Marktplaats

Watch out for Markplaats!

Here’s another post not very related to seeds and gardening.  It’s also somewhat specific to the Netherlands, but I think it’s a useful thing to be in English, because there are expats who may read this.  Those of you who live other places may have similar websites.

Marktplats.nl is a website owned by Ebay, and primarily a place where you can put up free classified ads to buy and sell second hand things, either for a fixed price or auction.  It used to be an independent site, but got bought early on by Ebay.  It’s sort of a mini Dutch language Ebay, with things specific to the Netherlands.  As well as classified ads, it’s possible to leave reviews, giving your opinions on the merchants.  As well as free ads, there are various paid options, like better placement or the ability to mention an external website.  It’s very popular here, or at least used to be.

I regularly read comments on the Internet of people who try to use free ads.  They say they end up placed on page 9 or something, completely unfindable.  People also complain that as soon as you sign up and give them your email address, they flood you with spam, and you can never get them to stop.  It’s pretty clear, maybe logical, that they really only care about their customers who place paid ads.

It’s also not as safe a site as you might think.  It was in the news recently, that someone was arrested for pretending to sell tickets to events, but then just taking people’s money.  He ripped off more than 200 people before he was stopped, which is a lot of people for a country as small as the Netherlands.  You might wonder why on a site where you can leave comments about merchants, so many people would get ripped off.  The way it should work, is people should be able to leave reviews and ratings, and honest people should build up their own reputation.  Dishonest people should have a hard time getting established.

Well I just got ripped off using Marktplaats the other day, and in the process I learned something important about how it works.

I don’t usually use Marktplaats to buy and sell stuff, rather I look for services.  In this case, I was looking for a plumber.  I choose a plumber who had been on Marktplaats for 7 years or something silly like that, and only had positive reviews, all of them spread out one or two at a time, over the entire 7 years.  The name on the ad was ‘Daniel’, and only a mobile phone number and email address was given for contact information.  I also chose him based on geographic location, an option in the site’s search engine, because I only wanted to work with someone based nearby.

As it turned out, he had paid for multiple listings in multiple locations, and actually came from out of town.  Not only did he have multiple locations for the name ‘Daniel’, but I was able to see later that he also had multiple listings under other names.  When he showed up at my house, he wore a sort of uniform with the name AKC-Loodgieters, and there is a website with this name.

After getting ripped off by him, I went to Marktplaats to leave a negative review.  I created a new account using a disposable email address, clicked away their terms and conditions, and left my review which appeared instantly.  It was a pretty straight forward review, saying I was ripped off, explaining how and why, and advising others to choose another plumber.

Ik heb geen specifiek klachten over de qualiteit van de werkzaamheden, maar Daniel is geen bijzonder vakman. Ik heb €1450 betaald voor iets met waarde €700. Daniel biedt geen eerlijk dienst voor geen eerlijk prijs, en wel een oplichter is.

Eerst was de onderzoek. Voor dit moet ik €500 vooruit betalen. Hij moet naar Almere rijden voor een héél duur (2000 euro) apparaat met en camera om binnen mijn rioolering te kijken. Daniel was agressief en grof over dit vooruit betaling, dat niet normaal is. Hij was niet duidelijk hoezo dit zo duur moeten zijn. Dit onderzoek was met waarde €200, inclusief duur apparaat, en was niet sluitende over de oorzaak van de probleem.

Ten slotte was de reparatie. Eerst biedt Daniel een prijs van €2000, helemaal vooruit betaald. Dit heeft niets te doen met de werkzaamheden, gewoon wat ik was klaar om te betalen voor een oplossing. Daarna praten wij over de specifiek werkzaamheden, en komt naar een prijs van €700 inclusief onderdeel (Daniel zeg hij dacht de onderdeel kost €200), ook 100% vooruit betalen. Daniel daarna belt mij te zeggen de onderdeel was €450 en eist nog een betaling van €250, anders gebruikt hij een laag *qualiteit alternatief. Een gelijk onderdeel is wel bestelbaar op amazon.de voor €60-150, afhankelijk van qualiteit. Dit reparatie, inclusief onderdeel, heeft waarde van €500.

Dit advertentie heeft geen legitimatie bewijs, geen website, alleen een 06 nummer en de naam ‘Daniel’. Het zeg niets dat Daniel werkt ook als bedrijf AKC Loodgeiters. Je betaald contant, geen PIN, altijd 100% vooruit, altijd met grof en agresief eisen. Als je moet politie of jurdisch hulp, heeft je echt niets.

Bescherm je geld en veiligheid, kies een andere loodgeiter.

A few hours later, my review was removed and my newly created account was blocked.  I seem to have been banned from Marktplaats for leaving a negative review!  I started researching their terms and conditions, to see what I may have violated.  I found this: “Mag geen scheld- of kwetsende woorden bevatten”, which says reviews cannot contain swearing or ‘hurtful’ words.  It says if you violate these rules and are banned, you can contact their helpdesk and ask to be reinstated.

It’s now been 3 days since I sent a message to their helpdesk asking the reason my review was removed, and they haven’t answered  They seem much more interested in removing negative reviews then they are at helping you leave a negative review that satisfies their criteria as acceptable, and doesn’t contain any ‘hurtful’ words.  It would of course been no problem if I had created 3 or 4 new accounts with disposable email addresses, and left multiple positive reviews.

It’s now very clear to me how someone was able to cheat more than 200 people before being stopped by the police.  It’s much easier to file a police report than place a negative review!

Update

A few hours after making this post an item appeared in the news [in Dutch].

It says at least 8 times this year Marktplaats thieves used violence against their victims.  In different cases there were different injuries.  In one case a person lost a piece of their tooth.