ONLINE auction giant eBay Australia has rejected claims that it breached the Trade Practices Act, while staving off threats from its own members to take it to court.
Last week, PayPal rival Paymate wrote to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission claiming a recent move by eBay ran counter to the law.
In April eBay applied for legal immunity from the ACCC as it sought to introduce two payment measures: by May 21 all sellers would be required to include PayPal in its list of payment methods, and by June 17 only PayPal and cash on delivery would be recognised for sales.
After several months battling it out with the ACCC, the financial sector and its own members, eBay backed down from the second proposal but the first went through.
The fact that eBay sellers are required to offer PayPal is anti-competitive, according to Paymate.
"It restricts the ability of ourselves and other payment options to be used by eBay members because of the preferential treatment PayPal is afforded," Paymate managing director Dilip Rao said.
"It is our belief that eBay, in both Australia and New Zealand, is engaging in conduct in breach of the Trade Practices Act."
EBay spokesman Daniel Feiler said the claims were unfounded.
"We absolutely refute the claims made by Paymate," Mr Feiler said.
"If a seller wants to offer Paymate on eBay they are free do so, but we promote PayPal because it is the safer option," Mr Feiler said.
Mr Rao declined to comment on eBay's reaction, choosing instead to leave matters with the ACCC.
ACCC spokesman Brent Rebecca said the agency did not usually comment on complaints received or whether any investigation may be under way.
"As we have previously said, requirements that traders make available PayPal among the payment choices offered is in itself unlikely to raise trade practices concerns.
"However, the ACCC would be concerned about misrepresentations made in relation to such a requirement or further conduct that restrains traders' ability to offer other payment systems," Mr Rebecca said.
Meanwhile, a group of eBay members has begun to mobilise their local parliamentary representatives to help investigate ways to sue eBay.
"EBay's recalcitrant behaviour has pushed us to the point that we must now use the legal system to bring them into line with decent trading practices," group spokesman Tony Green said.
The group had decided to use legal due processes to stop eBay from "destroying its own site", he said.
"We are eBay's customers and to date they have refused to listen to us.
"EBay has left us no alternative but to appeal to the courts to right the wrongs that eBay has forced upon us," Mr Green said.
Mr Feiler declined to comment on the group's actions.
Ebay is a criminal organisation -
The management of Ebay STEAL money from people, they LIE to people, they STAND OVER people and they CON people.....
How they play the Confidence Trickster - It's in their terms and conditions "The Ebay Policies" - stating "Paypal Protection will cover you for loss. (up to some fictious amount)....
Then you read the fine print -
It's not an automatic guarantee and it's not applied across the board to ALL sales - as the management of Ebay want to portray it.
Remember this is Ebay - a company who's management has a history of lying out their collective arses as often as they breath.
Ebay owns Paypal - they set all their own policies - and all the income they generate from sales and theft, goes into their pockets - not yours and that's just how they intend to keep it.
Their policies and their practices - are specifically designed to lull the stupid and gullible - and the too lazy to read the fine print people; into a false sense of security.
IF you read Ebays terms and conditions and their policies, you will see TWO things.
1. They have stacked the deck of cards against you from the very beginning.
2. It's ONLY after YOU have jumped through an extraordinary amount of hoops, and you have had to make a minimum amount of sales, and you have had to pay up big time on postal insurance and all this other really hard to justify expenses and time consuming activities - making it both very expensive and very difficult and or generally impossible to qualify for getting the "Paypal Protection".......
(***If a normal real world shop front pulled this kind of bullshit, the owners in most countries would soon be facing charges of the "fucking with the consumer" kind." - but the management of Ebay thinks it's immune to the principles of Fair Trading Laws - they skirt a very thin line from actually conning people outright - by using extremely slippery policies and terms and conditions.)
Then they use these "terms and conditions" and their policies to automatically 'disqualify enormous amounts of people - FROM their "Oh so freely offered Paypal protection".
And if you can jump through all the hoops, pay all the expenses and and meet all the conditions to actually qualify for "Paypal protection" - the people who run Ebay won't pay it.
They will do it by fucking you around so badly, by ignoring you and giving you the run around - and making arbartry and idiotic "judgements" out of your favour - Until you give up and go away...
The Paypal Protection Policy - is a Confidence Trick.
(You mean this is a company that plays deceptive mind games with it's customers - the buyers and sellers?)
Oxford Dictionary:
confidence trick
(N. Amer. also confidence game)
• noun an act of cheating someone by gaining their trust.
Cambridge Dictionary
Definition
con (TRICK) Show phoneticsverb [T] -nn- INFORMAL
to make someone believe something false, usually so that they will give you their money or possessions:
She felt she had been conned into buying the car.
Thieves conned him out of his life savings.
He managed to con £20 out of them (= get that amount from them by deceiving them).
con Show phonetics
noun [C] INFORMAL
a trick to get someone's money, or make them do what you want:
It's a con - you get half the food for twice the price!
a con trick
Wikionary
confidence trickster (plural confidence tricksters)
- Someone who takes part in a confidence game.
confidence game (plural confidence games)
