posted on September 19, 2001 06:34:52 AM new
Can't reach your bidder for one reason or another? Got a bidder ignoring you and you want to prove it? How about the bidder who claims none of your emails have made it to them?
I got a solution! Go to www.egreetings.com and send them a free postcard or e-greeting with all of your end of auction information on it!(Maybe even a nasty note about them not contacting you! Just Kidding!) Once they go to egreetings.com to claim their 'happy' greeting card you will receive a confirmation from egreetings that your card was picked up by the recipient!!!
Make sure you put something vague in the email subject line like "A SPECIAL E-CARD IS WAITING FOR YOU!" this way they have no idea who sent the card. Their curiosity will get the best of them, they WILL claim that card and then you will have the proof you need that yes, your bidder is REALLY alive AND ignoring you!
Make sure you tell them that egreetings will send a confirmation that they picked up their greeting - that's why you are contacting them that way!
Hope this helps someone! I've had a bidder claiming I haven't contacted her over the past week when I have sent her no less than 8 emails from 3 different email addresses. I just got confirmation from egreetings that she picked up my email so I now I'll wait to see if she does in fact contact me now!
posted on September 19, 2001 06:57:44 AM new
If your bidder is ignoring you or doesn't want to pay even contacting them wont helpseems pointless to me.
Joe B
posted on September 19, 2001 12:13:51 PM new
Well, at least the seller has PROOF that the buyer got the information. The buyer can't say they never heard from you!
I have thought about this in the past but have so few deadbeats, that I have never used it, but it isn't a bad idea.
posted on September 19, 2001 03:37:08 PM new
I always send EOAs within an hour of close. I have a buyer currently who has sent me several emails saying "why haven't I heard from you???" They sent one to each of my addys listed in the auctions. Primary AND backup.
They are a hotmail user so I gave them benefit of the doubt and just hit the reply button on both the emails I had received and included the information ALREADY sent and let them know I was receiving, apparently I wasn't able to get through to the hotmail address.
Then, I went to hotmail and sent one hotmail to hotmail....no response. Then I sent them a PP request for payment with all the information including my mailing address in case they wanted to pay with check or money order and stated I would cancel the PP request if still pending after 3 days and assume that payment was coming in some other form. I try to accomodate by buyers anyway I can and there was the possibility they weren't getting my emails, right?
Finally I got an email to the hotmail addy that said I'll send a MO. No name, no location nothing but the email address.
Why do I have the feeling, that MO will get lost in the mail?????
posted on September 19, 2001 04:53:21 PM new
I also agree that the NPB alert usually works fine. The problem is that a whole lot of bidders, even the payers, do not reply to any emails at all. Yeah yeah I know they're "busy" and "have a life", but that's a lot of baloney. If they are so busy, it's easier to hit the reply button, paste a stock reply and hit send then to come up with some Clintonesque excuse when eBay sends the NPB.
posted on September 19, 2001 06:47:42 PM new
I really liked this tip also. I have had a bidder ignoring my address request emails so I have just sent him/her and greeting from Blue Mountain that says, "What's Up?".......I loved this idea and have added it to my favorites! Great tip! I agree that you can't make them pay but it sure is nice to just get the confirmation that they picked up the card.......somehow makes it better just knowing they can't use the excuse they haven't heard anything from you! This tip made my day! ~smile~
posted on September 19, 2001 07:17:56 PM new
ODD that you should post this today.
I received an email on my Seller email address (friends and family do not even know it). It said I had a greeting card and was signed by Chris at AmericanGreetings.com. I clicked the link to go see my card. BIG MISTAKE!
Next thing I knew this window came up said NORTEX CORP in the right side and something about windows now running in the safe mode. Behind it I could only see portions of 2 other windows. It would not let me bring them to the top not could I move them over to see more of the screen. I tryied to control alt del and end task - would not let me. I finally shut it off. When I turned it back on the thing just started again. The Nortex screen said it was registering drivers. When it was done I had no choice but to reboot. I truned it back on and immediately it started dailing. Where? Who knows! I know had an icon which was a sexy eye and said Anoyomous something or other. I closed all dial thing and deleted the icon.
