Sigh, it just keeps coming.
First, they mandate you only pay with Paypal.
Now they have a policy where buyer's funds, once collected by Paypal, are held in escrow for 21 days prior to being sent along to the seller.
It appears to only come into play with sellers having less than 100 feedbacks - don't confuse that with the feedback rating. And it may not apply to all that seller's auctions, just the large value auctions - and perhaps not even all of them (random selection may be working here, too).
They only release the funds upon buyer feedback being left, proof of dispatch and delivery being provided by seller, or the passage of 21 days.
So, I've got a seller without money who is being asked to ship the items to me. He of course is confused as to WTF.
Now in essence, this is just shifting the burden of trust from the buyer to the seller. And actually makes refunding for an auction gone bad easier for the buyer, as the funds are in escrow. But for my overseas buying, where delivery often takes more than the 21 days, I can still get screwed and be caught up in the eBay 'buyer protection' scam.
And being new, it confuses the hell out of the sellers who are used to getting their money in a timely manner.
I understand they did this during the Holidays for Wii and powerstation auctions. Enterprising seller camps out, gets item hoping for quick flipping profit to finance their holiday buying and wind up out their money until well after the holidays. Imagine telling your own kid the money for their gifts is held in escrow at Paypal?
And of course, Paypal now has LOTS of $$$$$$ sitting in escrow that is gathering THEM LOTS of interest.
Corporate greed at its finest.
Larry
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