What on earth is Customer Support?. Review on Ebay

I had been using Bazee.com since 2001, and used to bid on items once in a while. To date, I have purchased 16 items online and had never had any significant problem with anyone selling any item on this site. In 2004, I also had a very good experience with their customer support, when someone hacked into my account and placed a bid on an item I had no interest in buying.

However, I recently discovered that four years is a very long time in cyberworld, especially when Bazee was no longer Bazee, but a multinational called EBAY. I had purchased a computer graphics card online through Ebay, and paid for it by credit card(using their Paisapay system) on 01/12/2008. When I received the card, I found that it was faulty, and therefore returned it to the seller, who promised to refund my money. After receiving the card, when he tried to process the refund, he found that I was no longer a member of Ebay, and informed me by an SMS. On counter-checking, I found that I had been suspended from Ebay for providing FALSE CONTACT INFORMATION.

Please note: I had just received an item at the address I had given to Ebay, and returned it to the seller, who was able to contact me on both my mobile number and email address, which he got from Ebay! But as far as Ebay was concerned, I had given them false information.

Then started a saga of my sending multiple mails to Ebay, asking them to let me know what part of the contact information was wrong(according to them) so that I could send them the documentation to prove that item. All I kept getting were automatic, mails, with only the name of the sender(I am Fredrick, I am Kayle and so on) being different in each mail. Finally I resorted to sending them documentation to prove all my addresses and phone numbers, but to no avail. When I contacted them again, I was asked to resend the information "in case we don't get in touch with you in 2-3 days". Information resent, again to no avail.

They are an internet company, but don't let you send scanned documents by email. You have to depend on fax machines which are renowned for failing to send the entire document in a flawless fashion. The only other option is to use good old snail mail. Even courier service is not permitted, as they only give you a Post Box Number. All of which fit in perfectly when Ebay wants to deny that they have actually received the documents, because the sender has no proof of delivery!

To me the whole thing smacks of an attempt to steal my money, since the company also claims that they cannot process my refund, which was given to them by the seller, unless my account is reactivated. I completely fail to understand this logic, since the refund should be to my credit card, the details of which were verified by Ebay over 2 years ago!

MORAL OF THE STORY

Keep away from ebay if you don't want to lose your money, because if the sellers at the auction site wont cheat you, then Ebay will!

AN UPDATE-ON 24TH APRIL 2009

My account was frozen on 15th December 2008. Since then I faxed the documents proving my identity and address to Ebay four times, and sent the same by ordinary post thrice. The company claims to have never received any of the documents. They also claim that they cannot open the documents if I send them as attachments by email, because of "SECURITY" problems. However, their Paisapay department has no problems with opening scanned documents to verify your credit card details! Maybe, the Trust and Safety Team never heard of antivirus scanners! Anyway, it seems that my activities with Ebay are doomed to die, because the company which is a giant in e-commerce does not trust the internet enough to open mails sent by clients, and uses a garbage can as the "IN" tray for all postal mail!