gumtree.com > Reviews (29)

Gumtree is a website dedicated to free ads of certain areas of the globe. It is advertised as UK n°1 website for classified ads but it has branches also in other Worldwide locations (Australia, Poland, New Zeland, Asia and South Africa) plus European and North American partners, meaning other websites called differently but offering the same service.

The website is divided into main areas of the UK and each main city in those areas have their own space for posting your ads. So if you live in Manchester you will post your ads in your local area. Also the search of items for sale is local, there isn't yet a function for a global search, mainly because most of transactions end with a collection in person so it's useless to search items across the UK if you live in Cardiff.

Classified ads are divided into categories:
Flat & Houses
Services
Pets
Friends & Dating
Cars For Sale
Stuff For Sale
Jobs
Community

Each one has sub categories, for example in Flat & Houses there are subcategories such as For Rent and For Sale, each one again divided into Offered and Wanted. So if you are looking for something you know exactly where to search. Posting ads is free. They stay up for 120 days, after that time they disappear and you need to post it again. The adverts are usually posted imediately but sometimes they take up to 1 or 2 days to show up. Everyday your advert will lose its high position going down in the list the more days pass, so the high peak of inquiries will probably be in the first 3 days from posting. After that it's rare to get interested people noticing your post. To have your post always in first line you have to pay... and this is why Gumtree is owned by Ebay, at least that's what I've heard. It's all about money, if you don't pay your visibility is really scarce. However you can still post for free with one picture allowed (if you want more you pay!) and getting some stuff sold. No inserction or final fees.

Sounds great doesn't it? Well it's not really. Personally speaking Gumtree really ticks me off for several different reasons.
First of all it's usually a waste of time, more than once I posted an advert which was automatically removed (without anyone telling you) from their system for preventing spam or frauds. I'm at the point that everytime I post a single ad it gets deleted soon after, so that I have to contact the admins and tell them to look into it. They always reply something like "we have looked into it and it seems that there is no problem at all, your ad has been restored and please let us know if it happens again"... well thanks for nothing it happens ALL THE TIME I post a single ad! Some other times silly people decide they don't like your ad and report it as fraud to the customer service which promptly delete it without even looking into it. Again you have to contact them and tell them to check why it has been deleted.
So these are the problems with the website and its hyper-sensitive spam/fraud filter. Another problem is the people who navigate into it.

It must be because I'm selling in the city of Glasgow mostly, perhaps other cities have better people, but it's full of cheapskates and time wasters you wouldn't imagine. Of the many ads I've put in these years the stuff that I actually managed to sell is so little that I don't think it would be even the 0.01%. People asking for appalling discounts (if I'm selling new DVDs for £2... and I mean NEW... there is still someone asking to have them for less, how CHEAP can you be???), people asking to meet in town and never show up (only done it once and never again! Learnt my lesson), people not showing up at your house and never contact you again... what is wrong with people buying on gumtree??? What is wrong with the glaswegians on gumtree????? Sorry people, nothing against glaswegians but the ones on gumtree must be a race on its own.

I'll never waste my time ever again on Gumtree, not simply for the annoying website but also for the people who just like to wind you up. Perhaps in other cities it works better but I would rather prefer to spend some money on ebay fees than go through the hassle of posting an ad on gumtree. Personally I wouldn't suggest it to anyone. Too few serious people (buyers) around gumtree.