Whirlpool

Graysonline is a online auction house specialising in corporate and business selling - ie. no individual sellers. I was surprised that graysonline (graysonline.com.au) does not seem to offer a place for buyers to put feedback (both +/-) from their dealings with the sellers (some of which often sell there and repeat type of goods).

Does anyone know where you can see buyers feedback on the sellers of this site? Is there something I cant see? Even ebay has this function and its VERY useful for obvious reasons. I would like to see it implemented at graysonline - perhaps if enough were to say they also would like this i might send this thread over to the admin of grays or point them in this direction.

I've made a number of purchases from Grays and have been happy with all of them, never had any problems with any of the items.

Gray's is an auction house, both online and with "bricks and mortar" warehouses.
You are only buying off Gray's who are selling oh behalf of corporate, government, etc, you are not actually buying off the corporate, government, etc.
All stock Gray's have in their possession, (they do with their BM). All your receipt's are from Gray's.

Somehow I doubt Gray's would enable such a system for people to comment on.

grays doesn't operate like ebay... they make sales on behalf of vendors and then take a big fat commission out of it.

At the end of the day, the only people doing the selling on grays are grays, so I don't really see how you could have a feedback system.

oh well i have had mostly good experiences with grays too but there have been times where what i received was different from the item description or even faulty. When i contacted grays they told me I had to speak to the seller of the item,,,

for example i recently bought an expensiveish ($60) fountain pen off grays but when it arrived the nib was damaged. I contacted grays but they told me to contact the seller and the seller told me i had to send the pen to them at my expense to get it "checked" prior to any action they could perform (ie. repair/ refund).

Is it fair I have to pay the freight back to their facility? I had to pay for freight to get the pen from grays already? If i cant leave feedback how are other buyers going to know if a seller is shipping faulty goods? What would be grays responsibility here?

OH and thank you for all your help!

It's quite normal to have to pay freight costs to return faulty items. It's not fair but it's normal. If you push you might get some money back but.....

jimgg writes...

You are only buying off Gray's who are selling oh behalf of corporate, government, etc, you are not actually buying off the corporate, government, etc.
All stock Gray's have in their possession, (they do with their BM). All your receipt's are from Gray's.

This might be the case with most auctions but isn't always true. I have bought a few items through Grays where the vendor arranged freight and invoicing. In one case the vendor was HPM and it took almost two months for delivery (they have promised to refund the freight costs!).

I've also bought a couple of items where there was a problem. In one case the item was broken on delivery, and Grays arranged for the vendor to refund (via cheque) the cost of the item, without me sending it back. In another case the item never arrived, and Grays refunded without any question.

Adrian writes...

This might be the case with most auctions but isn't always true. I have bought a few items through Grays where the vendor arranged freight and invoicing.

I stand corrected, I didn't realise Gray's had branched out into this type of selling, (it's been a while since I bought off Gray's, either online or BM).

Adrian writes...

I've also bought a couple of items where there was a problem.

They are pretty good when it comes to refunds. I bought a home theater system for the in-law's which packed it in about 6 months later.
Because the vendor went out of business and couldn't honour the warranty Grays gave a full refund including freight.

Thanks for the helpful advise so far! So ebay has that great feedback thing built in but graysonline has nothing at all like that? I would say that for sellers the feedback system is really important. Why wouldnt grays have it as it could only be good for business as it would gives shoppers confidence and therefor more would shop there? seems really silly of grays?

Its also interesting that Grays will offer refunds or exchanges on items that arrive if they are faulty/ damaged? And even honour warranties? I didn't know Grays did this as I thought that was the sellers responsibility but I did wonder because Grays gets the buyers premium which the seller doesn't pay but the buyer does. So what is this premium for if not to support the buyers? Well thats my logic anyway...

So, back with the pen example, if I'm not happy with the sellers solution to fix the pen I should ask grays directly for a refund and send the pen back to grays and ask them to pay freight too? Will this work? I'm pretty sure I don't want to go through all the fuss of getting it fixed, and I'm afraid my pen will sit in a repair facility for months as someone said their item did above.

I'd say it depends on who issued the Tax Invoice for the pen, if it was GraysOnline then I'd be taking it up with them.

What did the T&C of the auction say about guarantees and warranty's?

Warranty:
12 MONTHS WARRANTY

this is what the auction said and the invioce is from Grays. does this information change things?

then I'd be taking it up with Grays...it was that entity that sold you the item and offered the warranty

Remember the 3 R's of the consumer...Repair, Replace or Refund, at your choice.

I'm sure a polite phone call to Grays would start the ball rolling about your entitlements.

