discogs marketplace?

"Positive only. Neutral or negative feedback against a buyer isn't allowed"

yeah ebay instituted that some time ago, and it's really bullshit

Even as a more frequent buyer than seller, I agree it’s... unexpected. What’s the rationale – to eliminate petty/retaliatory feedback? I guess if seller never pays, leaving negative feedback doesn’t stop them from bidding & winning on other auctions anyway...

I sell more than buy there, though both are pretty infrequent. In practice i think this is kinda moot. There are loads of one-time/first time buyer sales on ebay and iirc there's nothing you can do to limit selling to only good-reputation buyers. They aim to be the biggest and easiest used (and increasingly new) marketplace.

(whoops, yeah, I meant “if a buyer never pays...”)

it is pretty cute that the standard positive feedback text is largely unchanged from the 90s: excellent buyer, fast payment, great communication a++++!!!!@ Bud, we've never spoken and i paid for this before you knew anything but alright

never spoken IS great communication

it's true. Conversations on ebay will only lead to trouble.

no more chilling email subject than "the seller has sent you a question about item 1234129786"

"by mint condition I mean I spilled a bottle of peppermint extract on it is that cool"

Mint-conditioned

I just sold a record within 30 seconds of listing it. How does this happen? Do people build apps from the API that give them instant notifications?

“Apps that gives” — nice one, brainiac

“If you prefer to pay with paypal you must wait until stock is confirmed before you pay.”

ding dongs

What is that, we might have listed something we don't actually have?

People will have items in a physical store or listed elsewhere and haven't updated their Discogs inventory.

PayPal has stopped refunding the service charge to the seller when they refund a customer, so they will be out of pocket.

Right, in other words, they already sold it once.

Sorry, yes, my post left out that part of the scenario.

i never used to get "sorry, turns out i dont actually have this" messages but i feel like its been happening to me more and more over the last 3 yrs or so. i guess an inevitable result of stores & high-volume sellers using the site more.

Makes sense with that Paypal change. Lot of sellers with storefronts plus their own sites (plus ebay and whatever else)

The number of sellers listing common records in VG or worse condition mystifies me.

eh, if that price is right, I don't see an issue with it, especially since no one sane has been inside a record store in over a year

I sell plenty of common VGs, but then they all have audio clips attached to their listings, and I almost always describe the condition in more detail.

Really, people will pay like a buck fiddy for a general used Linda Ronstadt album and then shipping on top of that? That’s... interesting to me. Altho maybe makes more sense for domestic US sales cuz you guys have media mail. In Canada shipping STARTS at $15 for an LP.

My question tho is, What’s in it for the seller? Surely the effort of looking up the record, listing it, then pulling & mailing it isn’t justified by the buck fiddy.

I suppose if you have a couple of hundred LPs like that you don't want to just chuck them out (assuming you're just a private collector downsizing not someone selling as a business)

I've probably got hundreds of LPs not worth much I want to get rid of at some point, so will have to decide if it's worth the bother or if I should just take them to a record shop or donate to charity shops

I’d say it’s worth it, you need to outlay for some mailing envelopes (or keep and reuse yr Amazon ones)

It depends on if you need the space pronto, or not.

In the post when I've listed a load of records cheap it is because I assumed other buyers are like me and are going to get a handful of records by digging through a sellers stock when they see one thing they want in my store and take a few punts on records.

In about a thousand sales though I've discovered that only a tiny percentge of people seem to do this, which has surprised me, but perhaps I've just got a load of rubbish for sale normally :D

^^that is what I do. It is quite a nice way to go about it I think, even when I eventually decide to not buy anything

I do that too. Probably pretty common when buying from Canada (per HD, above) or anywhere the postage is gonna cost you. Been meaning to actually start using the wantlist since they have options now for showing you if the seller you're looking at has more you're looking for.

Yes I do that too, and am similarly surprised when buyers don't. Particularly when the lp is £2 and postage is £11, I mean, nothing else interesting? OK I guess.

I just packaged up my biggest sale. The guy bought two high-priced records (both of which had been sitting in my store for too long), a medium-priced record, and then sent me an offer for three more that were in my 'low-priced-add-em-to-your-order' category. I accepted, and yes, this is how it's done!

