eBay and VeRO abuse from competitors.
12 July 2014, 12:07 PM
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eBay and VeRO abuse from competitors.
Hello, all.
I am sure there are enough ebay traders amongst you, as I am sure there are a lot of traders who have pulled out of ebay.
So, the whole story - I am not a huge ebay seller/trader, but ever so often I find myself bored and try to make a buck or two. As a result I like to experiment and I pull in a lot of stuff from china, sell it on ebay as piece or two and thus distinguish if it is profitable and/or sought after.
So, recently I have come across a very specific item that has great profit margins and is fairly sought after on ebay, however, there are only two traders who sell it and the odd auction of people who re-sell them after use.
I have a feeling that the two sellers are parallel accounts, since the pictures in the listings are identical, yet one account has around 30k feedback and the other has around 4k and is very electronics specific.
I had noticed, that sometimes some auctions had ended very quickly and/or disappeared, but that did not bother me up until I received a bigger delivery of said item and wanted to start selling it.
Guess what? 1 hour before the end of the auction the item got reported by someone and the auction got pulled leaving me with a penalty and on ebot watch list.
the e-mail I received says the following:
Now, I would like to stress that I am not selling a counterfeit, as the item as such is not trademarked, neither it is copyrighted and there are several vendors in China who produce said item and market it on the various marketplaces online as well as there are enough different other options to purchase said item online in the UK e-shops. as well as my listing pictures were genuine and mine and were displaying the item as it is. I had put a lot of time and effort to set up the listing to attract more buyers.
After reading on the internets, it seems that a lot of people abuse this policy just to kick competitors out of the marketplace and keep the profit to themselves, especially after filling in the generic form to submit to ebay by fax, the vendor can report an item online and a bot will remove the listing automatically. The form does not ask for absolutely any specific information regarding the items and/or documentation to prove thus literally anybody can apply to become a rights holder if they catch the right moment.
The most obvious thing about all of this is the generic e-mail address that was provided with the email, it was a gmail address with a generic prefix that does not identify the copyrights holder at all, and as such, can be used to apply for almost any product that the abusive vendor deems good enough.
I am currently not in loss, as before purchasing the bigger lot, I had already made some profit to purchase the next lot, so I am currently on zero loss, however, I have heard that there have been cases where people have lost on 600quid a day profits just because somebody had filed a VeRO report and claimed they are the copyright holders and the initial vendor has lost profits worth of 60 grand and has been banned from trading from a week up to a month as well as left with mountains of stock and all of the groundwork to get the listing to top pages etc.
So, does anyone have any experience with this on eBay UK? I have read that it is almost senseless as there is no legislation regarding this apart from trading standards and small claims as opposed to eBay US where you can fax in a counter-claim and if there is no action taken within 10 days, the listings can be restored.
How to go about this? Market the item on facebook and/or gumtree (ebay owned) to get rid of it and move on, or cause some distress to that abusive seller so that he gets some fun for this as I have a feeling he is just trying to play it and has no grounds to prove anything.
I would appreciate any input from knowledgeable members.
I am sure there are enough ebay traders amongst you, as I am sure there are a lot of traders who have pulled out of ebay.
So, the whole story - I am not a huge ebay seller/trader, but ever so often I find myself bored and try to make a buck or two. As a result I like to experiment and I pull in a lot of stuff from china, sell it on ebay as piece or two and thus distinguish if it is profitable and/or sought after.
So, recently I have come across a very specific item that has great profit margins and is fairly sought after on ebay, however, there are only two traders who sell it and the odd auction of people who re-sell them after use.
I have a feeling that the two sellers are parallel accounts, since the pictures in the listings are identical, yet one account has around 30k feedback and the other has around 4k and is very electronics specific.
I had noticed, that sometimes some auctions had ended very quickly and/or disappeared, but that did not bother me up until I received a bigger delivery of said item and wanted to start selling it.