Internet Auctions: What you should Know!!

www.accc.gov.au/content/...ml?itemId=303760

Very good advice from accc and asic,

HTH, 3>)

I bought an amplifier from Gray's. It was not powering on when it arrived. I contacted Grey's who put me in contact with the seller (It was a refurbished HarmonKardon Amp). They agreed to pay shipping both ways - I actually went to pick it up myself as it was more convenient for me and I could make sure it was fixed.

I did not expect Grey's to cover the warranty as it was clear in the details of the auction that it was the vendor's responsibility. Considering that I paid a tiny amount compared to an equivalent amp (new) I was not too concerned. I had no trouble with them or the vendor - they were quite sympathetic and helpful.

I haven't bought anything else off of them that required a return.

I have stopped checking out their site though as I noticed prices were getting bid too high to justify the danger of buying refurbished or run out stock.

Hey

I have bought a few things from grays nothing but positiv feedback!

GOt some ipod connectors and also a LCD screen.. no issues at all..

Hey bookz

Sorry to hear about your problems

I work for grays and will sort out your issues as I agree with your comments and maybe we could have handled it better

Drop me a whim with your email details and I will get our Customer Service manager to drop you a line and get things moving for you.

Take care and thanks for having a bid on our web site

Auctionboy writes...

I will get our Customer Service manager to drop you a line

Don't hold your breath...

Evan,

Thanks for your feedback which as usual is useful and constructive..

I've never actually bought anything from Greys yet (nor from ebay) but from what I've heard from other people IRL, Greys is a pretty useful and reliable site.

Im pretty amazed over all by the in house Grays online team that continually post in this forum and talk it up as a customer instead of them truly representing themselves.

Its happened on a number of occasions and its blindly obvious, and against whirlpool rules

Always be precautious about an online auction site that doesn’t allow feedback

Name and shame them.

Auctionboy writes...

Evan,

Thanks for your feedback which as usual is useful and constructive..

Sorry, Auctionboy, that is a pretty piss poor attitude for an official member of the Grays team to take.

I was charged shipping ($100) on a lot that had no shipping listed (in fact, the entire auction had no shipping prices listed). Sent the obligatory email to the auction email, received response that it would be forwarded to manager.

Then nothing.

Like I said, don't hold your breath.

Evan,

Give me your sale and buyer number and I will get someone to see what they can do for you.

I wont offer you excuses but we have had a few issues in the past which have now been resolved and we now have a very strong customer service team under us who will be only too willing to help.

Take care

The auctions on greys are dodgy at best, ie auctions being pushed to your set limit.
Just seen it once to many times so i dont purchase there anymore.

Graysonline doesn't have customer feedback.

What's more, their 'Customer Service' is nothing short of a disgrace.

What they clearly haven't learned, is that good 'customer service' is how you handle problems, not how you handle your day-to-day business.

Good customer service is when something goes wrong, and you put it right, not ignore or desert your customer.

Case in point:-

I bought a laser printer on Graysonline. I got a very good price. The freight, according to their calculator was $27. This is about right. I used to buy new laser printers off Ingram Micro all the time and have them shipped to my customers for about $15.

The delivery guy (Star Track) arrived, and the box was quite big. It was destined for a customer of mine and so I asked the delivery guy if he would deliver it there since it was way to big to fit in my car. He agreed and took the box away. I removed the invoice first to learn that I had been charged **$110** for delivery!!

Now I'd seen the size of the box, and felt the weight. Sure, it was bigger and heavier than most, but my years of developing software systems for the freight forwarding and shipping industry told me I could ship it to ENGLAND for that kind of money! What's more, it was not what I had been quoted.

To cut a very long story short. GraysOnline refused POINT BLANK to tell Star Track to deliver it to my customer. Star Track were ready and willing to do so. A simple call from GraysOnline would be all that it would take.

Nothing doing.

I got a complete load of búllshít about how they 'held a meeting with senior managers' and out of that came the decision to NOT allow the delivery address to be changed. That was that. They gave absolutely NO VALID REASON why they wouldn't simply pick up the phone, call Star Track and have it delivered to the address I'd already given the driver.

The box sat languishing at Star Track's depot in Minchinbury for several weeks, before even they got fed up with it hanging around their depot and sent it back to GraysOnline.

I asked the Department of Fair Trading to intervene. An officer from there called to say that he had a HUGE file of complaints against this company and that 'there must be something very wrong over there'.

My details had been passed on to GraysOnline's 'customer service manager'...

Have I heard from them? No.

An email to remind me they had the goods? No.

An email to ask me what I'd like to DO with the goods? No.

