Following Valve’s reveal of Steam Deck, pre-orders went live and it was difficult for many to reserve one. Scalpers naturally came in and are now listing pre-orders for thousands of dollars, so now eBay is cracking down on Steam Deck scalpers.
The news that eBay is cracking down on Steam Deck scalpers comes via Eurogamer, where the digital marketplace said they’re clamping down on every single scalped Steam Deck listing. eBay is doing this by utilizing their policy of cancelling any auction that does not deliver its product(s) within 30 days of the auction’s end.
It’s worth noting that all of the Steam Deck scalper listings are priced at well over double or more of the handheld’s actual retail price, the same predicament as the Xbox Series X And PlayStation 5 scalpers prior to those console launches. eBay came under fire when those consoles were not only hard to find but when units did appear, scalpers frequently snagged and flipped them.
“We understand how frustrating it can be for gamers to see overpriced listings for presale hardware,” eBay said in a statement. “To comply with eBay’s presale policy, listings must clearly indicate that they are ‘presale’ items and must guarantee postage within 30 days of purchase. As the Steam Deck is not expected to ship until next year, these listings are in violation of our presale policy, we are working to remove all listings of the product.”
eBay, like other tech companies, also uses word filters and other secret algorithms to screen things posted to their website, of which they’re using these tools to crack down on scalpers. Once these words or algorithms are discovered scalpers will try to work around them, however eBay is cracking down on Steam Deck scalpers – and they seem quite serious.
At the earliest Steam Deck is coming to consumers at the end of 2021 at the earliest, and even then shipping windows are only general estimates at this point.
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