Please help stop these eBay counterfeit auctions!

I've been maintaining another thread about my experience buying a counterfeit Barber quarter on eBay. That seller has been moving a large number of counterfeit coins and exonumia, including no less than fourteen "Hawaii half dollar copper test strike plates". Most of his auctions are one-day, presumably to reduce the chance that they'll be reported by someone knowledgeable. It's discouraging that he seems to have received positive feedback for lots of the fakes -- apparently it's hard to go wrong underestimating the savvy of eBay buyers.

The seller has one item ending in just a couple of hours, an 1893 Barber half that looks even sloppier than the quarter I bought. He has three other items ending early tomorrow morning (US time):

1936 Cleveland Commemorative Silver Half Dollar #L78 - near BU- GREAT TONING 90% (check out the spaghetti hear on this one! It looks like someone engraved the mold with a crayon...)

L#50----1926 Oregon Trail Memorial Commemorative -SUPERB DETAIL W/tone - sharp (check the "doubling", or extra features, around "26" in the date)

lot#9F-1926 commem coin Sesquintennial - 90% early half - nice filler - details (look at INDEPENDENCE on the reverse)

If these coins also look fake to you, please consider using the Report Item link on each auction. I don't know how many reports it takes to draw the attention of a human.

As I said in the other thread, I think this seller is starting to feel some heat; he's added text to his recent auctions begging people to contact him directly if items aren't as described instead of opening a case or leaving negative feedback. To me, this is a bit like saying "please contact me directly if you find I've picked your pocket, and I'll give you your stuff back, no questions asked! Just don't call the police."

It's also possible to call eBay and report this sort of thing verbally, but they've made it considerably more difficult to find the phone number, and I had to go through a lengthy phonemail process, then wait ten or fifteen minutes for a person. I wouldn't ask anyone to follow that process if they hadn't already received a fake item, but I might consider doing it myself in the future if a seller is egregious enough.

Thanks in advance if you decide to pitch in!

 

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eBay doesn't care anymore.
They no longer investigate reports of counterfeits.
Caveat emptor when buying on eBay.

 

What Rick said.

 

sad really.....eBay has no integrity anymore, at least at one time they tried and relied on the 'community' to report stuff and it was somewhat effective, no longer.

 

I dont care to police Ebay any more either.

 

Lots of bids on those coins. People are so naive.

 

I just bought a Yuan Shikai coin, supposedly 5 "Yuan", and the coin looked super super legit. I looked all through the post, and found nothing saying otherwise. I figured the seller is an idiot, and mis-posed 5 "Yuan" for 10 Chaio, or Jiao. However on scrolling down way to the end of the list, the seller included dimensions of the coin. 4.3CM AKA 43mm, which NO Yuan Shikai coin that I know of is that big.....

What is the world coming to when people resort to lies, and falsehoods in order to make money?? There are so many venues, and ways of making money legitimately, however these cretins continue to plague the world.

I learned my lesson first off, very clear, NEVER EVER buy ANYTHING from China! Sorry to all of the good reputable Chinese people, but if their place of origin is China, I will instantly assume they are scamming cheaters. There are over 1.3B people in china, and you have to think that a good portion of those people are not honest. Since so many people, the dis-honesty % will be higher than anywhere else in the world. Too risky to trust at all.

Thankfully, I learned my lesson at the cost of $3.99, instead of a lot more, I was at the time willing to pay.

 

But you get another chance! Incredibly, the seller has apparently found another of the incredibly rare "Spaghetti Hair" Cleveland commems, and so far the bidding is only up to 99 cents!

Clearly, all my concerns about "inadequate seller protection" and "dealing with difficult buyers" are overblown. I should immediately list any fake coins I can find, and open a revolving account with Jinghuashei to start building an inventory.

It's a tough world when you have ethics.

Maybe I should focus on the positive instead. If you're looking to build up your "black book" collection, you could do worse than to buy a dozen or so "coins" from this guy, then open cases on all of them. You'll get your money back without any fuss, and of course you'll get to keep the fakes.

 

That may be the ultimate way to put his business out a business by giving him (the) business...

 

Or open an account and bid but never pay making him have to wait weeks to recoup billed money.

 

Well, it's interesting -- he'd been listing items daily for weeks, but tonight, the cupboard is apparently bare. I did leave feedback yesterday with the C-words (COUNTERFEIT COIN) prominently featured. I also let eBay have it in the customer survey they sent me as a follow-up to the case, pointing out that I'm a lot less likely to point people toward eBay now that they've shown complete indifference to this counterfeit coin operation.

So, maybe one or both of my actions yesterday finally got someone's attention, or maybe he's just taking a day off. I'll be keeping an eye on him. If it DOES turn out that he's bailed, I'll feel bad for waiting so long to raise the flags -- there were, on average, two or so buyers a day getting stuck with counterfeits from him.

 

Ha. Fat chance. He's back today with THREE listings, including another spaghetti-hair Cleveland commem. I'm going to try the "report seller" path, which I don't think I've used previously, but I can't say I'm terribly optimistic.

 

this guy is convinced his cheesy fake is real. he even says he had it looked at. Lol. and under item specifics he listed it as a ms62. what a joke. its an obvious $2 fake.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1795-FLOWIN...55?pt=Coins_US_Individual&hash=item3cea5b0df7

I usually don't even bother with these but I was bored. The guy sent me a message saying its real. lmao

 

It appears that he, ahem, "thinks" both his cheesy fakes are real... and at least four others do too:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1798-BUST-1...16?pt=Coins_US_Individual&hash=item3cea5b153c


A fool and his money....

 

Wow, and the Bay lets them slide??

I submitted a report...been in the family for years...must be dog years.

 

I'm not sure if those are real bidders or people just trying to teach him a lesson.
I rather send them a message letting them know its a fake instead of disrupting an auction. but I'm sure he will learn one way or another

I also reported it

 

Well the fact that it has been in his family for years leads me to believe he is not being honest.....

 

Yeah, I used to do that -- but then eBay "closed that privacy hole", so you can no longer see who the winning bidder was.

To be fair, exposing the winning bidder was an uncomfortable security issue. I don't necessarily want to advertise widely the sorts of things I'm buying.

 

US $585.00
Free shipping
[ 31bids ]

bidiots

 

How about the cartoon like 1798 $:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1798-BUST-1...16?pt=Coins_US_Individual&hash=item3cea5b153c