An email to ask if I'd been satisfied with the 'managers decision'? No.

So boys and girls, the moral is:-

If you want to deal with GraysOnline, pray it ALL works out their way because if it DOESN'T, you are STUFFED! When something goes wrong, quite frankly they're too hard and too stubborn to see that their own rules conflict with basic common sense and so that will be my last transaction with GraysOnline.

By the way, upon calling Star Track to enquire why the freight was $110, they told me the package weighed 250kg(!) and needed a tailgate for delivery due to the weight. I asked if that was VOLUMETRIC weight, but to be honest, she didn't know.

I asked if they could deliver the printer to me, and then perhaps I could commission THEM to deliver it to my customer? No. Because I didn't have an account with Star Track...!

I checked the printer's spec, according to the manufacturer it weighs 48kg. Big for a printer, but are you telling me that Dick Smith pays $100 freight on each laser printer? Of course not. Not even Ingram Micro charges that much....

One must ask...

What does this 'customer service manager' DO all day at GraysOnline?

Are they so overwhelmed with complaints that they cannot get to deal with them in a timely manner (it's been almost three months now). Surely if their customer service is that good and complaints so few, their customer service manager would have phoned MONTHS ago!

Or do they hold their customers in such flagrant contempt that they feel they can afford to lose a few? After all, a new sucker is born every day!

I'll let you decide...

EonPeon writes...

I'll let you decide...

Their in house auctions are great. I have been to a few Grays Auctions and scored a heap of bargains. My brother purchased 5 latops via grays online and had no problems.

My experience of Grays was a negative also, bought a 2.4Ghz phone, auction stated they were a particular model Doro, ended up being the model below being delivered without an answering machine (which was the feature I made the decision to purchase on). Made contact with the "customer service team" was given a huge run around, about 5 calls later after none of the promised call backs I gave up and sold the phone on ebay.

Since then no more Grays for me.

what did i buy from graysonline.com.au?
item description:
(NEW) HP IPAQ HX47XX WINDOWS MOBILE 5.0 POCKET PC PREMIUM WITH OUTLOOK 2002 UPGRADE LICENCE AND MEDIA PACK. (P/N: FAxxxA#AC3) (SN:N/A) (8xxx6-30)

accompanied by a stylish image of hp IPAQ hx4700

i thought cool $9.00 starting bid
done some research discovered pda for around $200.00 to $300.00
decided i'll bid on two max bid at this time $59.00
at end of auction i won both paid promptly. tracked delivery from star track express's on line traceing system item delivered promptly opened box and wtf!
take a guess what i received?

tezar writes...

take a guess what i received?

I'm guessing you received "WINDOWS MOBILE 5.0 POCKET PC PREMIUM WITH OUTLOOK 2002 UPGRADE LICENCE AND MEDIA PACK" !!

I looked at these on several auctions and spotted the trap. This happens with a lot of the items on Grays - I always ensure that I can find a model number in the description, and ignore the photo.

spot on Adrian! i'm currently persuing a refund.

I bought a Toshiba Portege 4010 from Graysonline last year. I opened the box, and the silver paint on the back of the screen was rubbed off. Annoying, but I could tolerate that. Then I turned it on, and there were blotches right across the screen. It was completely obvious, and it must have been seen by the techs, unless they are blind. I complained and they did immediately offer a refund. But since it worked, and I needed a laptop desperately, I kept it, even though it's true value went down from $400 to maybe $150 (- who'd by a laptop with a blotchy screen?) Oh, and the power supply wires were exposed, so I had to tape them. It was basically a very worn system, although it was supposed to be in good condition.

A few months later I reformatted the hard drive, thinking that it had a recovery partition, because when I first turned it on, it went through the last few stages of installation as if it was coming from a recovery partition. Wrong. No recovery partition (and no CD).

And I think it's true that some bidders don't realise there's a "buyer's premium" of 12.5%(?), so the bids are 12.5% higher than they would normally be, especially on the newer stuff.

I've brought a stack of stuff from there. My dad and sister both have Dell laptops that have given them no problems, I've picked up a 24" Dell monitor, Altec (spelling?) speakers with sub-woofer, a panasonic 32" LCD with integrated tuner, Panasonic DVD Recorder, plus other stuff :-) Haven't had an issue yet. Their delivery times are all over the place, that's the only issue.

I used to buy from Grays Online in person before they invested so heavily in the 'online' aspect of auctions. There were always some excellent bargains.

However the golden rule is that if you can't inspect it, don't buy it. Which obviously is the case for online auctions.

