Do a search on eBay for ‘crocs’ – those ghastly plastic shoes worn by holiday makers and imbeciles – and you’ll find about 50,000 items. Many are the garish charms that are fixed to the footwear, but nevertheless there are still thousands of pairs of shoes on sale.

Which is why avid Bitterwallet reader Claire isn’t sure why her listing for a pair of crocs was removed by eBay – even after spending two hours on eBay live chat with three of their customer service reps. Initially the listing was flagged up as fraudulent, but then it transpired there was another reason:

eBay: We had to remove you item because, SNB-REACT Netherlands, an intellectual property rights owner, sent us a signed legal statement telling us that your item infringed their copyright, trademark or other rights.

Claire: What does that mean? Are you not allowed to sell Crocs on Ebay any more?

eBay: The rights Owners had issue with you selling their item.

Claire: And…?

eBay: If you think your listing was wrongly removed (or if the rights owner doesn’t have an About Me page), you can contact them directly at their email address. If you’re able to resolve the issue with the rights owner, and they grant you permission to relist the item, then just ask them to write back to us and we will surely reinstate your item.

Claire: There are thousands of pairs of crocs on ebay – you’re telling me that every one of those has emailed some bloke in the Netherlands and they’ve sent you the explicit permission??

eBay: They are the actual Rights Owners of the item that you are selling.

Claire: And…?

eBay: So, you need to contact them in order to sort this issue as they would be in a better position to make you understand the reason why your item breached their policy.

Claire: But my item hasn’t breached any policy!

eBay: In that case you can surely contact the Rights Owners and discuss the issue with them. If your item is reported again and removed repeatedly then it might affect your account status.

Claire: So let me confirm… Some bloke says he doesn’t like my listing, but won’t say why. You end it, but won’t tell me why either. I get threatened that my account status will be ‘affected’ if I ignore the non-warning, and I’m the one who has to mess around emailing people in Holland to try and work out what is going on? And then when I eventually sort it out, you guys get money for all my hard work?

eBay: I do understand your frustration in this matter. However, you need to contact the Rights owners to sort this issue.

We suspect after the first hour Claire was continuing the conversation purely for shits and giggles, but eventually the supervisor joined the conversation to answer Claire’s questions:

Supervisor: The information about the About Me page was provided by the previous representative just to give you further details of the Rights Owner.

Claire: What ‘about me’ page?! There was no info provided!!

Supervisor: Also, at present, we’re not in a position to provide you with the exact details of the breach.

Claire: Why? Because you don’t know? Or because you can clearly see there wasn’t one?

Supervisor: I’m looking for this Rights Owner’s website.

Supervisor: We normally suggests members to check the About Me page of the Rights Owner.

Claire: Which is where?

Supervisor: There is no About me page for this Rights Owner.

The conversation continues for another hour, and only ends when the operator disconnects because Claire becomes suspicious of the staff’s command of the English language, since they flatly refuse to answer any of her questions, the sort that any customer would think to ask in the same situation. Furthermore, Claire’s account still has a black mark against it, until the ‘breach’ is resolved with the rights owners. There can’t be many better ways to spend a Sunday evening, surely?

People who go on ferries, like Gerry and his Pacemakers, are expected to get a whole bunch of new compensation rights if their journey is delayed or cancelled.

How about that?

At the moment, ferry passengers generally have the right to a refund or a place on a later ferry if any journey is disrupted. However, airline customers have had much more protection (unless you’re flying with a bunch of shagsacks), such as compensation if a flight from a European airport is affected. If you fly, you can get compensation… if you sail, you can get fucked.

So, if the new regulations are adopted (which it is looking like they will), you’ll be entitled to:

A full refund or re-routing if a journey is cancelled or delayed for more than 90 minutes; free meals and accommodation of up to three nights if you’re stranded because of a cancellation or delay; compensation of between 25% and 50% of a ticket price if a journey is delayed or cancelled; free assistance for people who are disabled, as well as compensation for damage or loss of their mobility equipment.

Siim Kallas, vice-president of the European Commission and in charge of transport issues, said the change in regulations would “extend passenger rights to further transport modes”.

“This means that passengers travelling by water will benefit from the same basic quality service standards wherever they travel in the European Union.

“We hope that the European framework of passengers’ rights might soon be completed by the adoption of a regulation on rights for passengers travelling by bus and coach.”

[Beeb]

A customer actively knowing more about their rights, yesterday

Do you know your rights? Apparently you do. You may not think you do, whilst you’re sat there, dribbling at your flickering monitor in your stained undercrackers, listlessly flicking dead insects from your hair whilst dreaming of a day when you’ll be allowed to eat Angel Delight dry from the packet wearing nothing more than a dirty grin in a bus-stop… but you are more aware of your rights than ever before.

That’s according to studies by some staggeringly dull people at the Office of Fair Trading (OFT). They’re saying that internet shoppers are more aware of what is just and more online retailers are complying with consumer protection laws than ever before.

In essence, retailers are upping their game because they’re aware that they’re being watched by a horde of e-smartarses.

The OFT carried out a survey of online shoppers and a study of online shops in a follow up to research from 2007 (remember 2007? What a year that was! It was International Heliophysical Year as well as being the year Anna Nicole Smith randomly shuffled off her mortal honkers) which showed that a lot of consumers were completely ignorant of their rights and many sites thought it would be fine to take advantage of it.

The report said, without anything moist to counterbalance the dryness: “Overall assumed compliance and information provision by online businesses has improved with more sites now providing full geographical addresses, and fewer sites imposing restrictions on cancellations,” it said.

Assumed compliance? What does that mean? Apparently, it’s the term used in these studies when sites they examine appear to operate in line with the law.

“A greater proportion of sites reviewed in 2009 appeared to comply on all aspects for which they were assessed,” said its report of its ’sweep’ of retail websites. “While the web sweep covered larger businesses, it is possible that assumed compliance of smaller sites, not included in the review, also improved due to the larger sites setting a higher standard.”

Isn’t that thrilling news? They go on to give woolly figures about how we’re all better equipped when it comes to calling out foul play on retailers who think it’s alright to mess us about. I’d tell you the stats but, to be quite honest, you’d probably try killing yourselves (again) if I typed it all out.

The report also claims that less of you are using price comparison websites. They reckon that’s because we’re more likely to keep going back to familiar sites, rather than concluding that price comparison shopping was on the wane. Whether they’ve looked into the fact that price comparison sites make the most irritating adverts on TV is not clear. I know for a fact that there’s a secret army of people being gathered in an underground lair ready to find the people responsible for the Go Compare commercial, ready to flog them like canines in the street.

So what does all this statistical shit mean? Effectively, it suggests that we’re all a lot more confident when buying crap online… but you chumps probably knew that anyway. Sorry for wasting your time.

[Register]