Guess what? 1 hour before the end of the auction the item got reported by someone and the auction got pulled leaving me with a penalty and on ebot watch list.
the e-mail I received says the following:
MC999 listing policy violation alert: Trademark Violation - Unauthorized item
After reviewing your eBay account, we've taken the following action:
- Listings have been removed. A list of items that were removed can be viewed at the bottom of this message.
- We have credited any associated fees to your account.
Your listing was removed after the rights owner reported it as counterfeit. We urge you to contact the rights owner directly for more information about why they requested the removal of your listing and whether you can relist the item.
After reviewing your eBay account, we've taken the following action:
- Listings have been removed. A list of items that were removed can be viewed at the bottom of this message.
- We have credited any associated fees to your account.
Your listing was removed after the rights owner reported it as counterfeit. We urge you to contact the rights owner directly for more information about why they requested the removal of your listing and whether you can relist the item.
After reading on the internets, it seems that a lot of people abuse this policy just to kick competitors out of the marketplace and keep the profit to themselves, especially after filling in the generic form to submit to ebay by fax, the vendor can report an item online and a bot will remove the listing automatically. The form does not ask for absolutely any specific information regarding the items and/or documentation to prove thus literally anybody can apply to become a rights holder if they catch the right moment.
The most obvious thing about all of this is the generic e-mail address that was provided with the email, it was a gmail address with a generic prefix that does not identify the copyrights holder at all, and as such, can be used to apply for almost any product that the abusive vendor deems good enough.
I am currently not in loss, as before purchasing the bigger lot, I had already made some profit to purchase the next lot, so I am currently on zero loss, however, I have heard that there have been cases where people have lost on 600quid a day profits just because somebody had filed a VeRO report and claimed they are the copyright holders and the initial vendor has lost profits worth of 60 grand and has been banned from trading from a week up to a month as well as left with mountains of stock and all of the groundwork to get the listing to top pages etc.
So, does anyone have any experience with this on eBay UK? I have read that it is almost senseless as there is no legislation regarding this apart from trading standards and small claims as opposed to eBay US where you can fax in a counter-claim and if there is no action taken within 10 days, the listings can be restored.
How to go about this? Market the item on facebook and/or gumtree (ebay owned) to get rid of it and move on, or cause some distress to that abusive seller so that he gets some fun for this as I have a feeling he is just trying to play it and has no grounds to prove anything.
I would appreciate any input from knowledgeable members.
Last edited by netbeast; 12 July 2014 at 12:12 PM.
12 July 2014, 05:45 PM
#6
If it's not in copyright and there are no trademark issues then I'm not sure why e-bay have acted in this way...........have you mentioned something that has a brand name in the advert?......... TomTom, Lego, Hoover etc or other such "owned" word?
Shaun
Shaun
12 July 2014, 06:35 PM
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yes, it is.
yes, I have mentioned the "brand name", of course, as it is readily available with such a name. I have heard that adding things like 100% genuine etc. helps, but who knows, need to find out.
Ebay has not acted, an e-bay set up bot has acted, because somebody has reported. Ebay does not even know why somebody has reported it, because, as they say, they are not 3rd party rights experts and thus obliged to remove something.
There is a big dilemma in all of this - if you are in a position to say that said chinese product will take the market, you can fill in a Notice of Claimed Infringement (NOCI), which you can view in the link and thus you are basically the owner AND Verified rights owner of the product, while you actually are just a scammer who believes that the best way to a fair market is foul play. When a NOCI has been submitted and approved, they do not even check the product, it is automatically flagged and removed. easy as that.
You can set up a fully bogus NOCI document, as long as it is submitted in such form and thus you are going to be the one person eBay are going to believe and not the other person, who wants to take a share of their profits. As you can see, the NOCI does not require absolutely any documents to prove you actually are owning the "brand" as long as nobody contests it, like the big players - Gucci, Louis Vuitton and other well known or more or less established brands.
please see this ridiculous e-mail ebay has responded to my inquiry regarding this.
so basically, I got nothing. somebody reported the item and they have no way of knowing why. even if you do not like it being on sale you can report it and nobody is obliged to reply, nobody can be forced and there is absolutely no way of any action taking place, according to eBay.