A lot of the auctioneers were nice re. answering questions and fixing any problems in real life. Some sort of feedback system as you are describing isn't really necessary (obviously) in reality, and as others have pointed out, it's Grays who are doing the selling, not the individual originators of the goods.

I wouldn't buy from Grays these days because even taking into account the inability to inspect the items, the prices just aren't good value any more. Let alone taking shipping and the infamous buyer's premium into account.

+ better customer service than most of eBay individual sellers
+ extremely fast delivery

- most of item ending at higher price than eBay
- they charge buyer fee for some items

I've bought several items from Graysonline without major problems ranging from $1600 notebook, SD cards, DVD players, KISS Divx players, clothes, cordless phones.

The only time I had a problem was when one purchase took ages to arrive so I contacted Grays by email and after a couple of days they couldn't track the package so they refunded my money. (Couple of days after that it did arrive but I didn't let them know).

I rarely buy from them these days a seems all of australia tries to buy from them now and there are hardly any bargins here these days (especially with the buyers premium).

Peter James writes...

Im pretty amazed over all by the in house Grays online team that continually post in this forum and talk it up as a customer instead of them truly representing themselves.


No I dont work for them.

sobie writes...

I rarely buy from them these days a seems all of australia tries to buy from them now and there are hardly any bargins here these days (especially with the buyers premium).

When do you think it started to fall away?

From what I can see, most of Grays' stuff is overpriced.

How does the bid precedence work on their site? Looks a bit funny to me.

The way I understand it, if someone bid on a lot yesterday and I started biding on the same lot today then they can come and match my exact bid and I loose as they have precedence.

The bit that gets to me is the Original Bid Time. I bid at 5 today and it says so in the system. But then someone comes in and matches me but their "Original Bid Time" is suddenly sometime yesterday giving them precedence. But they aren't listed in the bidding history. So how in earth does this happen?

Its not that they bid on another item in the same auction as I have tried that and my first bid time in that auction isn't transfered to another lot in the same auction.

Can anyone explain?

joelunch writes...

The way I understand it, if someone bid on a lot yesterday and I started biding on the same lot today then they can come and match my exact bid and I loose as they have precedence.

I'm confused by how the precendence works too. I mean the theory is good that the early you get in, the better your chances should be. This encourages you to bid early for something you want.

someone comes in and matches me but their "Original Bid Time" is suddenly sometime yesterday giving them precedence. But they aren't listed in the bidding history. So how in earth does this happen?

In this situation, could this person's bid also have been preceeded by another person who bids the same price and hence their record is wiped from the list? But then when they bid higher price, even though it's the same as yours, they bidded before you and hence is given precendence?

I'm just guessing. I don't really know how their priority things works either.

Bidding history only shows the highest accepted bid for each person

If I am winning an auction and you bid, but your max is lower than my max, then only my bid that is higher than yours is shown in the bidding history and it is shown with the time it was placed, not the time you were outbid.

The only time when you win an auction by bidding exactly the same price as another bidder is if the auction is for multiple items and you have bid on more of them than the other bidder.

Is there anything you can buy from graysonline or do you need to follow all the auctions?

I've just put my first bid on Grays Online. It's a big ticket item with large freight costs and reading all the comments here at Whirlpool, I’m starting to worry.

I've been as prudent as I can be, read the auction over and over and all the terms conditions charges freight etc...... All straight forward.

You can easily calculate your max bid + commission + freight = Your total cost

But Grays Online has some MAJOR flaws IMO and is Wide Open to the buyer being screwed over.

1. They hold your credit card details even before the Auction is finished! No one does this anywhere else. And what happens to your details if you are unsuccessful?

2. Their site isn't very safe, no SSL encryption seems to be running when you submit your credit card details, God knows where your details including credit card are sitting.

3. The Auto Bid system is only an honesty box. It can easily be manipulated that you end up paying your maximum bid.

4. Freight is just estimate, yet another thing wide open to interpretation

Add these issues to some of the complaints seen in this thread (second hands goods sold as new etc), and I’m really starting to wonder why I bided at all.

Basically everything is in their hands and nothing is in yours.

I’ll post back once this Auction ends tomorrow….. Geez and I thought ebay was bad!

Salty Dog writes...

Basically everything is in their hands and nothing is in yours.

This why i dont use them,too one sided.

Well luckely i was out bidded.....

So i'm off the hook...... But now the next problem, getting your credit card detials off their server!!!!

This place is bullshit, i have NO WAY of knowing my details have been earesed, and to be honest, there isn't even an option to let you remove them.

It will not let you change your credit card to fake number that will not work for them, the only option you can try is entering all zeros in the fields and hope that worked.

