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reverb.com scam?

#101
Anyone who is touting Reverbs " protections" may find themselves in for a rude awakening when something goes arwy. I haven't gotten outright screwed, yet, but I've had some really excessive and unnecessary stresses dealing with them. My father used to refer to it as an " attitude adjustment"

Glad to see so many ethical people here however, sure everyone makes sure not to pirate music or cut corners at work, take a longer lunch than authorized, call in when you're not sick etcetera
Wrong is wrong, right?

When someone hits me up with a low ball offer I'll mention the bass is on Talkbass, several times I've gotten a PM here and had a successful deal.

Never once felt like I owed Reverb a penny
 
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#105
Ok, Wilmington- you’re not seeing the big picture here; we aren’t “forced” to adhere to anything regarding Reverbs TOS- that’s my whole point. If you wish to apply your ethos onto others, good luck with that. Continue to breathe that rarified air atop your tower- it doesn’t affect anyone other than yourself. My personal position here would be one of respecting Reverbs TOS and paying the 5% if I chose to sell on their site, but that will never happen. I would instead start with CL, and come here, and just because this site has been so good to me of late, I would pay the annual fee rather than the monthly fee, (which I plan to do come January 2) and list my goods here. The breakdown is like this- CraigsList costs nothing, but the audience is minuscule in comparison, so $1000 remains $1000, and you only risk being robbed at gunpoint. TalkBass costs roughly 3% for PayPal and the shipping, which I’ll set @$70, so that $1000 becomes $1100, you lose 10%, but you have a nationwide audience and enjoy the PayPal protection. Finally, Reverb...You lose 5% for their fee, $70 on state taxes paid to a state that you don’t live in, and $70 in shipping, 3% to PayPal for a whopping $220 making that $1000 into $1220. You’ve lost 22%, and for what? Reverb will not protect the buyer anymore than PayPal does...You’re stupid if that appeals to you. I’m not calling you stupid personally, but in a much broader sense, why would anyone freely hand over 22 cents on the dollar to an unseen corporate entity who enjoys exemption from taxation and gives both parties virtually nothing in return. I think the hand you hold is the hand that holds you down.
 
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#107
The original poster asked if it was a scam , he didn't ask for virtue signaling of moral imperative. Is it a scam? Everything could potentially be a scam, in this particular instance likely not. Trust your gut and take whatever preventative measures necessary, anything beyond that is extraneous
 
#109
LBS-bass said:
Yet so many people here jumped at the chance to out themselves as dishonest. Sometimes it's best to just move on.
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"Dishonest" with a happy buyer and extra cash in both our pockets.
Guess there's worse things to be in life.
Only have several hundred transactions through the site and have paid them thousands of dollars. Hope Etsy manages to survive
 
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#110
vvvmmm said:
Whataboutism, given a little thought, is not persuasive.
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Yet, it's valid. What makes this different than any of the things he mentioned? Why is there such a strong affinity for the profits of Reverb and the truing of one's ethical compass when using that site, but those other points are unreasonable?
 
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#111
Grahams Groove said:
Yet, it's valid. What makes this different than any of the things he mentioned? Why is there such a strong affinity for the profits of Reverb and the truing of one's ethical compass when using that site, but those other points are unreasonable?
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Its very odd to me.
We're living in a recession. Reverbs fees are almost 8% not including any bump tier not to mention the buyer pays sales tax, in some instances close to 10%

Whats 18% on a 3k bass? A LOT

What blows my mind is when someone buys from me on Reverb and then I see them post NBD on Talkbass or on a FB forum. Must be that " protection" Reverb offers.

Once you go through the process you'll realize it can be neither safe nor fair to the buyer or seller
 
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#114
JDA04OSU said:
Is the seller in the US? If not, I'd have very little doubt that it's a scam. If they are, well... I'd still avoid it because it always feels sketchy when someone is trying to push me off the site.
PayPal, with all its claims of buyer protection, can be difficult to deal with once you've been victim to fraud on Reverb.

