Ebay

[Sophie's mom]

I was looking up a coral on the net and ebay came up as a source. Apparently, there are ALOT of corals for sale out there.
I was just wondering if anyone had ever dared purchase such on Ebay?

[Junkzoo]

It's been done,(not by me tho) I quess it's like any other transaction, you have to be wary of your seller, check their feedback rating,,and go from there. Read the fine print, a lot of times the pic you see , is not what you are bidding on, more likely you will be getting a frag of the one pictured(which is the case on a lot of e-sales places, ) I think the chance of getting good livestock can be had by some other means,,,some online places, our sponsors, or local reefers that are doing it as a hobby, and not that much as a "business". Hook up with a local reefing club, they most all do some sort of frag trading, and that way you prob will be able to see what you are getting ,and save a decent amount of cash, by not paying for overnite/next day shipping charges.
There's prob nothing wrong with dealing with eBay, or other online places for your corals etc.,but just like any other purchase, you kinda have to watch for possible less than positive sale practices.
Members here have prob some great transactions, some possibly have not, ask around if you find something you are interested in, do a lil detective work, and see how the sellers pans out, and hopefully you will end up with a positive transaction when it's all over with

[theplatypus]

I'm not a huge fan of buying livestock off ebay.

[Junkzoo]

Ditto, not that there are prob some good deals to be found , if i was to get some stuff , it would probably be from a sponsor, or another online with a good track record,,,,myself , never had to resort to onlines for my corals, got plenty of fellow reefers who have loads of frags to offer/trade,,or just go to the LFS .
Not to say that members here have possibly had good transactions from eBay, it's just that IMO, i can find just as good, or better(and feel safer) getting it from these other means,,,,

[Loverotties]

As long as they have over a 100 feedbacks with 100% good ,then why not.

[VWD]

All I can Say is like anything on e bay or any other online auction site. You need to know how to use the tools they have up to be a smart shopper, One is look at how long they have been selling and the feedback rating , Then read some of the feedbacks and look at what the feedback was left for . If You find a seller that hads a high rating and good and all he sells is corals. More then likely You will be happy , If he sell hats and hads a few corals may not be. Alot of the sellers are regular dealer of fish and corals and have stores. I do want to add That I myself have never ordered coral or anything live off of e bay. But have been using e bay for many years and have been pretty happy with everything on the most part. Im like most That I like to see what I am buying and also like to deal with sponsor of TRT if I can.

[Little Luey]

dealing on e-bay makes me nervous. I have seen too many threads about sellers that ship damage goods or coral that don't make it to their destination, some cases the buyer gets replacement but have to pay shipping again; some other times the buyer gets screw with nothing to show for the money they spend. Those few bad sellers is what makes me not want to deal with e-bay. When I have bought coral/fish from Liveaquaria or Vividaquariums they always stand by your purchase, they want you to come back to them; I guess some e-bay vendors cannot aford to do that or do not have the stuff to offer a replacement.

[VWD]

Well You are right on the shipping, I have see alot of live rock and other stuff listed on e bay and the shipping is even ups ground, I'm sorry but if You pay to have it shipped like that You are going to have problems. even live rock I want to have shipped overnight.

[Little Luey]

One thingt that is very misleading is the fact that some e-bay sellers use US postal Priority Mail to ship coral. USPS Priority mail is 2-3 days but as I found out while shipping other stuff, it is not guarantee to arrive in 2-3 days, it just means they will try a little harder to get it to you in 2-3 days. By having this option they give the impresion that the coral will be ok shipping this way, but most of the time it is not. If anyone gets any coral/fish should pay for overnight shipping.
The e-stores do not even have the option to ship 2-3 day, everything is overnight.

I like Junkzoo idea of hooking up with local reefers to trade a lot better.

[Fly Guy]

Originally Posted by Loverotties

As long as they have over a 100 feedbacks with 100% good ,then why not.

DITTO. Ill say this, any9one selling corals via ebay with more than 100 transactions and a 98%+ positive feedback rating CAN be trusted. Period. For anyone who doesnt know how feedback works, if you do business with a jerk who doesnt give you a chance to remedy any complications, and just gives you a negative feedback instead...it goes on your record. Its pretty hard to NOT come across people like this sooner or later.
When you see a vendor with more than several THOUSAND transactions, and still retaining 100% feedback rating, that vendor not only operates to the HIGHEST customer service standards, they have been lucky to NOT have come across a jerk who unfairly tarnished their record.

just my 02

[thekid55]

ebay ebay huh i wouldnt do it. people on this site will sell you some coral and i think its alot better that way.

[Fly Guy]

Originally Posted by thekid55

ebay ebay huh i wouldnt do it. people on this site will sell you some coral and i think its alot better that way.

Its funny you say that. When i go to purchase coral and or other hardware from people via this site and other places that i dont know in person, i many times insist that they set up a "buy it now" for me on ebay, and that they have a good feedback rating on the ebay site. We then complete the deal on ebay. I will even offer to pay for their ebay fees soemtimes inorder to do it this way.

In fact, just last night i had somebody well me some equipment off of the classifieds section here. We completed the deal through the ebay console and I paid his listing fees. I talked with him for some time over the phone and he was a really nice guy that no doubt was not out to rip me off or take advantage of me. Just the same, i didnt KNOW him and it was worth it to me to do it that way.

This not only gives me insurance coverage on my purchase, it makes it that much more important to the person im buyingf from to practice good business. Becasue if they dont, they risk tarnishing their ebay feeback, AND will be liable to ebay and or paypal if proved in the wrong. We all value our 100% feedback ratings and have earned them.

Ive spent a lot of money on this hobby in the last year and i HAVE been ripped off via here and reefcentral both several times, with nothing i could do about it. (except fopr the one guy i publicly forced via threads to make good on his word without ever mentioning his name). Ill spare you the details of it but i found his ebay website and somewhat anonymously threatened to somehow get him via his ebay feedback if he did not make good on our agreement via TRT. So ebay was indirectly a tool there as well. He ignored me for a week until i blindsided him with a little ebay creativity.....he paid me within an hour after doing so. Thats why i do it that way. I have been ripped off on ebay only once and paypal refunded my money.

[fchidsey]

Not for nothing Ebay is no different than buying something from one of the internet live goods dealers. you never actually know what you are getting. look at the trumpet that Pastina ( i think thats her name) received the other day that was all brown. I have to go with the feed back rule if people are willing to do the right thing and fix a problem then why not give them a chance.

[Fly Guy]

Originally Posted by fchidsey

Not for nothing Ebay is no different than buying something from one of the internet live goods dealers. you never actually know what you are getting. look at the trumpet that Pastina ( i think thats her name) received the other day that was all brown. I have to go with the feed back rule if people are willing to do the right thing and fix a problem then why not give them a chance.

Yeah, its kind of like the woprd of mouth that marine depot, drs f& S, reefer madness etc. The word of mouth on these people is that they rock and do a good business. Difference is that you can achieve that same word of mouth IN WRITING on smaller vendors via ebay.

[fchidsey]

some of the best companies are thriving because of word of mouth. I worked for a cabling company that installes computer and phone networks that was started and run on word of mouth and quality of product I know it's apples and oranges but still same pricipal.