Ebay?

Sorry if this topic has been here before.
Myself and a few friends are curious to know if its safe to buy stuff on ebay. Ive seen stuff which is ridiculously cheaper than in shops in Ireland. How does one know if the dvds cds clothes etc are genuine and not fakes? Is there come back if you find the articles to be fake? Has anyone any good/bad reviews?

Thanks

tbh only buy off people with lots of good feedback, read the feedback to see what other people think, personally i've never had a problem with using ebay

If you are buying goods from overseas (over a value of 125 euro or something) then you will have to pay about 21% tax when you receive the goods here. I dont know if that is the same with ebay.ie?

I once bought an electronic good from the US for 400euro and had to pay 90odd euro tax, even after that it was still 100 euro cheaper than here in Ireland.

Think the VAT only applies to goods purchased outside the EU.

Golden rules for not going wrong

1) Always pay by Paypal - If the sale goes pear shaped you have some form of comeback against your credit card company.

2) Feedback is vital - Would normally only buy from someone with rating > 10 and a positive rating > 97%.

While both conditions are not vital for a sucessful sale, if you stick to them you cut out a huge amount of potential hitches.

One thing to look out for which I've noticed of late. If you bid for larger items and don't win, you will more than likely get e-mails from people pretending to be the seller trying to complete a sale outside of E-Bay ( you send them money, they never send the goods ).

when buying also, check the delivery charges. Some people artificially lower the price and increase the delivery charge.

I saw a USB memory key on ebay.co.uk for sale, starting at 1p, but scrolling down, the deliver charge was a fixed "sellers standard rate" of GBP 35 !!!