In the last two weeks I've received a total of three delicate items packaged only in flimsy manila envelopes or a thin bubble mailer with no protection, and in all three cases, the stuff I bought arrived damaged.  This is stuff I paid upwards of $10 each to ship, so it's not like they didn't have the money to buy me a piece of bubblewrap or a sheet of tissue paper to wrap around my doodad.  And in each case, when I notified the seller of the damage caused by their poor (or total lack of) packaging, there was trouble.  One totally freaked out on me.  Another just said "So send it back"---no apology, no nothing.  The third hasn't written me back yet and may be ignoring me.  What is up with people lately?  Isn't this the holiday season, when we're supposed to be kind to one another (as if we're excepted from niceties the rest of the year), and doesn't packaging someone's expensive item properly qualify as kindness, if not something the buyer is supposed to be able to EXPECT? 

Frankly I'm sick to death of it.  You can't even leave a negligent seller an honest feedback for shoddy packaging and poor customer service because they'll turn around and neg you right back for it, no matter how quickly you paid and how problem-free your end of the transaction was.  No wonder people are going back to shopping at Wal-Mart.  At least there, if your doodad is broken because the packaging was cruddy, you can get your money back with no questions asked and nobody accuses you of lying or trying to get a better deal.

Silverware MUST NOT be mailed loose in a bubblemailer---metal scratches metal, and by the time someone's set of twelve rare cutlery pieces arrives it WILL be scratched all to heck and back.  DVD sets MUST NOT be tossed in a thin manila envelope with nothing around it because the cases WILL get crushed and broken before the package even leaves your local USPS branch office.  Frankly, the people who did these things know better, they're all long-time sellers with experience and I was shocked they even did such a thing.  But what shocked me the worst was their attitudes when informed of the consequences of their apathy.  I guess these days the buyer is just out of luck and the seller can be as negligent, rude, and hostile as they please.

Sellers seem to have lost sight of the fact that without the buyers, they are nothing.

I'm not speaking as an uninformed buyer who knows nothing of the problems sellers face.  I am first and foremost a seller myself, and I've faced my share of upset customers, both deservedly and undeservedly.  And in cases where I could offer a resolution, no matter if the problem was my fault or not, I offered it gladly.  I've had two situations where a mistake was my fault, and both times I apologized profusely and gave the buyer several options to choose from to make it right.  The sellers I've dealt with recently didn't even seem to know what the word options means.  What's so hard about saying you're sorry, you goofed, can I offer you a couple of bucks back to make it up to you, or would you like to send it back for a full refund and I'll pick up the tab on the shipping too?

There's another thing that burns me.  A seller makes a huge mistake or commits a blatant falsehood, it's absolutely their own fault, and when the buyer has to send the item back, they lose their shipping money.  If the seller misrepresented their item and it's 100% their fault, not the buyer's, the buyer should get their shipping money back too.  Such as when an item is advertised as brand new and when it arrives it's been used, scraped up, scuffed, scratched, dirty, and has teeth marks on it.  That's the seller's fault, and when that seller refunds, the poor buyer shouldn't be out ANYTHING, not one penny.  In the one case where I made a big mistake (listing a clothing item as small instead of extra-small) I refunded every penny, shipping included, because if I hadn't made that mistake, the buyer wouldn't have bought that item.

Before long there will be nothing here but sellers, because the buyers are being run off by seller-made rules that serve only the interest of the seller, and there's nothing the poor buyer can do about it except decide whether he wants to keep his damaged item and live with it or send it back, losing both the item AND his $10 shipping. 

Come on sellers, take a look at your behavior toward your customers.  When they all leave, it's just going to be the lot of us, looking at each other and wondering why we've got no sales.

All my shipments that were paid for in time have gone out as of December 20th and everyone *should* get their goodies before christmas, if the USPS realizes what time of year it is and gets a move on.  So far so good.  Everyone who paid on or after December 20th, needless to say, won't be getting any packages from me in time to go under the tree...unless you want to pay for expedited overnight, which is still an iffy option.  So, no more christmas shipments, the season is over for me as far as eBay goes.  Thanks to all my customers for the great sales this year!