I told my spouse (the computer know it all)late. He search all over and got it all delete - it was hide in all kinds of files.
It was calling sex sites.
NEVER AGAIN will I click to see a card on my business email.
This is a said joke. I know people who have lost their jobs because someone ( or them) had visited a site like this on a work laptop or other work computer!
posted on September 19, 2001 11:27:07 PM new
Sorry, but I don't think it'll work too well. I get those greeting card e-mails once in a while, and I delete the e-mail without even reading them (because they're usually spam). Anyway, if a bidder is ignoring you, it probably means that he/she doesn't want to pay you. Proving that he/she got your e-mails probably won't change anything.
posted on September 20, 2001 04:41:46 AM new
Never said it didn't have it's bad points too but...
I did send out e-cards to 4 deadbeats yesterday afternnon and have received responses from 3 so evidentally these people really must like to *read* supposed spam mail..you can't put yourself in the mind of a deadbeat unless you are one!
All 3 were very apologetic and promised payment will be sent. ( I won't be holding my breath and turning blue waiting but at least I got an answer!)
Most internet users are familiar with egreetings, american greetings etc - they are kind of like the internet Hallmark(which also offers e-cards, I believe) so when people see the sender being such, they may not be so tempted to erase the email.
Besides, it's nice to spread a little love and cheer around these days - even if it's in the form of a cute fuzzy bear postcard that says, "I miss you! Send me my damn money!"
posted on September 20, 2001 06:26:00 AM new
"Go to www.egreetings.com and send them a free postcard or e-greeting with all of your end of auction information on it!"
And because of e-greetings being used b y spammers, they are blocked from a largish chunk of the net by spam filters ... it's better to go to the "mail an auction to a friend" lnik and send from there .... but eBay's mail system is screwed up and many spam filters tag those as spam too.
posted on September 20, 2001 11:57:27 AM new
Great idea but on the other hand if you are dealing with person as paranoid as I am,
I would never go and open the card with subject line like that,
It would be a one key operation for me: delete.
Most of the time when I got something like that, I also got a virus with it too,
And many people may feel the same way....
(dont mean to offend, just offering my opinion )
posted on September 20, 2001 07:50:51 PM new
Anggellene, I think this is a great and funny idea.
Someone asked: why bother? Well, nothing is more irritating than buyers pretending they didn't receive your dozen messages, when you know they did but can't prove it.
Somehow, some bidders feel if you can't prove it, their conscience is clear. They can "pretend." Once they know you got a receipt that they read your message, suddenly many are shamed into finally responding.
The human mind. Go figure.
Also, you may want to try the below for email with delivery confirmation. I had a guy insisting he never received my emails. I didn't confront him with the delivery confirmations (he read each message almost immediately after I sent it) but I felt better knowing the situation, i.e. he was a liar.
posted on September 21, 2001 05:21:20 AM new
"ust add .confirm.to at the end of your email address you are sending to.
[email protected]
They don't see the confirm.to but it sends an email back to you when they open it."
Yet another USELESS bit of advice, based on a misunderstanding of how email works.
Only if they have certain software AND ONLY if they have that software set to return confirmations.
posted on September 21, 2001 05:48:34 AM new
I think its a clever idea, anggellene. Maybe if some don't like it, they can use the idea in other ways.
I have a poem to include with it...
==================
Rose are red,
We are terribly blue,
To fulfill our Ebay contract,
We need to hear from you!!!!!!
====================
OK OK, JUST KIDDING about the poem! It is still early! But, I needed to laugh this morning. Not doing much of it lately.
[ edited by labrat4gmos on Sep 21, 2001 05:50 AM ]
posted on September 21, 2001 03:12:30 PM new abacaxi
If you would bother to read their web-page, you will find that this works with the following email services:
Outlook Express, Outlook, Netscape Messenger, Eudora, Hotmail, AOL mail, Yahoo mail, and all webmail services.
Also, their email does NOT have to be enabled to return confirmations.
An now for a personal note: Even if this was a useless bit of information as you seem to think, this is a discussion board, everyone has a right to voice their opinion without the attitude. Get a grip.
posted on September 22, 2001 04:38:11 AM new
Sara -
I was pointing out the TOTAL USELESSNESS of thinking these methods will somehow be able to make it through the email system when the methods have been abused by spammers.
