I posted on another forum on August 8 in response to some warnings that were given about this seller on Ebay.
"I will give you another compelling reason to avoid this seller. I bought a six cutting package and a two cutting package from this seller.
This morning I was examining my cuttings and I noticed that this one, Daisy Wilcox was very soft. The soft part was more above the soil line, but I dug it up to look at it and I noticed this little worm crawling at the end and the end was a dark brown. It didn't quite look black yet like root rot notrmally does. I started to cut the ends to get to clean wood. Then I got to a spot where their was some clean wood, but a whole. I fiqured then what it was. Then I started to cut longer wedges up the length of the cutting and I found it - a borer. It was just like the classic picture in the books.
I should have taken a picture and regret now that I didn't, but I was so p.o.'d and panicked. I then uprooted the other cuttings I bought from him and found another infested cutting. The cuttings were with other more expensive cuttings I had rooting.
I threw away the pots, soil, and cuttings of the infested ones and isolated the rest. I will soon know if the cuttings are true to their name. Two cuttings have inflos. This guy may be a "drive by" collector.
The cuttings looked good when I got them, but now after the fact, I realized that the a some of the cuttings did not have clean cuts. They looked more like they were broken off the tree."
Today
Two of the six remaining cuttings I bought from Charles Robinson bloomed. One was supposed to be Celadine and the other Daisy Wilcox. Both of them are common white. This has to be a first. Many people buy what they think is something exotic and end getting a Celadine. I "buy" a Celadine and get something else.
I don't know if everyone is aware of what a sleeze this guy is. He is going all out to make a quick buck before he is stopped. He is not only selling to the low bidder on his auctions, he gives several people who bid on his auctions second chance offers. My cuttings were a second chance offering and I received an email from someone recently asking my opinion because he had sent them a second chance offering and they were trying to decide if they should take it. I bought one of his first offerings and I noticed that he had more than one feedback on the same item.
I got what I paid for because I didn't pay very much for the cuttings I got. I feel sorry for the people who are paying good money for some of his rarer offerings like Vera Cruz Rose, JL Titanic, etc.
This message was edited Aug 25, 2007 10:13 AM
This message was edited Aug 25, 2007 11:34 AM
Beware of charlesrobinson808
just because you didn't pay much doesn't mean a thing! money is money. did you contact him?
it's too bad that e-bay is polluted. i just can't bring myself to by from someone i don't know nothing about.
That is terrible. I had the same experience with an Ebay seller named Sue70 a couple years ago. I don't buy plumerias on Ebay anymore, but if I did, I would only by from Brad or from HawaiiSandy. It is too risky buying from other unknown sellers. I always tell my gardening friends here that Florida Colors Nursery and Brad of Brad's Buds and Blooms both have their own web sites with reasonable prices so why not buy from them and stay away from Ebay.
People go to Ebay because they don't know the other growers and the difference. The Ebay sellers sound very compelling and you look at those numbers (approval ratings) which really don't mean that much. People post their ratings early on and a lot of things can happen later. Jose, I hope you went back and gave him a poor rating and explained why.
I really *really* appreciate your help in this area, Clare. It's more than about the money for that purchase. It's about buying from a reputable source and avoiding contaminating your own plants and having confidence that you are getting what you paid for and not more (like the infestation and other diseases).
btw, I posted a thread in the palm forum on a guy that was selling a cordyline with a bogus name calling it rare (you can regularly find it at Home Depot and lows in 1 gal pots for about $6). I'm sure he made up a name for it so that unsuspecting bidders would not be able to search for it elsewhere on the net.
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/754426/
At any rate, he's been using copyrighted photos from davesgarden. He was warned more than once to remove them. Finally, the admin here said they would have their attorney send a letter. I see now that those images are gone. The guy was actually snipping the copyright info off the images before posting them on Ebay. He is a powerseller and Ebay will protect him. I intend to go through his postings and see what other copyrighted images he is using.
Ebay has made it impossible to complain to them about this kind of thing. I tried to notify them about the copyright violation as well as misrepresentation but because I did not make a purchase from him, I couldn't complete their form. MSNBC (I think it was) had a good report on Ebay and how they protect dishonest power users (or don't take action against them). I'll see if I can find the links.
jose...why don't you leave bad feedback so that others on ebay can steer clear? i notice noone has left bad feedback for him....
Sticks_n_Stones, when I got the cuttings, they looked alright. I did not find out until about a month later there were borers in the cutting. I just found out the other day that they did not bloom true to what he represented in the listing.
The problem with plumeria cuttings and plants is that you may not know for several months, possibly a year or two before you know what you got. I have cuttings that have been rooted over a year or two and still have not bloomed. Once you give a rating, you can't go back and change it. I also believe you have only sixty days from the close of an auction to leave feedback.
As far as EBAY, you can't count on them when you file a complaint. This is the response I got from them:
"Because this listing ended more than 60 days ago, you will not be able
to file an Item Not Received or Significantly Not as Described dispute
for this transaction.
We will investigate your complaint and take appropriate action. However,
under the eBay Privacy Policy, we can't discuss the results of our
investigation or any action we take."
