an Optimus V from E-bay? It is shown to be brand new, original packaging, never opened, etc. The seller has a 100% feedback. It is a buy it now price for $179.99 with free shipping. My local stores all have a price of $199.99 plus tax. I did e-mail the seller and asked if it was refurbished (just to make sure). Would I be better off just buying locally & spending the extra $$?
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I've had good luck on ebay before, but I'm not a big buyer, just mainly things that are older and no longer o.w. available.

Anyways ALWAYS check the shipping cost. I've noticed in the last several years that some sellers have outrageous shipping charges, and while your at it check where it ships from.
 
SOME sellers will ALWAYS get the amount they are wanting out of their product..

Here's the way they do it........offer the PRODUCT itself at a super low bid, then....the SHIPPING cost is out of this world.

REASON! If you're a seller, Ebay charges around 10% fee based off the FINAL AUCTION value of the product itself....shipping is just added for whatever the seller specified.

SO, if a ebayer was selling an Optimus V for $100 and Charging $50 shipping, the BUYER would be getting a good deal most likely........

But in terms for the seller, he's having to pay $5 less in Ebay fees.

Ebay usually prohibits this, but they can't screen EVERY phone.

ANOTHER REASON you have to be careful in EBAY AUCTIONS (with phones especially)..... Lets say, for example, in terms of an OPTIMUS V, a prepaid phone. Usually these phones have to run thru a POS to actually "authorize" the ESN in the system (i'm not talking about activation...the user does that). If in a scenerio where a person stole this phone from a wal-mart or a target, THEN tried to sell it on EBAY...this phone would NOT WORK when the buyer tried to "ACTIVATE" it because it was never "pre-authorized" thru a retailer's system that it was ever sold.

So, you letter READ, LOOK, and ASK QUESTIONS if you're thinking about buying a phone on Ebay . ..

OF COURSE, if something happens when you get it, you can always file a dispute, but that's a lengthy process, and no guarantee you'll win or get your money back!

cutterjohn said:
I've had good luck on ebay before, but I'm not a big buyer, just mainly things that are older and no longer o.w. available.

Anyways ALWAYS check the shipping cost. I've noticed in the last several years that some sellers have outrageous shipping charges, and while your at it check where it ships from.
Click to expand...
 
I bought mine from eBay, just look for a trusted seller (Power Seller) like 1000 plus positive feedback. If it's refurbished the seller is required to notify the buyer before purchase. Also it will not come in brand new packaging like from a store, it will come in a generic box if it's refurbished (most times anyways)
 
Thanks so much for all your input! I just purchased the VM LG Optimus V on E-Bay for $164.99 with FREE shipping. The seller is a "Top rated seller" with 99.8% positive feedback (12,127 feedbacks). I e-mailed him twice with questions and he immediately responded with answers.

The seller's listing says "no returns" but I e-mailed him and asked if the manufacturer's warranty would still apply, and he e-mailed me back and said if there is a malfunction of the phone to let him know immediately and they would replace it; after that, the warranty through VM would apply.

After I completed the transaction I got an e-mail from Ebay wanting to sell me an extended warranty through "Square Trade Warranty" for $21.59. They say Square Trade is the "top selling warranty on Ebay and is consistently rated 5 stars--they fix it or pay the full cost of the item." It is a two year warranty and covers parts and labor with no deductible.

Opinions? Would you guys purchase the 2 year extended warranty for $21.59?

Thanks so much for all your advice. :)
 
If you read the extended warranty details, you find they have almost always have a ridiculous deductible, add that together with what you pay for the insurance, and you're better off buying a new phone. If you do get warranty replacement, they have the right to send you a refurbished phone.
 
greg4android said:
SOME sellers will ALWAYS get the amount they are wanting out of their product..

Here's the way they do it........offer the PRODUCT itself at a super low bid, then....the SHIPPING cost is out of this world.

REASON! If you're a seller, Ebay charges around 10% fee based off the FINAL AUCTION value of the product itself....shipping is just added for whatever the seller specified.
Click to expand...
Yep. I'd actually heard that one reason for doing it was to avoid ebay charges, however most of the auctions with super high shipping that I've seen some poor fool bid the item up to what it was actually about worth likely not noticing the ripoff shipping price. I'd presume that ebay'd side with the purchaser against the seller in this case, but you never know...

And this outrageous shipping price trick happens in ALL sorts of auctions, not just phones/tech items... and ebay does a really crappy job at sorting them out. Just makes looking on ebay tedious having to sort out these junk auctions first, as I'd never trust a seller pulling a scam like that.

extended warranty: I'm really hoping that this phone gets replaced by something better soon, i.e. a cortex-a8 or -a9 SoC based phone... probably still keep it as I got it for about the same price as my Archos A32 which I NEVER would've bought had I known about this phone as even leaving it unactivated it's a MUCH better value at the price than the A32 which has low res(200x320), no GPS, no magnetometer, VGA camera, less RAM(256MB), feels no faster even though it's a TI OMAP 36XX @ 800MHz, etc. Only benefit of the A32 is 8GB of onboard flash memory...
 
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