Anyway, i need to find out how this goes along with fair trade/trading standards and small claims, as usually, when you write an e-mail to the "rights owner" they will not respond and it all stops there.
Ebay has not acted, an e-bay set up bot has acted, because somebody has reported. Ebay does not even know why somebody has reported it, because, as they say, they are not 3rd party rights experts and thus obliged to remove something.
There is a big dilemma in all of this - if you are in a position to say that said chinese product will take the market, you can fill in a Notice of Claimed Infringement (NOCI), which you can view in the link and thus you are basically the owner AND Verified rights owner of the product, while you actually are just a scammer who believes that the best way to a fair market is foul play. When a NOCI has been submitted and approved, they do not even check the product, it is automatically flagged and removed. easy as that.
You can set up a fully bogus NOCI document, as long as it is submitted in such form and thus you are going to be the one person eBay are going to believe and not the other person, who wants to take a share of their profits. As you can see, the NOCI does not require absolutely any documents to prove you actually are owning the "brand" as long as nobody contests it, like the big players - Gucci, Louis Vuitton and other well known or more or less established brands.
please see this ridiculous e-mail ebay has responded to my inquiry regarding this.
Thank you for contacting us. My name is Kapil and I’ll be helping you resolve your query about the removal of xxx.
I have reviewed your listing and it was removed based on a request from xxx , an intellectual property rights owner. They send us a signed legal statement claiming that your item breached their IP rights, we were therefore obliged to take action on it.
We would surely like to provide you with the exact reason for the removal, however as we are not experts in third party rights we cannot tell you exactly how your item breached their IP rights. Only the rights owner will be able to provide you with specific information why they requested the removal of your listing. So, for more clarity regarding this removal please contact them directly at this email address:
If you are able to resolve the matter with them and they write back to us confirming that the item was reported in error, then we will reinstate your listing and also remove the related policy breach from your account.
If you don't get a reply in five business days, let us know by replying to this email. We'll contact the rights owner on your behalf and ask them to get in touch with you. However, please note that we can't force a rights owner to contact you. In the meantime, we would recommend you not to relist this item to avoid any further inconvenience.
I have reviewed your listing and it was removed based on a request from xxx , an intellectual property rights owner. They send us a signed legal statement claiming that your item breached their IP rights, we were therefore obliged to take action on it.
We would surely like to provide you with the exact reason for the removal, however as we are not experts in third party rights we cannot tell you exactly how your item breached their IP rights. Only the rights owner will be able to provide you with specific information why they requested the removal of your listing. So, for more clarity regarding this removal please contact them directly at this email address:
If you are able to resolve the matter with them and they write back to us confirming that the item was reported in error, then we will reinstate your listing and also remove the related policy breach from your account.
If you don't get a reply in five business days, let us know by replying to this email. We'll contact the rights owner on your behalf and ask them to get in touch with you. However, please note that we can't force a rights owner to contact you. In the meantime, we would recommend you not to relist this item to avoid any further inconvenience.
Anyway, i need to find out how this goes along with fair trade/trading standards and small claims, as usually, when you write an e-mail to the "rights owner" they will not respond and it all stops there.
Last edited by netbeast; 12 July 2014 at 06:39 PM.
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12 July 2014, 06:47 PM
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for those who want to understand how this actually works, please read this post. It is a superb example of how a well versed ebay trader and afficianado can basically push you off the cliff by claiming your achievements as theirs.
http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/th...-claim.315020/
the most painful thing in all of this is that the guy had made it to the top of the listings page for said supplement, somebody waited for it and claimed the rights and as such got themselves a guaranteed profit that where the painful groundwork was set up by somebody a bit less educated in how it works...
here is another one, however, the claimant there has had a bit of finesse and actually has set-up some web pages etc...
http://www.thewholesaleforums.co.uk/...n-ebay.161863/
http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/th...-claim.315020/
the most painful thing in all of this is that the guy had made it to the top of the listings page for said supplement, somebody waited for it and claimed the rights and as such got themselves a guaranteed profit that where the painful groundwork was set up by somebody a bit less educated in how it works...
here is another one, however, the claimant there has had a bit of finesse and actually has set-up some web pages etc...
http://www.thewholesaleforums.co.uk/...n-ebay.161863/
Last edited by netbeast; 12 July 2014 at 06:49 PM.