They have some sellers who are known throughout the plumeria community to be frauds and have complaints filed against them and they still continue to sell on EBAY.
Consequently, I did the next best thing, I posted my experience on this and some other forums.
got it....what a shame that feedback cant be posted once you find out the bad news....; i certainly would have bought from him cause his feedback looks great....thanks for the heads up:)
perhaps policy change will come when people start complaining about the giant e-bay and not just the bad sellers.
I got this email message from Charles Robinson today.
"Please stop interfereing with my current and future ebay transactions. It is against Ebay rules. Please remove posts you have posted about me and my buisness off of the Garden Web , Daves Garden, Maui Plumeria Gardens and any other fourums that you posted to.
Regaurds,
Charles"
I probably will give him the same courtesy that he gave me when I notified him my cuttings had the borer beetle - ignore him.
If I were to respond to him, I would tell him it is against the law to ship plants and cuttings without having them inspected by the Hawaii Department of Agriculture. Where does this guy come from lecturing me on EBAY rules when he is selling items not as described. Add to that that I paid him through the mail and he shipped the plants through the mail. Isn't that mail fraud?
unfortunately, your posts can PROBABLY be considered slander even if your claims are true. that's the tricky thing. how do you warn people w/o "bad-mouthing" the seller's practices.
josegabriele,
I hate to hear of your bad experience with this eBay seller. Unless that you know someone that has purchased from the seller before, you just don't know if they are good or bad seller.
I would have done the very same thing you have done, as far as letting people know of your experience with the seller. Sometimes eBay sellers feel like they are untouchable and are very arrogant.
I have had my own problems with people on eBay. I have had people crop out my copyright and use my photo with out permission. And it took me staying on top of eBay to get the person to remove the pictures.
I sell brugmansia on eBay, normally from late fall through early spring. And if I do have more than one item, I offer "second chance offerings" too, so that much is not unusual for sellers to do. But I always make sure that the plants I sell are not infected with any type of pest.
Like everyone else has said, complaining to eBay won't get you very far.
On another matter, with eBay almost insisting that sellers use PayPal as a payment method, you get double dipped with each sale. First you have to pay eBay to list the item, then pay fees on the final sale price. Then if you get paid by PayPal, you have to pay a percentage of what you get from the buyer. One big racket if you ask me. Sorry about going off topic and venting, but I get upset everytime I think about this.
If I had the plumeria's that you had bought I would share with you, but I just got a couple of cuttings of two varieties this past spring, so I don't have anything that I could help you with.
Clare gave some good advice, try to purchase from the known sellers.
I hope things work out for you.
It is not slander when you report the facts. The internet is full of sites set up so that buyers have an opportunity to report their personal experience with a particular seller. What may happen is that Ebay may temporarily suspend josegabriele's account but that's a business call (which, imo, is intimidation on Ebay's part when they do that).
If Ebay temporarily suspends josegabriele's account, that could be a big plus for josegabriele :-) And we benefit because we are better informed.
MSNBC conducted several investigative reports on fraud on Ebay. You might be interested in what they found. I'm not sure how much has improved on Ebay since these articles but hard to believe they let things get this far:
Evidence undercuts eBay's tought talk on fraud
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3078736/
Cautionary tales of two auctions.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3078735/
Man arrested in huge eBay fraud
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3078461/
Not msnbc but a good article all the same -
eBay Auction Fraud Spawns Vigilantism Trend
http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y02/m10/i12/s01
That article provides a link to another article (3 parts):
Online Auction Fraud: What You Should Know, Part 1
http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abu/y202/m08/abu0076/s02
a quote - "Nearly 43% of all reported Internet fraud comes from online auctions"
Part 2 http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abu/y202/m08/abu0077/s03
Part 3 http://www.auctionbytes.com/pages/abu/y202/m09/abu0078/s03
The article was written in 2002. I don't know if things have gotten better or worse.
If you Google - eBay fraud - you will get over 3 million results.
Jackie
This message was edited Aug 25, 2007 11:25 PM
have you noticed the new 'reward' ebay is giving if you recommend someone new to sell on ebay?? you get 50 bucks for 3 new sellers referred....i can smell fake id's already....duplicate seller accounts....; as in everything it is buyer beware, unfortuantely:)
Very sad to have had that happen!! Good for you - spreading the word. Ebay most definately needs to change that feedback policy!
I work for a major credit card company and we have alot of customers asking for help recovering their money for unfulfilled E-bay purchases. We are required to have the customer contact the person offering the items for sale but when they try the phone numbers listed are bogus. When they appeal to E-bay they are not given any assistance. We are unable to help with recovery as they had an agreement with the seller we cannot interfere with. I just suggest to them to avoid any purchases on E-bay unless they are familiar with the seller.
I don't shop ebay period. When a search brings me to e-bay if the seller doesn't have their own website, I look no further. Nor do I use Pay Pal. Feedback, especially here at Dave's Garden I think is a stamp of approval or disapproval, one I live by.
I just had a similar bad experience, even though I should have known better. I suspect my seller is actually one who has been discussed here and is using a new ID.
josegabriele-
How did this person even know you were discussing him?
This message was edited Sep 17, 2007 12:17 PM