Are Music Magpie and such just ruthless scammers?

[HRHQueenMe]

Third time trying to shift unwanted tech, and was offered a good price on Music Magpie, again. Sent it off, and they got back within a day saying the item had multiple invisible faults bringing the price down from £81 to £16.20. Seriously? The item has ZERO faults. Same with an Iphone 3. from £33 to £1.20. Do they think we are stupid? Has anyone had good experiences with them, and is there a reputable company that will purchase old tech for recycling? Thank you for any tips!

[safariboot]

They're in a position to be ruthless scammers. You post your stuff on the basis of an offered price, then when they physically have the item they lowball you on the price. Music Magpie even claim the right to retain some items they "reject" without either paying you or returning the items .

[WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll]

Maybe the market is already flooded with the Stephen Kings and Harry Potters. I presume they work on a quick turnover of stock and know what they can move on swiftly, as paying postage for and storing hard-to-shift stock would all eat into their profits.

At least they were honest and declined them from the outset instead of promising to buy them from you and then 'losing' them once you'd sent them.

[JonasKahnwald]

I've used webuybooks.com recently. Got quoted about £20 for 40 books. Fine but I have about 200 other books they wouldn't take. No idea why, books by well known authors too, Stephen King, Harry Potter etc 🤷‍♀️
Still, hermes came and collected for free which is good.

[BluTangClan]

I'm always amused that they boasts about their quality checks. I've had DVD's that skip (they did send out a free replacement), DVD's with jam on them and CD's that skip and with the wrong discs in.
Buying things from them maybe cheaper, but it's always a gamble.

[Soletsgotothepubearlierthen]

I sent one box of 20 items and they 'lost' half of it. When I queried it they said the second box must've got lost in the post, then in the warehouse, then no trace whatsoever and no comeback. Funnily enough they were all the recent films that went missing

[WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll]

I checked on MSE for best prices when I wanted to sell my iPad Mini about a month ago and MusicMagpie came out top, offering £162, so I sent it to them. It was tracked all the way as part of the deal and they paid me the offer price day after they received it. I'd use them again.

You were one of the lucky ones, though. The problem is that they can quote any price they like to gain your interest, but there's absolutely nothing stopping them from claiming it was in far worse condition than described or didn't arrive at all.

Webuyanycar work on the same principle, so I've heard widely: quote a value based on the car being in a completely unrealistically perfect condition for its age and then keep finding faults for which they knock money off until the price you're actually offered is much, much lower.

As I said upthread (and another PP echoed my opinion), webuybooks clearly tell you on their website exactly how they define condition, what is and what isn't acceptable and they don't expect a 10yo textbook that cost £40 new to be in as-new condition for them to pay you the (obviously very much-reduced) used market trade value as originally agreed with you, as long as you were honest with them.

[Slightlybrwnbanana]

I've sold cds with no issues, and bought three iPhones from them, again with no problems.

[WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll]

I've only bought from Music Magpie. I bought a "Very Good" DVD, and got a filthy disc that didn't work in a battered box.

Hmm, I wonder if that was one that they refused to pay the seller for as 'in unsellable condition'....

I wonder what they mean when they 'kindly' offer to 'recycle' items that they claim are unsellable or not the correct item. Considering that you can't actually physically recycle old discs in the same way as paper, plastic bottles or tins - and surely they couldn't legally describe chucking them in the bin as 'recycling' (plus they never sound at all sad about being landed with a load of stuff for recycling) - do they mean that they give them to charity shops (odd if they're unsellable), re-use the cases and chuck the discs or.... just sell them anyway....?

[Antirrhinum]

I checked on MSE for best prices when I wanted to sell my iPad Mini about a month ago and MusicMagpie came out top, offering £162, so I sent it to them. It was tracked all the way as part of the deal and they paid me the offer price day after they received it. I'd use them again.

[BashfulClam]

Mazuma are great. I sent my old I-phone on Saturday, got the agreed price today in my bank.

[user127819]

I've only bought from Music Magpie. I bought a "Very Good" DVD, and got a filthy disc that didn't work in a battered box.

[Augustbreeze]

Gosh I've only bought from them and hadn't realised they might not be all they claim....

[Toddlerteaplease]

I made £80 selling CD's to music magpie!

[WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll]

I'm convinced they are called MusicMagpie because they are thieving gits! Like Magpies...