12 July 2014, 08:55 PM
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I have a vero account and a similar setup on Amazon, I have removed many items in relation to IP problems, its very hard to know the rights and wrongs of your problem without knowing the name of the product and competitor details but I understand why you are not posting them.
Unfortunately in nearly every case I have dealt with it normally boils down to people taking the absolute pish with copying full product names, images, descriptions packaging etc and then being somewhat surprised when they removed or blocked from selling.
Its quite possible if this item does have a brand name that they have exclusive rights to sell it online through eBay there are several brands/products that do this, the main reason is to stop the brand being devalued as new sellers pop up they often sell items at a loss for a few years before going bankrupt and vanishing.
It is very difficult to get a VERO account, it took quite a while to get mine and as far as I am aware the requests are manually reviewed by someone as when I have issued a VERO takedown it takes 24 - 48 hours for the item to removed, recently someone from ebay did contact me requesting further information on a take down request but I think I can issue a take down request on any item not just one particular category.
It sounds like you are working on small scale is it possible for you to create your own product instead of using someone else's trademark its possible this could solve the problem,
Unfortunately in nearly every case I have dealt with it normally boils down to people taking the absolute pish with copying full product names, images, descriptions packaging etc and then being somewhat surprised when they removed or blocked from selling.
Its quite possible if this item does have a brand name that they have exclusive rights to sell it online through eBay there are several brands/products that do this, the main reason is to stop the brand being devalued as new sellers pop up they often sell items at a loss for a few years before going bankrupt and vanishing.
It is very difficult to get a VERO account, it took quite a while to get mine and as far as I am aware the requests are manually reviewed by someone as when I have issued a VERO takedown it takes 24 - 48 hours for the item to removed, recently someone from ebay did contact me requesting further information on a take down request but I think I can issue a take down request on any item not just one particular category.
It sounds like you are working on small scale is it possible for you to create your own product instead of using someone else's trademark its possible this could solve the problem,
12 July 2014, 09:11 PM
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thanks for the reply, clears up a few things, ScobySoon, however, I have a couple of questions.
How does this stop other people selling stuff and possibly counterfeits through different channels? ebay is not the only marketplace around. Apart from the obvious fact that somebody can actually catch you. Of course, it is one of the easiest, most straight forward market places.
I am not really sure about this, of course, you are the one who has experience with it, but even on ebay VeRO's description site it says it is all automatic and from what people speculate and from their experience, there is a bot that compares listings and catches phrases and no no words and goes from there, afterwards, if there has been an issue raised with this, then there is an actual person involved.
I am not really sure about this, it would work, but not be worth my effort and time as I am doing this as a past time and I am not really interested in turning this in to something I would make my living of, not currently.
I will see how this will proceed, but currently, as I have no losses and just a small amount of the item in question, I will just either gift it to my friends and/or get rid of it through different channels.
I am still thinking that I could, out of curiosity, actually contact the real "brand" owner in Asia and see what they have to say about it, as actually, the vendor should not really care, they still sell the items at a profit/wholesale price and there are actually a lot of alternatives around to it, it is just the blatant profit from this item that most probably has driven a certain individual to try and keep the market to themselves.
no idea, will keep you posted.
Its quite possible if this item does have a brand name that they have exclusive rights to sell it online through eBay there are several brands/products that do this, the main reason is to stop the brand being devalued as new sellers pop up they often sell items at a loss for a few years before going bankrupt and vanishing.
