eBay’s VIN System Error Costs Me $1,000, They Don’t Particularly Care
So apparently Ebay Motors has a feature that lets you punch in the VIN of a vehicle you are selling, and it looks up the information in order to populate your auction. Pretty cool feature, right?
Well this guy California decided to buy a Prius via Ebay. He bought the car, and shortly thereafter realized that while the car was advertised as a Prius III, he actually got a Prius II. The big differences beyond some trim differences? A “solar roof” and a “nav system.” Once he realized that what he bought wasn’t actually what he wanted, he tried to get the seller to resolve the $1000 price difference on the sticker between the Prius II and Prius III.
What has me scratching my head here is… you bought a car on Ebay, but didn’t realize that the car you bought lacked a nav system or solar roof?
I’d like to think that most people who decide to buy a car sight unseen via Ebay would actually do their research and make sure that the car they are planning to buy has all of the options and features that they are looking for – this yutz obviously skipped a few steps.
Most auctions have pictures. Most auctions have a full list of the features on the car. If it doesn’t have the feature you want, or the color you want, or the trim you want… DON’T BUY IT. If anything this guy probably impulse bought the car and then afterwards realized “Hey! For $1000 more I could have had a nav system and a solar roof?! Let me whine to the seller and Ebay about it!!!”
The customer isn’t always right, many of them are idiots, and I don’t see why Ebay or the seller should care unless it was advertised as having specific features that it didn’t actually have. This looks more like buyers remorse or an attempt to abuse the system to extort money from a seller.
My advice? Don’t buy a car online without seeing it and making sure it has everything you are looking for, or that you can afford to add those features after the fact. If you do – enjoy driving a car that does more damage to the environment in the process of creating its battery pack than you could ever offset by driving it. 🙂
