Ebay,are they nicked?

Quoted message said:

I have just discovered the road bike section of ebay.
Most are described as belonging to a friend.

Not necessarily suspicious.

Quoted message said:

I have not seen any frame
numbers or original reciepts offered, and even for very high end bikes
sometimes no size given.

Hmmm. While original reciepts are pretty likely to be lost, the
other details should be no problem, and frame number would be
a particularly useful search term for anyone whose bike has
been nicked, while size is pretty much essential to any buyer.

Maybe you should suggest to ebay that they *require* it for bike
listings, and make it clear to buyers that a bike without a valid
number listed should be treated as suspect.

I expect our old friend Thornbury has moved to ebay, as it's
quite a while since he advertised here.

Not that I'd know,

--
Nick Kew

Quoted message said:

I have just discovered the road bike section of ebay.
Most are described as belonging to a friend.I have not seen any frame
numbers or original reciepts offered, and even for very high end bikes
sometimes no size given.Surely someone that spent £2500 on a bike
would expect to show these things.
It seems fishy that's all.

They are not nicked, they don't exist at all.

This is how it works.

Joe the crook offers for sale an item.
Joe the mark wants to buy the item.
Joe takes the money for the item and disappears.

Simple really. For items of significant value arrange escrow or to meet
in person to complete teh contract. Never pay up front through
irreversible mechanisms (ie direct money transfer).

...d

Quoted message said:

TerryJ

Quoted message said:

I have just discovered the road bike section of ebay.
Most are described as belonging to a friend.I have not seen any frame
numbers or original reciepts offered, and even for very high end bikes
sometimes no size given.Surely someone that spent £2500 on a bike
would expect to show these things.
It seems fishy that's all.

Can you post a link please.

~PB

Quoted message said:

I have just discovered the road bike section of ebay.
Most are described as belonging to a friend. I have not
seen any frame numbers or original reciepts offered,
and even for very high end bikes sometimes no size
given. Surely someone that spent £2500 on a bike
would expect to show these things. It seems fishy
that's all.

Like any large selection of used bikes, a proportion will have been stolen.
It's up to the buyer to take reasonable care to avoid buying stolen
merchandise. Obviously it's harder to judge the honesty of a seller when
dealing via email and the www than when meeting face to face.

It's a fact of life that a bike may change hands many times completely
legally, and the paper trail leading back to the original owner may become
broken along the way. It's also a fact that being totally clueless about
bikes may not prevent someone spending a considerable sum on the latest and
greatest only to find that it doesn't fit, doesn't match the wardrobe, or
is simply no longer flavour of the month. I wouldn't expect to see a frame
number listed in an ad. for a used bike any more than I would expect to see
an engine number in one for a used car, though if I asked the buyer for it
and was rebuffed, I certainly wouldn't consider buying.

It's strange but true that the one piece of information most often
accidentally omitted from a bike ad. is the frame size. I've done it
myself.

James Thomson

David Martin said:

Quoted message said:

I have just discovered the road bike section of ebay.
Most are described as belonging to a friend.I have not seen any frame
numbers or original reciepts offered, and even for very high end bikes
sometimes no size given.Surely someone that spent £2500 on a bike
would expect to show these things.
It seems fishy that's all.

They are not nicked, they don't exist at all.

This is how it works.

Joe the crook offers for sale an item.
Joe the mark wants to buy the item.
Joe takes the money for the item and disappears.

You missed out that Joe C will suggest they do a deal outside Ebay which
turns out to be that Joe M sends Joe C the cash by Western Union and Joe
C will send him the bike by return, honest guv.

--
Tony

"I did make a mistake once - I thought I'd made a mistake but I hadn't"
Anon

Nick Kew wrote:

<snipped>

Quoted message said:

Maybe you should suggest to ebay that they *require* it for bike
listings, and make it clear to buyers that a bike without a valid
number listed should be treated as suspect.

<snipped>

How are you or ebay going to verify that it is a valid number? I could
enter any old number into such a system.

David Martin said:

Simple really. For items of significant value arrange escrow or to meet
in person to complete teh contract. Never pay up front through
irreversible mechanisms (ie direct money transfer).

But watch out for the dodgy escrow company con.

--
Dave...

"James Thomson" <[email hidden]>typed

Quoted message said:

It's strange but true that the one piece of information most often
accidentally omitted from a bike ad. is the frame size. I've done it
myself.

And you are _how_ tall?

One size can't fit all...

--
Helen D. Vecht: [email hidden]
Edgware.

Scrumpy Joe said:

Nick Kew wrote:

<snipped>

Quoted message said:

Maybe you should suggest to ebay that they *require* it for bike
listings, and make it clear to buyers that a bike without a valid
number listed should be treated as suspect.

<snipped>

How are you or ebay going to verify that it is a valid number? I could
enter any old number into such a system.

And my best bike doesn't have a frame number...

...d

Scrumpy Joe said:

Nick Kew said:

Maybe you should suggest to ebay that they *require* it for bike
listings, and make it clear to buyers that a bike without a valid
number listed should be treated as suspect.

Quoted message said:

How are you or ebay going to verify that it is a valid number? I could
enter any old number into such a system.

The whole basis of the ebay feedback system is that the majority of
buyers and sellers are honest and provide honest feedback, so honest
buyers could provide negative feedback if the numbers did not match.

There is no way of preventing 1 dodgy seller teaming up with 1 dodgy
buyer to provide the initial 1st feedback, but to fake 10's or 100's
of "good" feedback's with fake numbers would be non-trivial in the
long run.

