Worried that might be buying stolen goods

[Cherrymix]

I thought I'd do my bit for recylcing & buy some toys for my kids off ebay but now I've had a look at some of the sellers and the other things they are selling, I can't believe that they are genuine second hand things.

For example one seller seems to be selling almost new clothes from Next etc almost every week. I've purposely avoided people with shops & have gone for "private" sellers. But I can't get the thought out of my head that these goods are shoplifted (despite the fact that they have comments like - "unwanted present", worn once etc). Do people really buy that many clothes for their kids?

I've previously used ebay to only buy furniture where its much clearer who is a one off seller and who is dealing.

Any thoughts any of you ebay fans. Am I just being too suspicious or is dealling in small items a but dodgy? I can't believe you can make any money at it.

re Next clothing - I don't know if it's still the case but employees of next which includes call centre staff for finance etc have a store place where they can go (once a week I think) and buy seconds/returned stock etc at greatly reduced prices.
I recently came upon a seller who made me think that this is where they were getting their stock.

Interesting that you say you avoid sellers with shops.
There have been issues for a long time regarding visability of shops but for the past few months I have started to realise that a major factor in shop items being overlooked is due to a mis-conception or confusion people have as to exactly what shops are.
I think the time has come for me to close my shop and relist everything in auction or BIN.

Lordy knows where I shall find the time to do this
As an experiment I relisted 6 items from my shop in auction. All had been in the shop for over a year (so i had already lost money) and all were £1 items. In auction, 4 of the 6 sold at an average of £4 each.
Makes no sense

I prefer the shops, or at least the serious sellers. It feels like you're safer as they've more to lose by screwing you over. Also, they'll care more about customer service than someone who's just bunging a few bits on, because it's their livelihood.

I think its because its harder to browse in the shops, rather than just see what's ending in the next 5 mins?

Cherrymix; people can get goods from all sorts of places without it needing to be stolen.Would you really not buy it because of your suspicions? I'm interested because I've never even given it consideration!

Yes, people really do buy that many clothes for their kids , but like 6lmonkey's says, the selers prob. just work at the shops. Or are v.canny buyers - e.g last year I bought 10 prs of Clarks shoes reduced to about £5 from the Clarks outlet. I sold them all for about £10-£15. I made a small profit, and the buyers saved about 50% on normal RRP. All happy If you look at the people that sell lots of Clarks kids shoes, they live in Somerset, close to the main outlet in Street. They either work there, or just shop there normally. There's no way they could steal that many pairs - the staff would get suspicious, and they'd get banned.

sixlostmonkeys - sorry to hear about your shop. Could you do us a link?

I sure can laura

stores.ebay.co.uk/A-Little-Book-Shop

Yes I wouldn't buy if I thought stuff was stolen. The main reason for me wanting to buy on ebay is environmental i.e by recylcing stuff we all help the planet. So I really want to buy genuine second hand stuff or unwanted gift type items not just financing someone's drug habit (sorry - I live in London so maybe that's part of it)

Of course I know its not all stolen goods but once the thought had crossed my mind I started feeling a bit cautious about it.