OMG.... I'M AN ONLINE PACKRAT!!!!
Written: Oct 09 '00 (Updated Oct 09 '00)
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It's bad enough that I have a hard time getting rid of the things that have cluttered my closet and storage for years, without even taking a peak at them once every 2 years, but now I had to find Ebay only to add to that collection. I LOVE IT!!!!!!
Ebay.com is a online auction site which literally has millions of members world wide. I have visited many other online auction sites and had a hard time finding the rare things I was looking for. Finally, I gave in and joined Ebay! The day I joined, the first thing out of my other half's mouth was, " OH _____!( you fill in the blank with your colorful mind ) :-)
So far, I have had no trouble finding just about anything I have been looking for.
GETTING STARTED ON EBAY
First off, one must become a member which is a very easy process to do.
The address is www.ebay.com. Once at the homepage, look to the top right hand corner where you will see, Welcome New Users. Directly underneath, you will see the Register icon. Click on that and you are on your way.
Just fill out the required information to set up your account and you will be on your way to garage sale heaven! ( at least that's what I call it. )
Please be advised, when registering your account you must include a valid email address, and not a webmail address. For security and verification reasons, they do not accept email accounts such as YAHOO, HOTMAIL, etc. ( you get the point ) This, to me, is a bit of a drawback if you are unfortunately set up on an email with only one account available to you. As long as it is your own, that's great if nobody else sees it, but if you are bidding on gifts for others in the household and they use the same email as well then make sure you come up with a way to check it quite often before they have a chance to see it.
Unfortunately, I don't have that option and was forced to make silly threats to my fiancee while hanging him off of our balcony by his feet, making him chant 100 times, " I WILL NOT READ MY HONEY'S EMAIL, I WILL NOT READ MY HONEY'S EMAIL! Just kidding but he knows better. lol!
Once registered with Ebay, I suggest going straight into your,
My Ebay account. Before jumping out on the site to discover all of the wonderful products they have to offer, take some time to get familiar with the set up in your account. These tabs will include:
1. Bidding and Watching
2. Selling
3. Recent Feedback
4. Account
5. Favorites
6. All
7. Preferences
These are all pretty well self explanatory, but being the helpful individual I am, ( someone tell my boss that ), I will break it down a bit for you.
Bidding and Watching
This category, is one that will probably be used the most. Once you begin your journey through the endless opportunities of obtaining other peoples property, this is where your account will keep track of what you have bid on, if you are currently the highest bidder, and how many days and hours are left in that particular auction.
It can become very difficult, once you are out there to keep track of everything you bid on or are interested in so this feature does it for you.
Once you have bid on something, the information will automatically be placed in your account so you may find out how your bidding is doing without having to constantly visit that particular page to see. This works great for me because I can't even remember where I placed my brush 5 minutes after using it.
It not only shows you what you have bid on but it will show you the exact status of the auction. It will show as follows:
1. item - ( duh )
2. start price - what that item started off as
3. current price - which is what the bidding is currently
4. my max bid - shows what bid you currently have in there
5. quantity - how many of that item is avail
6. # of bids - how many people have bid on it already
7. start date - when the auction began
8. end date - ( duh again )
9. time left - how many more days, hours, and minutes are left before the auction closes.
When viewing your bids, anything highlighted in Red means that currently, you are not the highest bidder, which means, click on the item and outbid! Show them who's boss! Anything highlighted in Green means you are currently the highest bidder.
They also have the Watching category. This is the one I use frequently. These will be listed below your active auctions. These are the ones that you want to keep an eye on but don't want to bid yet until you may be at your last day. If the price is right and the bids are still low, I will wait sometimes, until the last 30 mins of an auction, and bid $.25 higher and usually end up winning it. Some say it's cheating, I just think it's smart.
Why outbid someone when there is still 6 days left on the auction. All you are doing is raising the price of what you may not have to pay. When someone is outbid and they want that product, they will outbid you, and in return, you will bid higher, ( if you really want it ) and probably end up paying more than you would if you just kept watching it till the last minute. Working this way, I have just acquired 8 items in which the total amount, including shipping and handling came up to $27.00. Some of those items include, 2 movies, 1 of which is very rare, 1 dreamcast game at which the original value is $39.00, etc.. you get the point.
Selling
This tab does the same as the previous one and will show you the activity of the items you have listed for bidding.
Recent Feedback
This works like an online credit report within Ebay. Buyers and sellers use this tool to leave comments for public view on how you did business with them.
Account
This just shows you your credit/debit transactions.
Favorites
Here, you can choose your favorite categories and have easy access to them instead of having to search in the Browse section of Ebay for what you want to look for. It just gives you faster access to what you want to look for. It too also includes the options to look for items that are the most recent, to the ones closing today.
All
This shows you all accounts active and the status for not just buying, but if you are selling as well.
Preferences
The title says it all. In here, you set things, the way you want them. Simple as that.
Payment Options
This is not one of the tabs but I wanted to give you and idea of how you can pay. The number one payment option seems to be a service called PayPal.com. This allows you to transfer funds from your bank account to the sellers. This so far has been proved to be very secure and the quickest way to acquire your products.
Every seller has different payment options, so make sure you check those out on the product page of what you are bidding on. Most sellers will include their payment options right off the bat including how much it will be for shipping and handling so you know what to expect. A lot of them also accept money orders, cashiers checks, but I personally have not found an overwhelming amount that accept personal checks, but they're some that do.
The item categories on Ebay seem to be endless with the products available to you with the click of the mouse. I guarantee that you will come across items that you would have never thought you would see again.
I would take the time to list all of the categories for you, but that would take up wayyyyyyyy too much time. Just go to the site and discover what has to be offered. I don't think you will be disappointed.
WORD OF WARNING
One piece of advise for you if you do plan on bidding. Make sure to take the time to check on the Sellers status. The way to do this is once you are at the page of the item that is being sold, under the Starting and Ends, you will see the Seller name, and beside that you will see different colored stars.
Simply click on the star and you will be brought to a page that will explain what each color represents. Once you have read this, just hit your back button and under the name of the seller you will see your options on following up on how that seller does business. There are some people out there who have not fulfilled their obligation, but these people come in small numbers so it's best to do your homework on who you are buying from to insure you don't get ripped off.
I know this has been a long review, and there are many out here who already know how this works, but I chose to break it down for the new people experiencing the NET and just getting to learn it.
I hope that in some way this was helpful to you and informed you a bit on what a great place Ebay can be. Just make sure you check out who you are buying from and have a great time.
Till next time, take care and thanks for stopping by.
Channie
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
chanele21
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Member: Channie
Location: mo
Reviews written: 45
Trusted by: 21 members
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