You think Audiogon has problems ... look at Ebay

I know there are problems on Audiogon. I was once scammed by a no-feedback seller on a cable purchase. Audiogon tried to help but there was nothing they could do except support me if I wished to press criminal charges which was not in the cards since I live overseas. That having been said, I believe there are few such occurrences on Audiogon, thankfully.

I believe Ebay poses a LOT more potential problems for buyers than Audiogon. Please understand. I am not faulting Ebay. They and PayPal have been very responsive in this case. The problem is that sellers can find ways to misrepresent merchandise they are selling -- and end up the winner -- no matter what Ebay or PayPal does.

Here's what happened to me recently on Ebay. I was caught in a scam while purchasing a tube tester. The tester in question was a B&K 707. Being new to tubes I didn't realize that the B&K 707 does not do mutual conductance testing on most of the tubes I will need tested for mutual conductance -- the 6DJ8 group of tubes.

I did a lot of homework prior to the purchase but this information only came to my attention after I made the purchase. It was buried pretty deeply on sites and forums that took hours to find. In fact, I just happened on this information by accident -- one report from a user. When another user and 2 experts confirmed the fact then I was convinced.

The problem is that the seller claimed the B&K 707 does "true mutual conductance" testing -- quoting the manufacturer. But many tubes cannot be tested for mutual conductance on the B&K 707. They can only be tested for emissions on the bottom of the unit. This applies to many tubes besides the 6DJ8 group of tubes. So, the seller is allowed to quote misleading advertising by the manufacturer in his/her Ebay ad. One cannot expect Ebay to police the ads from manufacturers. But good luck to you if you don't know the name of the game -- that key information is omitted by the manufacturer and is then quoted by the seller who is given license to appeal to buyers not in the know.

This is not trivial because there are many tubes that cannnot be tested for mutual conductance on the B&K 707 and a person can be out a lot of money if they don't realize this since many sellers of tube testers do not take returns. Now, one might say to me that I should have done more homework before deciding to purchase. That may be true but since the ad is not accompanied by an obligation of full disclosure by Ebay sellers how is one to know that the ad is misleading -- and that the seller is running a misleading ad? I might never have learned this information until the unit arrived overseas and I looked through the tube charts to my dismay.

The Ebay seller in question had things all figured out. He knew I was right and that I might leave negative feedback. So he offered to take the unit back if I left positive feedback for him. Since the unit was sitting at a commercial shipping company, unopened, waiting for shipment to me overseas and I had no use for it at that point I agreed to leave positive feedback and return the unit at my expense for refund.

When he received the unit back he said it had been tampered with -- inferring that I did the tampering -- and that he could not send me a refund. I told him I live overseas and am not in the States and that my shipper is a commercial shipper that simply returned the unopened box to him. I appealed to Ebay and PayPal but to no avail.

This particular seller has been refurbishing B&K 707 tube testers for years. In his advertisement he said he refurbished and tested the unit and that it was ready for years of trouble-free use. But when he received it back, all of a sudden it was not only unusable it was unrepairable. He said there were 2 shorts and he could only find one so the tester was junk to him.

There are more and more of us who are acquiring tube equipment and who will be looking for a tube tester to make sure the NOS tubes they will be using are not only as matched as possible, but also have no shorts. Beware there are many pitfalls on Ebay for potential purchasers of the B&K 707. Unscrupulous sellers are plying their trade on Ebay.