eBay making me grey

[cycloneuk]

eBay are total a-holes, basically all my listings have been removed because i have violated a supposed trade mark and my account suspended. Coty who manufacture quite a large range of various designer fragrances have submitted a trade mark infringment request and thus eBay took the above action.

From the information i have gathered, Coty persumed i was selling unboxed fragrances which breaches their trade mark apparently. All the fragrances i send out are fully boxed and in retail packaging, i can only persume it is because i didn't put that they are boxed in my listings or one of my parcels was switched on it's way to Germany, since it is the german section of Coty that submitted the trade mark violation.

[LightingGiants]

eBay are total a-holes, basically all my listings have been removed because i have violated a supposed trade mark and my account suspended. Coty who manufacture quite a large range of various designer fragrances have submitted a trade mark infringment request and thus eBay took the above action.

From the information i have gathered, Coty persumed i was selling unboxed fragrances which breaches their trade mark apparently. All the fragrances i send out are fully boxed and in retail packaging, i can only persume it is because i didn't put that they are boxed in my listings or one of my parcels was switched on it's way to Germany, since it is the german section of Coty that submitted the trade mark violation.


Bloody ridiculous......the most annoying thing for me with ebay is not being able to communicate to a person over a phone. never seem to get through or else i would give them a piece of my mind. all they bloody good at is taking direct debit from my account

[cycloneuk]

I have a 5 year old account in good standing and not a single other policy violation and eBay suspend me. Coty are also going to get a piece of my mind tomorrow, i sell a lot of their products and they could of at least contacted me if they thought there was a problem.

[LightingGiants]

I have a 5 year old account in good standing and not a single other policy violation and eBay suspend me. Coty are also going to get a piece of my mind tomorrow, i sell a lot of their products and they could of at least contacted me if they thought there was a problem.


Totally understand and agree with you. I think you should fight for it...lets hope they listen to you.

Wish you all the best

[stevemac]

eBay are total a-holes
From the run-of-events that you describe, your problem is not with ebay but with the item manufacturers. If ebay receive a copyright complaint, they will be required to take action.

[Christiane]

Hope you get it sorted soon. The worst is, sometimes, it happens to people who live off their ebay sales. I hope it's not your case. When something similar happened to one of my friends, it took nearly 2 weeks for her to get her shop back but it was a shock to her system as she relied on the sales heavily.
I started on ebay 5 years ago and I'm so glad I managed to sell a lot of more on the website than on ebay eventually so I don't rely on it at all now, and only use for marketing purposes now.
Good luck!

[paretowasright]

The problem with e-bay is they get a lot of problems with counterfeit and stolen branded product and the slightest problem makes you 'guilty until proven innocent' especially dealing with a faceless machine like ebay.

[TotallySport]

Sorry to hear that, you should contact the Vero holders and explain the situation, they should be able to remove the restriction if the vero holders agree.

[cycloneuk]

I have spoken to the lawyer who is acting on behalf of Coty and the problem is that some of my perfume images only shown the bottle and not the box, they are saying that by doing that i am offering the product without a box which violates their trade mark. The majority of websites and eBay shops show a number of images of just the perfume bottle, and i have never considered it would be a problem.

Have to wait until Monday before the lady that deals with this at Coty is available.

[TotallySport]

at least they are willing to discuss it with you and move forward, good luck.

[paretowasright]

If that's the case they are trying to set one hell of a precedent for all the manufacturers. Sounds like it might be typical German pedantic behavior to me and hopefully they will back down. There are always 'sales prevention' departments in companies and unfortunately seems like one has jumped on this. Good luck tomorrow. Are you a member of the FSB?....they have a great free legal advice line and a copyright/product/patent Lawyer may be able to advise.

[Dan Healthcare4all]

I had a similar problem with Braun then Philips over eBay images. As a power seller I can phone up eBay and talk to my account manager (not that they can make a huge difference). Do you not qualify as a power seller? Worth checking.

With regard to the VERO nonsense, basically eBay have to do something otherwise they would get hit with legal action so the soft touch is to take your listings down. At least Amazon provide the images for their sellers which makes life much easier.

Perhaps the best solution is to use your own images with boxes and that way they can't complain.

[cycloneuk]

Hopefully on Thursday when i get my account back, i won't have listing restrictions again. I am going to take pics of all 400 of my perfumes with the bottle and box and just use those for eBay. That is the only way to prevent this happening again i think, quite a big task but will have the other half helping out.

[Gotum]

What is amazing here is that most of the time manufacturers simply want to stop knock-off branding. It appears to me that they are shooting themselves in the foot here as you look like you have the real McCoty on offer.

I'm sure your supplier will be able to set thing striaght once they realise this.

Nice site. Good luck out there.

[cycloneuk]

What is amazing here is that most of the time manufacturers simply want to stop knock-off branding. It appears to me that they are shooting themselves in the foot here as you look like you have the real McCoty on offer.

I'm sure your supplier will be able to set thing striaght once they realise this.

Nice site. Good luck out there.

Yep, we only sell genuine perfumes. I have just received an email from the lawer again after speaking with Coty and they have sent an email to eBay saying that they no longer uphold the objection since i have confimed i only sell boxed perfume.

So hopefully i should get the account back soon, if and when i do i will be changing all the pictures and making it 100% clear that they are boxed fragrances. Quite a big job but will avoid the hassle and damage this does to my reputation. When eBay suspend an account, every buyer from god knows how long back gets sent an email leting them know that they don't have to complete the transaction.

[TotallySport]

One good thing is, the brand is now aware of you, so for that brand you should have any problems in the future.

[paretowasright]

Glad to hear you have sorted things out and seems like the 'sales prevention dept' have been over ruled!

[Gotum]

:D:p I love it "Sales prevention department" LOL I have to admit every company seems to have one.

I wonder what the job ad looks like.


WANTED Token Sales prevention person. Must have a serious disrespect for hard working people who are trying to make a living. Inability to see common sense even if it is staring you in the face. Previous experience in political bureaucracy a definite asset.
Please call our ‘I don’t care department’ for an argument.

[cycloneuk]

Ok, i'm starting to go grey again, trying to get a human reponse from eBay is next to impossible. All replys to my emails so far are canned responses, they said i would have to have Coty send an email confirming that they no longer uphold the complaint, which they have done early Monday morning.

I have tryed to explain that but they keep sending the same email. I get my account back Thursday anyhow and am beginning to give up hope of getting the violation removed.

[MH1]

If you are a powerseller try ringing them.

[TotallySport]

There is also live chat on live world I think, so you can speak to someone direct if you don't have a PAM

[cycloneuk]

There is also live chat on live world I think, so you can speak to someone direct if you don't have a PAM

The people on live chat don't have any authority and only deal with minor issues.

Still going round in circles, Coty have sent emails to ebay and ebay say they havn't received anything.

[cycloneuk]

Finally managed to get this sorted, now in the process of taking photos of over 400 perfumes and listing them again.