I posted this separately because it touches base on a separate, but yet very important issue.

eBay has another company that it uses to handle the risks of passing large amounts of money forward to a seller. The company is www.Escrow.com

You can figure out how Escrow.com works by logging in to the page, but the main gist of it is that you send your payment to escrow.com and once they receive it, they forward an email to the seller to let them know that your payment is secured. The seller then sends the item to you, and you let escrow.com know when the shipment arrives, and confirm or deny that it is in the condition you expected it to be in.

If you confirm that everything is A-okay, then escrow forwards your payment to the seller. BUT - if there's something wrong with the delivery, you tell escrow.com about the problem, and they make sure YOU GET YOUR MONEY RETURNED TO YOU AND THE SELLER CAN'T PREVENT THIS FROM HAPPENING.

Now THAT is insurance!