uSell

uSell Review:

uSell acts as a go-between for individual sellers and “hundreds of professional buyers” of electronics and games. These buyers are apparently looking for bulk purchases of smart phones, tablets and other electronic devices.

Bulk buys are generally not going to pay as well as individual purchases and sales. So, don’t expect to get top-dollar here. In fact, don’t necessarily expect the quoted price. Although some buyers appear satisfied, a number maintain they were scammed. They say they didn’t get anything close to quoted price after the buyer got their goods.

How it works

Like many electronics resellers, the process of selling to uSell is easy. If you want to sell a cell phone, you plug in the type of device, capacity and condition. The site makes an offer. If you like the offer, they’ll send you a mailing label.

With other devices — tablets, cameras, computers, for instance — you click on what you’ve got; specify the model and other pertinent details to get an offer. Then, again, they’ll provide a label for shipping.

Ship and wait

Here you’ll ship the item and wait for it to be evaluated. Consumers contend this can take weeks. The site will then evaluate the phone and either provide the payment promised or revise the offer, based on their evaluation of the phone’s condition

Revised offers

The most common complaint we see about this site is that the site not only revises offers, it revises them dramatically — to $1 to $3 per phone. If you don’t like the new offer, you can reject it and the site says it will return your phone for free.

Recommendations

If you have time to sell your phone, you’ll do much better negotiating with an individual buyer on Swappa than you would here. Swappa is a marketplace that brings individual buyers and sellers together. There are no middle-men. We’ve found this site typically generates the best deal for both buyers and sellers. You can check out Swappa here.

If you want to sell to a reseller for ease — i.e. you don’t want to negotiate with the final buyer — we like ItsWorthMore. The site gets great seller reviews and is almost always among the best-paying when we’re testing site offers. You can check out ItsWorthMore here.

What their users say: From SiteJabber:

I would have given zero stars if I could but had to choose one. Sent Samsung Galaxy only two years old. Excellent condition no damage. Never been taken out of the protective case. Was supposed to get $120. Now wants to pay $27. Buyer lies an says there’s water damage. IMPOSSIBLE! Phone never dropped nor has any water damage. I’m insulted! Told them to send my phone back & it better be in the same condition that I sent it in! This company deals with dishonest ppl. DO NOT SELL YOUR PHONE TO THIS COMPANY! You will regret it. They are LIARS!

$40 offer to $3

“I sent them in a phone that was in flawless condition. It was barely two months old. They email me saying it was damaged and cut the price on what they would give me big time to $3 from $40. I am now waiting for the return of it. It better still be in perfect condition because that phone was not damaged when I mailed it”

I wish I would’ve read reviews prior to sending in my iPad mini. It worked fine, almost perfect condition but after sending in, recd msg that there was a slight imperfection so only worth $1.00! What a joke! Next time I’ll take my next device and get more pleasure by smashing it!

From ResellerRatings

“They offered $50 for my Kindle which I tested before sending and mailed in it’s protective leather case as well as lots of bubble wrap. They claim it doesn’t turn on and edited the offer to $3, gave only a week to reply and only 2 emails of notification about said downgrade. Andddd are about to charge a ton to ship it back to me since I declined their insulting bait-and-switch offer.”

“I was given a reasonable offer of $53 on their website for my Iphone 6s. I had rated my phone as “good” condition, being it was in an Otter Box for all of the 4 years I owned it since it was new. When Usell received it, it took them 3 weeks to evaluate it. Then they claimed the mic was bad and the phone was damaged! They offered me $5 for it. This is how these people make money, they lure you into sending your phone in then devalue it and sell it for a bigger profit. Stay away from Usell.”

Worked for me

I found it simple to get the application filled out, mailed in with the phone, and accepted. It sold quickly and I got a check soon after. The new owner of the phone wins, as it was a great phone, the Usell folks win because they get a cut, and I win because I got a few bucks for a phone I will no longer be using.”

“The transaction was very good and very fast no problems.”

Updated 2/12/2023