Buyers and Sellers refresh guide to being a good eBay member. Copied from a eBay source of rules for buyers.

Rules for Buyers - Overview

eBay's policies help to create a safe, fair, and enjoyable trading environment for our eBay Community. As a buyer, you're responsible for reviewing and understanding eBay’s policies, including the eBay User Agreement.

eBay’s policies are intended to:

Support government laws and regulations

Minimize risks to buyers and sellers

Provide equal opportunity to all buyers

Provide an enjoyable buying experience

Support eBay Community values

Buyer Guidelines

As a buyer, you must:

Commit to paying for the item you win in a bid or through Buy It Now. Most of the items on eBay are auction-like listings and each bid is a binding contract to buy if you win. To understand the penalties for not paying, see the Unpaid Item Policy.

Bid with serious intention to buy the item, including when placing a non-binding bid (for qualifying items such as real estate and vehicles). Non-binding bids still signify your serious intent in buying the item, and insincere bidding isn't permitted.

Only use the bid retraction option for qualifying circumstances (for example, you entered too many zeroes in your bid amount). Never use this option to manipulate the bidding process.

Bid on or buy an item only when you meet the seller’s buyer terms as described in the item listing. (For example, the seller might specify that the buyer must live in a certain country or use a specified payment method.) Only bid or buy with the intention of buying the item, never to disrupt a listing. Violation of these policies is considered unwelcome and malicious buying.

Use Buy It Now rather than bidding if you're connected to the seller in any way, because people like the seller's family members, coworkers, friends, and roommates can have knowledge of the item not available to other bidders. Sellers can't bid on their own item. Engaging in shill bidding to artificially increase an item’s price or apparent desirability violates eBay policies and is against the law in many places.

Both buyers and sellers may not interfere with a transaction or offer to buy or sell listed items outside of the eBay site (see Rules for Everyone – Overview).

Posts made in eBay’s Want It Now must also comply with eBay policies. For more information, see the Want It Now Policy page.

Violation of these policies may result in a range of actions, including:

Listing cancellation

Limits on account privileges

Account suspension

Forfeit of eBay fees on canceled listings Loss of PowerSeller status

To understand eBay’s selling rules, see Rules for Sellers – Overview.

To learn more about eBay’s rules, you can take the Marketplace Policy Tutorial and other Trust and Safety tutorials.

We can all help make eBay a better place to Buy and Sell.