As an aside, Reverb is overrun with scammers and my experiences in the past year are a testament to that. I made the mistake of jumping on a too-good-to-be-true deal on a Fender Jazz Elite (coming from Australia)... after some kind TB'ers talked some sense to me, I attempted to cancel the order within just a couple hours. Notified both Reverb and PayPal of my suspicions for fraud the same day, and both were content to let the whole thing play out.

Seller then sent a 2 lb package to a different address in my zipcode and provided tracking that made it look like it was delivered, though without a specific address listed on UPS tracking. Seller sends PayPal a scan of a label that looks like it was addressed to me. Even though this was the exact scam I predicted to Reverb and PayPal customer service, I got nowhere. PayPal sides with the seller since their fraud bot believes shipping was confirmed. Reverb does nothing but tell me they'll be happy to work with PayPal if I have any issues (though there's really no way to make the 2 talk to each other).

Nobody seems to care that an electric bass sold from Australia ends up being a 2 lb package sent from Germany. Tried appealing but wasn't getting anywhere. PayPal then bowed out completely when I took the dispute over to AmEx. AmEx initially made the same default decision to side with the seller based on tracking, until I was able to show them that UPS confirmed by email that the recipient address on the package did not match my address. The whole thing took about 2 months and a lot of wasted time to get my money back.

I can say with certainty that this particular scam is common on there, as I have seen 2 of my own personal bass listings (originating from my Craigslist ads) get re-posted to Reverb with partially copied/pasted descriptions, coming from foreign countries, at below market price. I have also gotten numerous bogus messages from buyers on my actual Reverb listings, asking me to email them to discuss a sale. To me, the platform seems pretty unsafe at baseline. So I'm easily sketched out by what was described in the OP.
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This, indeed! Had a problem with bringing some high-end home speakers in from Canada - the story is long and painful, but the net net is that my credit card co. protected me, while Paypal and UPS were worthless - although to be fair, UPS might have come through if the seller had not declared the value of a Canada-to-US shipment at salvage value, rather than true value.
 
#118
Grahams Groove said:
Who is lashing out and being hostile?

There are opinions and viewpoints being discussed, but I didn’t notice anything particularly hostile in the thread.
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There's certainly been no shortage of vitriol spewed at the business models of Reverb, Etsy, etc., accusing them of being uncaring, greedy, sociopathic corporate entities, and thus using that as justification for their own actions as individual buyers/sellers.

If one doesn't like the way a system based on voluntary participation is set up - don't participate in that system, or instead advocate for change in some way. Cheating that system is unethical. Again, I'm amazed at how many people aren't afraid to openly admit that they behave this way and actually think of their actions as virtuous. They're not.
 
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#119
My guess is that many here have no experience selling or buying before online platforms existed. Some defunct sale methods include "want ads" in local printed newspapers, or printed regional want ad publications. Not many views compared to online listings, and you had to pay for the listing, usually a 7-day run in a newspaper. The bigger the ad and circulation the higher the fee. Item didn't sell in a week? Pay another fee and list again for 7 more days. Repeat until sold, or you decide to keep it.

Or, one could sell to a local music shop for pennies on the purchase dollar, or leave an instrument for a consignment sale, which was usually for a fee of 15-25%. Sometimes consignments never sold, or took years, being subject to the foot traffic in the store.

Now, people complain about online listing service fees, which offer much lower fee structures than past methods, along with worldwide market exposure. They complain about transaction fees for payments, too. My opinion is that Reverb, eBay, Paypal, Venmo, etc offer fair, competitive prices for their services, and are much better than what existed before. I am happy to pay their fees for the services and benefits they provide. Their alternatives are usually not so pretty.
 
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#120
Gorilla Monsoon said:
Finally, Reverb...You lose 5% for their fee, $70 on state taxes paid to a state that you don’t live in,
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The tax is based on and goes to the state of the buyer. And it's not like Reverb wants to add all that additional accounting to their system for no benefit to them. It's the law. Go along with it or not, but get your facts straight.
 
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