--
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Stuart Millington said:

There is no way of preventing 1 dodgy seller teaming up with 1 dodgy
buyer to provide the initial 1st feedback, but to fake 10's or 100's
of "good" feedback's with fake numbers would be non-trivial in the
long run.

However ebay accounts are regularly hijacked...

Jim.

(Jim Ley) said:

On Wed, 26 Oct 2005 22:20:37 +0100, Stuart Millington
<[email hidden]> wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

There is no way of preventing 1 dodgy seller teaming up with 1 dodgy
buyer to provide the initial 1st feedback, but to fake 10's or 100's
of "good" feedback's with fake numbers would be non-trivial in the
long run.

However ebay accounts are regularly hijacked...

Only because brain dead morons believe all the "we need to verify your
ebay/Barclays/etc. accounts" - please go to this Russian / Nigerian
web server hidden behind HTML that a decent e-mail client would dump
to /dev/null - spam that they get :-(

--
------------------------------------------------------------------
- Stuart Millington ALL HTML e-mail rejected -
- [email hidden] http://w3.z-add.co.uk/ -

Jim Ley said:

Stuart Millington said:

There is no way of preventing 1 dodgy seller teaming up with 1 dodgy
buyer to provide the initial 1st feedback, but to fake 10's or 100's
of "good" feedback's with fake numbers would be non-trivial in the
long run.

However ebay accounts are regularly hijacked...

Yes, I got an email just yesterday saying that mine had been, and I was
supposed to log onto a website somewhere to validate it :-)

James
--
James Annan
see web pages for email
http://www.ne.jp/asahi/julesandjames/home/
http://julesandjames.blogspot.com/

Helen Deborah Vecht said:

"James Thomson" <[email hidden]>typed

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

It's strange but true that the one piece of information most
often accidentally omitted from a bike ad. is the frame size.
I've done it myself.

Quoted message said:

And you are _how_ tall?

I'm 6' 1", Helen.

Quoted message said:

One size can't fit all...

True, but there's only one of me to go around, and I don't like to spread
myself too thin.

Which size of Brompton did you buy your boyfriend?

James Thomson

"James Thomson" <[email hidden]>typed

Quoted message said:

Which size of Brompton did you buy your boyfriend?

<grin>

No long seatpost either. But then he *is* Mr Average at about 5'9½" and
70kg. He rides my old bikes, with seat up about 3cm, so I thought a
vanilla Brompton would fit. It did.

--
Helen D. Vecht: [email hidden]
Edgware.

Helen Deborah Vecht said:

"James Thomson" <[email hidden]>typed

Quoted message said:

Which size of Brompton did you buy your boyfriend?

<grin>

No long seatpost either. But then he *is* Mr Average at about 5'9½" and
70kg. He rides my old bikes, with seat up about 3cm, so I thought a
vanilla Brompton would fit. It did.

I've not come across that frame colour before ;-)

--
Tony

"I did make a mistake once - I thought I'd made a mistake but I hadn't"
Anon

Stuart Millington said:

(Jim Ley) said:

On Wed, 26 Oct 2005 22:20:37 +0100, Stuart Millington
<[email hidden]> wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

There is no way of preventing 1 dodgy seller teaming up with 1 dodgy
buyer to provide the initial 1st feedback, but to fake 10's or 100's
of "good" feedback's with fake numbers would be non-trivial in the
long run.

However ebay accounts are regularly hijacked...

Only because brain dead morons believe all the "we need to verify your
ebay/Barclays/etc. accounts" - please go to this Russian / Nigerian
web server hidden behind HTML that a decent e-mail client would dump
to /dev/null - spam that they get :-(

I recommend the Firefox spoofstick extension which puts the real domain
of the site you are on across the top of the browser in big red letters.

--
Tony

"I did make a mistake once - I thought I'd made a mistake but I hadn't"
Anon

On Thu, 27 Oct 2005 08:22:07 +0100

Tony Raven said:

Stuart Millington said:

(Jim Ley) said:

On Wed, 26 Oct 2005 22:20:37 +0100, Stuart Millington
<[email hidden]> wrote:

Quoted message said:

> There is no way of preventing 1 dodgy seller teaming up with 1 dodgy
> buyer to provide the initial 1st feedback, but to fake 10's or 100's
> of "good" feedback's with fake numbers would be non-trivial in the
> long run.
However ebay accounts are regularly hijacked...

Only because brain dead morons believe all the "we need to verify your
ebay/Barclays/etc. accounts" - please go to this Russian / Nigerian
web server hidden behind HTML that a decent e-mail client would dump
to /dev/null - spam that they get :-(

I recommend the Firefox spoofstick extension which puts the real domain
of the site you are on across the top of the browser in big red letters.

....or http://www.sitehound.com for those on IE.

Steve

Quoted message said:

--
Tony

"I did make a mistake once - I thought I'd made a mistake but I hadn't"
Anon

The whole basis of the ebay feedback system is that the majority of
buyers and sellers are honest and provide honest feedback, so honest
buyers could provide negative feedback if the numbers did not match.

I thought I had been ripped off of 200 quid recently when a bike didn't
turn up for 3 weeks. I saw that the guy had built up a 40 odd positive
score by buying lots of cheap stuff like books for a quid and so had
amassed this large +ve score. Luckily the bike eventually arrived
although with a knackered freehub, odd wheels and a [censored] Ultegra front
hub.