Lizard's Rant

Remember that Allen and Ginter George Washington DNA “hair relic” card? The seller Ken Simonis (who happens to be an eBay Power Seller with over 3,000 positive feedback) got absolutely hosed in his attempt to sell the card. eBay pulled the auction TWICE because they thought a George Washington card was incorrectly listed under the sports memorabilia category. The end result: he got screwed out of a few thousand dollars. According to an article on Beckett:

The original 10-day auction was being watched by more than 5,000 registered users and had drawn more than 20,000 unique page views and a high bid of $8,300 before its premature conclusion. The card also attracted quite a substantial mainstream media following. In fact, it was a reporter from the New York Times who informed Simonis that his first listing had been deleted. The auction that closed Thursday night [for $7,500] was being watched by 180 people and had received just 3,000 views.

Are eBay’s employees brain dead? This was clearly no ordinary auction. Don’t you think you should do a little research or, gasp, possibly even contact the seller of an auction of this stature before pulling the card? I would be livid. Simonis plans on letting eBay know how he feels:

Simonis says he spent no less than eight hours on the phone with eBay’s Trust and Safety division and his account manager throughout the ordeal and plans to write a letter to eBay North America president Bill Cobb detailing his struggles.

“This entire situation turned into a complete mess,” Simonis says. “I’m pretty decently respected in this hobby and this is a very small piece of the business for me. But at the end of the day, I’m frustrated about it. I’m hoping that some of this attention makes eBay make the right decision for collectors and for the hobby.”

P.S. - a ~$10k auction is “small business” for this guy? What does he normally sell?