bogus auction for Altair system on eBay

[John Foust]

At 09:57 PM 2/22/2006, vrs wrote:
>> >Seconded.  ebay and paypal exist for the buyer, not the seller.  I had a 
>> >friend sell something online for $80, then take the money out.  2 weeks 
>> >later the buyer claimed that "his computer was taken over by hackers" 
>> >and denied ever buying the item (which was virtual, ie. no physical 
>> >product to ship or track).  paypal tore the $80 out of his account, 

Welcome to credit card processing.  It favors the customer not the seller.
It doesn't get any better in real life.  If your business accepts
credit cards, you can bet that you'll be on the hook if the 
transaction is called into question for any reason.

>PayPal has a different revenue model, and a different set of biases.  
>They also have to deal with restrictions imposed by credit card 
>transactions.  As a result, PayPal is much more biased toward the 
>buyer.

I don't know how you can have an auction process for relatively
low-cost goods while keeping transaction costs low AND incorporating
some kind of dispute resolution or escrow service.  Good, fast, cheap;
pick any two.  

It's even true of any mail order business: Customer says they opened 
the box and it was full of packing peanuts and a chunk of wood, not 
their computer part.  What happens?

- John