I followed the advice ITT and just created a second account. one for the 40 or so records I'm really actively looking for, one for the 400+ that I'd just like to pick up one day, stuff like Falco and Starcastle and various Jean-Michel Jarre records that I'd like to get as part of a big order

maybe one for the “vinyl revival” thread but... is Joni Mitchell’s Blue a rare album now lol? very few US copies, all hella expensive

It’s never been particularly common, has it?

It's not a rare record by any means, but it's becoming more uncommon.

The silliest case of this is things like Thriller and Dark Side of the Moon and Rumours, which sold bajillions of copies, and fetch $20 or more a pop now.

I know, it’s ridiculous, but I can sell every copy I get of any of those 3 albums within a day.

I sold a CD box set to someone in Germany. They received it ok and are happy with it, but said they had to pay 16€ customs fees. They haven’t asked for a refund or anything but wondered how I should reply.

At very least I’m going to update t&c’s to say that buyer may be liable for any customs fees.

It's on them. Sellers needn't concern themselves with customs fees and certainly don't need to advise buyers of how much they will be, since the costs are entirely out of the seller's control. It's up to the buyer to do their own research on whether they will have to pay customs fees, they should be factoring that into their purchase decision.

xp

anagram OTM, although I've also been wondering whether to update my t&cs to make this explicit.

this is bandcamp rather than discogs related but wondering what would apply if it were a discogs transaction.

i sent a parcel abroad and it was returned as 'not known at this address'. i definitely had the correct address and indeed have successfully sent to this person's address previously. i re-sent and it arrived ok. i paid the postage to re-send it but wondered for future reference if it is the seller's responsibility to pay the postage again in a situation like this?

Someone (apparently) sent me some records I ordered two weeks ago, but they've not arrived. I contacted them to ask for some details of when/where they sent them, to chase up the package with the post office, but they've ignored the message thus far. What's the drill here?

I feel like I've done well so far in receiving all my Discogs purchases to date. Always knew my luck would run out at some point, though.

(Advance apols if any of the following is stating the bleedin' obvious!)

If they were 7-inch singles posted from the UK in a letter box, there won't be a proof of postage unless they were sent tracked (in which case you can ask for a tracking number, although this should have been sent when they marked the order as Shipped).

If they were UK 12-inch singles or LPs, they'll have been sent from a post office, in which case the seller will have been given a receipt with proof of postage. That said, if they were posted via standard mail, there are no useful details to be gleaned from the receipt.

If delivery was attempted and you were out, but no card was put through your letter box, the first port of call is your local delivery office. Finding out when/where the package was posted won't help, though.

Check also that your Discogs delivery address matches your PayPal delivery address, in case it's gone to the other address.

If they don't have anything waiting for you to collect, I would ask the seller for a refund, 30 days after the date they marked the order as Shipped. It's their responsibility to make sure the package is delivered.

If the seller has strong positive feedback, then it's likely they'll reply sooner or later. If all else fails, negative feedback may eventually prompt them to take action.

I sold a record to someone abroad, i actually tested it before sending as i was debating whether to keep it or not, and now they are telling me it is warped and that it is skipping. i think its because of their shitty turntable (i was sent pics, and it does look like it cost about £50), but now they have opened a paypal case for it. it is really making me livid, as in this particular case, i know there was nothing wrong with the record. i know paypal is often (or always?) buyer-biased, so not expecting anything in my favour, but it really does bother me. im not rough trade or amazon. the customer is NOT always right.

in which case the seller will have been given a receipt with proof of postage

There's some retroactive quantum causation effect that dictates that the very rare occasion where there's a problem with delivery will be the one time in a thousand that you left the PO without a proof of postage ;-) Actually I've been told that in that event the financial receipt can actually be used if you need to claim compensation.

actually

Cheers Mike - definitely not repeating the obvious. Just spent 30 fruitless minutes waiting for the local delivery office to answer the phone, but will try again tomorrow.

Delivery offices tend to be horrendously bad at answering the phone, and they all too often don't! If it's within easy physical reach, that's your better bet.

That's a good idea. I'd been holding off visiting them since lockdown began, but I guess this is a legit reason to visit.

And of course that's exactly where the package was. Thanks for the advice Mike!