It wasn't just me, then....!

I essentially see them as a free disposable service where I get a very little bit of token money too.

I think that's how they hope people will see them - and not probe too deeply if they dispute the condition, claim there are missing items or otherwise pay you less than they originally led you to believe; hope you'll just be happy to have £20 for some stuff you didn't want anyway.

I find that, the more they focus their advertising on 'recycling', 'helping the environment' and 'saving the world's resources', the more of a clue it is that they expect you to be grateful to them for taking your old stuff and that should be your main reward in itself - with any pennies they pass down to you as well almost like blood money for you, you filthy. evil, Earth-destroying over-consumer

[WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll]

That doesn't surprise me about Apple at all. So much of their business is based around building in obsolescence and wastefully forcing perfectly good older models out of use in order to sell more new ones.

The cycnic in me could even think that this was their plan all along - get people to send used products in to them, offering good prices, then subsequently declare them worthless and 'offer' to recycle them to get them out of circulation, rather than have people sell them on eBay or to CEX, with the result being that there's one fewer potential place in the market for a new one to be bought.

Apple are a bit like the main car dealerships - especially the premium ones - where they will routinely condemn something with the tiniest little bit of wear and declare it in need of replacement - all at top prices, of course. They refuse to use anything other than the brand new product as the yardstick, so they are unwilling to accept that anything that functions perfectly well, but with slightly less speed or battery life than when it was brand new has any value whatsoever.

[Hardbackwriter]

I use them to get rid of dvds because it's considerably easier for us to take them to the Hermes point in the shop up the road than to take them to the charity shop (and a lot of the ones around us have stopped accepting dvds). I essentially see them as a free disposable service where I get a very little bit of token money too. Seen like that it all works well, but I wouldn't use them for anything that had actual value to me.

[MostDisputesDieAndNoOneShoots]

I had a lot of success selling unwanted books, DVDs and CDs with them but with tech I’ve had the same experience. They had the cheek to tell me that the kindle fire- quoted £40- was now worth absolutely nothing because of, as you say, several invisible faults.... and then even further cheek to write in the email something like “but don’t worry, we will recycle it for you free of charge! I asked for it back and had a bit of a battle getting it back (and they wanted me to pay for postage to get it back which I had to fight). Ended up taking it to CEX and got £43 for it.

[FredtheFerret]

I'm convinced they are called MusicMagpie because they are thieving gits! Like Magpies...

I was going to get rid of DVDs which I appreciate aren't worth much - but I put the first one in, a newly released, Oscar winning film we'd bought for full price and watched. They offered 12p.

I just donated to charity. I'd rather Help the Aged got some money!

[Redwolf1]

They offered me £60 for an old iPad and they paid up

[FairFridaythe13th]

This always happens with these places. Same happened with my old phone - £x them when it arrives the price mysteriously went down. I said not thanks, send it back then’ and went elsewhere. I think maybe they overestimate to get the business - or maybe price you down in the hope you won’t bother to ask for it back.

Shop around!

[MadisonAvenue]

Back in March I sent an iPad to Apple as part of their product recycling scheme when I bought a new one, they estimated beforehand that it was worth £80. It was in really good working condition, it just didn’t have enough storage for my needs.

I had an email saying that the backlight wasn’t working so the estimated £80 had changed to £0, and I could either have it returned or they could dispose of it for me. I had it returned to me and it works perfectly, there’s no issue with screen brightness whatsoever so as soon as I get to somewhere with a CEX I’ll be taking it in.

[HRHQueenMe]

Brilliant advice people, thank you so much. Waiting to get my tech back now, and will go down to CEX.

[ColleagueFromMars]

I second the recommendation for webuybooks.com I've used them 3 times now. Some of the prices they offered were too low for a good book and I've held those books back, but I ended up with a few quid in my pocket and a load of books collected, rather than having to take them on a slog to find a charity shop who are accepting.

[CorianderLord]

They pay piss all but it's great for offloading large numbers of books, CDs and DVDs you have no use for and don't want to bother selling individually. We got £50 for two boxes of crap we never used and an ancient iPod.

[SomeSmotheringDreams]

I've sold 3 Galaxy phones to Music Magpie. Each time they've paid up the promised amount as soon as they received the phone. All were in perfect condition and no more than 2 years old, don't know if that makes a difference?