I'm sure they have a great little business here, but if you have concerns about your personal details, Don't Use them. I tried calling them..... was just on the hold music for 25min.

So thats my experience........ At the end of the day, i'd rather pay a little more for the item and buy it from a shop front, with tax invoice a point of sale and some contact details and most importantly, i'll control the payment method.

i bought heaps of stuff off grays online about 4 yrs ago aprox
on 1 item i wanted , no joke i put an upfront max bid of $600 , the price stayed less than half the 600 until about 3 minutes to go and one bid was made of the amount of 590 or 598 , what i was bidding on i was thinking the bids were like ebay not seen by the seller afterwards i relized what an idiot i was grays hold the highest bid i bidded and then pushed the bid up so i had to pay top price i have to admit all the goods ive bought in those yrs arrived and were in good working condition but

, there way to expensive now , i dont use them anymore i actually saw a bid on a fax phone , i looked at model number and went to a DSE site found same fax phone cheaper at tricky dickys than what some person had bid on it,
IMO there an ok site but dont put any max bid like i did ,
i never bought after that happened .
would rate graysonline about 7out of 10 ,

Grays was great 4 years ago when only net savey ppl knew about them, but now its a joke. Too many idots bidding out of spite and ego driving prices close to retail and in a couple of case over it.

4 1/2 years ago I got a plate of 20 acer system units some working, some not not. All were Intel 2.6 P4 HT, with DDR 512mb of RAM..... I scored them for $550, futher $200 for shipping. best deal I every got.... ! Everyone of them that was not working only needed a HD or PSU to get them back up. I purchased in Bulk 20 Viewsonic 19" monitors at a bargin price of $250 each...and sold the each system for a $900 each via the local rag in Ballarat.

They went like hot cakes made, $13K in 3 weeks ...eat your heat out drug dealers....

Cant do that today

Did a simlar trick not long after with 30 AIWA sound systems as well, but just after that the rot moved in. And scince that crap where they extend the end time of auctions by 10 min well I just give them a miss alltogether

Rustynailed writes...

Grays was great 4 years ago when only net savey ppl knew about them, but now its a joke. Too many idots bidding out of spite and ego driving prices close to retail and in a couple of case over it.

That's just the way their real (in-person) computer auctions went.

They started out as a great place to get bargains. Then the hordes moved in, people got carried away with the "excitement" of bidding and were bidding more for used systems than an equivalent new system would cost.

BrianR writes...

That's just the way their real (in-person) computer auctions went

Go to Customs & ATO auctions. I have picked some great stuff there. I once score a box of brand new hard drives 250 gig sealed for $100. Again placed an add in the local rag and made a 1000% profit

Rustynailed writes...

Go to Customs & ATO auctions.

link or address please :)

My feedback about Greys = Shill bidders, Loooong delivery, mostly rubbish, discontinued or cheap china junk all sold at premium prices.

Brought once 2 years ago for 2 Sony Ericsson mobile.
- Really long delivery,
- never ring me before delivery ,
- then charge me $12 extra for 2nd delivery (nobody at home 1st time),
- found 1 of them was not working,
- took 4 weeks for refund!
- and if you are the first time bidder you may easily missed the "12.5% Buyers Premium"

This site is a joke. you won't get any good deal now. I wonder if somebody is placing fake bids as well. There is no way to track.

hi am new to the forums.from what i have read there is enough people in here with

enough gripes and also enough people with the tech know how to do somthing

about it.i would like to open a disussion of how online auctions should work or we

can just put up with the crap service and rip off prices.

hope this passes the rules.

thanks

I have read a number of users complaining about delivery times. I have purchase an item from Grays last Saturday. I was billed for the item on Monday (confirmed with a email invoice). But have since been informed by a mate that the item has not been dispatched until Grays have emailed a dispatch notice?

- update 6/3/08 -
I have answered my own question. I received a dispatch confirmation today containing a star track reference tracking number

Salty Dog writes...

This place is bullshit, i have NO WAY of knowing my details have been earesed, and to be honest, there isn't even an option to let you remove them.

Wiat until you actually have to go there and speak to some one and THEN you relaise that this a very strange business, that has ZERO focus on customers or buyers experience - we dont use them at all anymore, regardless of the potential savings.

Graysonline - is the worst online experience I have ever had, little coordination between their customer service and other units, can't tell you when item is being delivered but you are expected to be be home to sign.

Item I purchase was late, no response to left telephone message, online replies are standard replies.

The organisation is pathetic should be called SABENA (SUCH A BAD EXPERIENCE NEVER AGAIN!!!)