It is very difficult to get a VERO account, it took quite a while to get mine and as far as I am aware the requests are manually reviewed by someone as when I have issued a VERO takedown it takes 24 - 48 hours for the item to removed, recently someone from ebay did contact me requesting further information on a take down request but I think I can issue a take down request on any item not just one particular category.
I will see how this will proceed, but currently, as I have no losses and just a small amount of the item in question, I will just either gift it to my friends and/or get rid of it through different channels.
I am still thinking that I could, out of curiosity, actually contact the real "brand" owner in Asia and see what they have to say about it, as actually, the vendor should not really care, they still sell the items at a profit/wholesale price and there are actually a lot of alternatives around to it, it is just the blatant profit from this item that most probably has driven a certain individual to try and keep the market to themselves.
no idea, will keep you posted.
Last edited by netbeast; 12 July 2014 at 09:13 PM.
12 July 2014, 09:32 PM
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I don't think what you have heard about VERO is 100% true, there is a company in the US that will operate your VERO account for you for a monthly fee they (the company) trawl ebay find the items and issue removal notices using keyword matching, the vero operator has to do it themselves. I have never known a item that I have veroes to be taken down straight away its always takes a while.
Its quite lengthy to issue a notice you have to go to the special ebay account, go to the item page, click a button select from a drop down box what the infringement is the seller you are dealing with has specifically selected the trademark option ebay would have asked for proof to back this up, is the UK trademark registered to someone? or he has signed exclusivity agreement for the use of the trademark on ebay.
Most trademark or brand owners are going to go after the big marketplaces ebay and amazon, small tiny websites are generally irrelevant, for example I have a particular product that I sell 200- 300 per month on ebay on my website only 3 -4 am I bothered if someone setups up a small niche website using my brand name (probably not) am I bothered if someone uses my brand name to steal some of my 200-300 sales on ebay, YES I AM!
Does the "real" brand owner in asia own the trademark in the UK? Is it registered to an international company? or a UK person that is who I would be getting in contact with and checking, if you email them now you will have an answer when you wake up on Monday morning,
Its quite lengthy to issue a notice you have to go to the special ebay account, go to the item page, click a button select from a drop down box what the infringement is the seller you are dealing with has specifically selected the trademark option ebay would have asked for proof to back this up, is the UK trademark registered to someone? or he has signed exclusivity agreement for the use of the trademark on ebay.
Most trademark or brand owners are going to go after the big marketplaces ebay and amazon, small tiny websites are generally irrelevant, for example I have a particular product that I sell 200- 300 per month on ebay on my website only 3 -4 am I bothered if someone setups up a small niche website using my brand name (probably not) am I bothered if someone uses my brand name to steal some of my 200-300 sales on ebay, YES I AM!
Does the "real" brand owner in asia own the trademark in the UK? Is it registered to an international company? or a UK person that is who I would be getting in contact with and checking, if you email them now you will have an answer when you wake up on Monday morning,
12 July 2014, 09:55 PM
#12
The difficulty might be that the OP has actually infringed someones IPR, it's easy to do..
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/dorset/6972224.stm
Imagine if I imported some headers and sold them as Harvey style, I guess Alyn at AS Performance would be somewhat miffed as I think he has the rights. Likewise Planet X might be upset if I sold bikes under the Holdsworth name as they own it worldwide...
Just look at McDonalds and what they do.......
you say you do it as a hobby, I guess if you are importing to sell on for a profit without prior use then HMRC would count that as an income stream so I guess trading standards would be no help.
Shaun
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/dorset/6972224.stm
Imagine if I imported some headers and sold them as Harvey style, I guess Alyn at AS Performance would be somewhat miffed as I think he has the rights. Likewise Planet X might be upset if I sold bikes under the Holdsworth name as they own it worldwide...
Just look at McDonalds and what they do.......
you say you do it as a hobby, I guess if you are importing to sell on for a profit without prior use then HMRC would count that as an income stream so I guess trading standards would be no help.
Shaun
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