Partial Refuns for Non Tested Items

I thought I would share an idea that I have started using more in my Ebay listings, and had success with. When I have a high value item that I either don't have the capability to, time, or even desire to test, I have been listing those items as-is (parts/repair), but stating clearly that if the buyer finds that they don't work that I will give them a full refund less my shipping costs. I also include something to the effect of "I have no reason to believe this item is not in working condition, and I'd rather give someone a chance to use this at a good price than recycled or in the landfill." It's important to visually check what you can, and take lots of pictures. Some obvious flaws can tell you when something is broken.

It's a risk with a chance of a small loss or a great gain. Let me give an example or two:

I got a high end ASUS gaming motherboard as part of a garage clean out. It was a little old and dusty, but in the box of a more recent high end board. I didn't have an I7 or the other parts to test it. I tried selling it as-is with no refund. I think I had a bid for 50 bucks, but the buyer backed out once he re-read the description. I tried a second time with it not selling. This motherboard was worth about two bucks to me in scrap. I figured it would cost about ten to ship. So I listed it as described above. If it tested bad, then I would have lost two bucks in scrap plus my time, because the buyer would eat my shipping costs of ten dollars. It turns out the board sold for 120 - and it tested good. Total profit nearly a hundred dollars after shipping and fees.

The next month, I got the motherboard, RAM, and a video card from a gaming machine from a local PC repair shop. Again, didn't have the capability to test it, but I knew it was probably worth less than $5 in scrap. Shipping it to someone to test might yield a profit, but if it failed, then I would eat the cost of shipping. I listed them each as described above. I think I got around 150 between the three items. The video card ended up being bad, so I asked the buyer to break the gold finger and send me a picture as proof that he wouldn't use it. I gave him the refund within a few minutes of his response, and still had a profit of $80 on the three items. I think I might have even gone above and beyond and refunded him the shipping costs (<$3), just because I was coming out ahead in the big picture.

I sold a 486 board without the CPU for triple the scrap price in profit. I currently have a 5.25 floppy pushing $30 in bids. Many more examples of this. People are willing to bid a little higher and take a risk their chance for loss is less.


It's important to be honest and state everything you know up front. I have never gotten negative feedback with this approach, and in many cases I'm getting better feedback than when I sell tested items. I'm even getting great feedback when an item is sent that ended up being bad. Depending on how things go, I can go above and beyond and really impress the buyer in this situation by refunding their shipping costs. If I decide not to, then they at least see me as being fair.

You also need to keep track of the failures and identify patterns. For example, the last four video cards I've sold from one repair store were all bad. I've sent a few laptop hard drives from the same store to a buyer on here and they tested bad. But, RAM and Motherboards were good. So future video cards and laptop hard drives go strait to scrap, but RAM and Motherboards will make Ebay if they have a high enough value.

To be completely honest, it is a risk. If it tests bad and I offer a refund, I'm out the scrap value. But $25 profit with the chance of losing $2 is a chance I'll take. There is also the possibility of negative feedback - but you face that any time you step into the ring on Ebay. This may not be everyone's approach - but I've had great success personally and thought I would share.

ya I always make sure to put sold as is untested but offer a refund if returned for those things I don't test mainly because things are pretty much a 50 50 shot because most things are rugged enough for a little abuse of travel but on that other side just looking at a hard drive can blow it up either that or I have some abilities I need to harness control of lol

I agree- being upfront is always the best policy.

As for drives and RAM , I test a lot that come in. It's not always the shop that did something wrong- some models of drives and RAM are more prone to failures than others. For example, Crucial desktop DDR2 RAM has a much higher failure rate in my testing than Kingston or Samsung does.