Here's how confirm.to says it works:
"The relay system intercepts the messages with the recipient address being of the form
" [email protected]"."
At the sender's end, some email servers could bounce the email back with a "we do not relay" error message before it leaves their ISP. They are capable of detecting this kind of concatenated addressing system because spammers have abused it.
"It adds some hidden HTML tags to the body text of the message and then deliver it to"USERID@DOMAIN ".
The delivery is also going to be unreliable. The IP adress used by this service belongs to APNIC, and is assigned to Korea ... and it does not properly identify itself to my mail server - the FROM and the registration don't match.
Received: from mrn.lsb.org ([164.124.123.208] (may be forged))
Because Korean email servers are the source of a lot of spam, ISPs who provide spam blocking or filtering services are very likely to tag this email as spam, or block it completely, because lsb.org is not the owner of [164.124.123.208].
"When the recipient display the message in his/her Outlook Express or Netscape Messenger online, the hidden HTML tags triggers the relay system to post a read receipt to the sender."
This is the same mechanism that email viruses use (in fact, it's a virus), and if the recipient has properly secured their email against viruses, this particular email virus will not work. They are NOT putting in "hidden HTML tags, they are putting in some encrypted stuff that they hope will make it into a browser. I am asking a friend to decode what this is.
I tested this from HOTMAIL, which I have set to do text-only emails. This "confirmation service" stripped out the ASCII text of my message, leaving behind only its encrypted code. As a result, I got zero in the way of a message body, and my spam filter nailed the message for being all HTML and threw it into the trash folder. Oh yeah, this confirms that my spam filters are working nicely. And that is all.
posted on September 22, 2001 07:45:35 AM new
WOW ... all the confirm.to service does is stick in a "web bug" image ... and totally wreck the message by encoding it in BASE64 so that if your recipient is using a text-based email system (and you have no way to know what they are using) they get bupkus.
posted on September 22, 2001 10:20:03 AM new
i must say i find this to be an interesting discussion and think both abacaxi and dakota1 gave me info i did not know about.i am testing my hotmail and @home accounts right now......it seems to work from @home to @home, waiting on hotmail now..ok hot to hot kicked it into the junk mail box, not a good thing looks like abaxaci makes a good point, thanks for your input. i would have used it otherwise thinking it worked l;ike a charm. YOUR POINT IS WELL TAKEN too bad others can't see that
..let me say that the MOST interesting thing i find about this thread is the way the MODERATOR stepped in for, what i see as no reason. are they going to try and totally control speach here. sometimes you guys are needed most times you need to sit back and let people be people. sometimes you all remind me of barney fife......abacaxi makes a relevant point...maybe you guys need to look before shooting!
posted on September 22, 2001 11:05:11 AM new
Isn't there some danger that the e greeting card could be construed as spam by eBay if a buyer turned it in with your seller address all over it? The buyer could still claim to never receive any other corresponence from the seller but the greeting card.
posted on September 22, 2001 06:17:58 PM new
vidpro -
Thanks for noticing. You know we've always been told to "get a life" off the net. I did and it wasn't pleasant.
posted on September 22, 2001 06:34:20 PM new
I want to clarify a few things..
First off, I used the e-card as a way to reach a bidder who was desperately trying to figure out why I wasn't contacting her. I was trying to find a way to reach her and get a confirmation that my email was getting through. It worked, she was happy, all is fine.
As for the 4 possible deadbeats I contacted through e-greetings. 3 responded and 2 got payment to me today. #1 & 2 now claim not to have received my prior emails. #3 was on vacation(hence my email got "lost" and #4 has yet to contact me but has picked up the card. (#4 IS a deadbeat, I'm sure.)
I don't think ebay would see sending the cards as spam. Afterall, I am trying to complete a transaction with one of MY bidders.
I DO use ebay's NPB alert, etc when all else fails. No one gets by me but I do like to give them every opportunity before I file for fees etc.
I simply offered this up as an option and I'm sorry if some felt it was an intrusive or useless bit of info. Just an idea!
Hey, it's somewhat worked for me and I wanted to give others another avenue if your email is not reaching it's recipient!
