Extremely frustrated with Catawiki's submission process. I have tried to list great Pokémon items multiple times, only for them to be repeatedly rejected.
Initially, the experts claimed my items did not meet their €50 minimum value threshold. To fix this, I grouped more items together to easily clear that threshold, but they still rejected the lot anyway. Their valuation is completely inaccurate based on current market prices.It feels like the experts are highly biased, they accept identical objects from other sellers while constantly rejecting my lots. They make it incredibly difficult for genuine sellers to get approved. Catawiki's expert system needs a major upgrade and a serious review for consistency and fairness.
I purchased a Capocine bag (Order #*******) through Catawiki. The item arrived in an unusable condition – it smells strongly of damp and moths, clearly from poor storage over many years. It is impossible to use and completely misrepresented. I contacted both the seller and Catawiki immediately to request a refund. To date, I have had no proper response from either. The seller has ignored messages, and Catawiki has failed to step in or provide any resolution. This experience has shown me that Catawiki does not protect buyers. Once they have your money, their "support" is non-existent, even when goods are clearly unfit for purpose and not as described. Warning to others: Do not trust this seller or Catawiki. If something goes wrong, you will be left fighting for your money back with no help. I will be pursuing this further through my payment provider and consumer protection authorities, but I want to warn others: avoid Catawiki and avoid this seller – they do not stand behind what they sell.
Catawiki is a platform that facilitates and protects consumer fraud. I purchased what was explicitly advertised in a dedicated "Fur Auction" as a "Fur Coat" (Lot *******). Upon receipt, the garment was a cheap Alpaca/Wool textile blend. Marketing a textile as "Fur" is a "Bait and Switch" and a violation of EU Directive 2005/29/EC and the Italian Consumer Code (Art. 21).
When I alerted Catawiki to this factual, material misrepresentation, their "Experts"—who are supposed to verify these listings—refused to honor their "Buyer Protection." They ignored the physical garment labels that proved the item was wool, and they ignored the fact that the coat was a German Size 46 (3XL) despite being listed as a "Medium."
Furthermore, the listing used deceptive photography; the coat appeared floor-length on a misleadingly small model, but barely reaches the knees in reality.
Catawiki does not protect buyers; they protect dishonest sellers to secure their commissions. I have had to escalate this to a bank chargeback/stop payment and am out an additional €73 in return freight because the seller and platform refused to acknowledge basic European consumer law.
Advice to others: Do not trust their "Expert" labels. They are a facade for unverified, misrepresented listings. If you are scammed, bypass their customer service immediately and go straight to your bank.
Date of experience: February 2026
Legal Fact for the Reddit person (Re: Age of the coat)
If the Reddit commenter is questioning the age/ISO standards, here is the legal response regarding why the seller's description is a violation regardless of the coat's age:
English: "The age of the coat is a distraction from the legal breach. Under the Italian Civil Code (Art. 1497), a seller must guarantee the 'essential qualities' of the product. Whether it's 1970s or 1990s, 'Wool' is not 'Fur.' Furthermore, using a 1990s label to claim a 'Medium' size for a German 46 is a failure of conformity. Sizing standards (ISO 3635) have never classified a 108cm chest (Size 46) as a Medium. The seller intentionally misclassified the size and material to inflate the value."
Extremely frustrated with Catawiki's submission process. I have tried to list great Pokémon items multiple times, only for them to be repeatedly rejected. Initially, the experts claimed my items did not meet their €50 minimum value threshold. To fix this, I grouped more items together to easily clear that threshold, but they still rejected the lot anyway. Their valuation is completely inaccurate based on current market prices.It feels like the experts are highly biased, they accept identical objects from other sellers while constantly rejecting my lots. They make it incredibly difficult for genuine sellers to get approved. Catawiki's expert system needs a major upgrade and a serious review for consistency and fairness.
Catawiki is a platform that facilitates and protects consumer fraud. I purchased what was explicitly advertised in a dedicated "Fur Auction" as a "Fur Coat" (Lot *******). Upon receipt, the garment was a cheap Alpaca/Wool textile blend. Marketing a textile as "Fur" is a "Bait and Switch" and a violation of EU Directive 2005/29/EC and the Italian Consumer Code (Art. 21).
When I alerted Catawiki to this factual, material misrepresentation, their "Experts"—who are supposed to verify these listings—refused to honor their "Buyer Protection." They ignored the physical garment labels that proved the item was wool, and they ignored the fact that the coat was a German Size 46 (3XL) despite being listed as a "Medium."
Furthermore, the listing used deceptive photography; the coat appeared floor-length on a misleadingly small model, but barely reaches the knees in reality.
Catawiki does not protect buyers; they protect dishonest sellers to secure their commissions. I have had to escalate this to a bank chargeback/stop payment and am out an additional €73 in return freight because the seller and platform refused to acknowledge basic European consumer law.
Advice to others: Do not trust their "Expert" labels. They are a facade for unverified, misrepresented listings. If you are scammed, bypass their customer service immediately and go straight to your bank.
Date of experience: February 2026
Legal Fact for the Reddit person (Re: Age of the coat) If the Reddit commenter is questioning the age/ISO standards, here is the legal response regarding why the seller's description is a violation regardless of the coat's age:
English: "The age of the coat is a distraction from the legal breach. Under the Italian Civil Code (Art. 1497), a seller must guarantee the 'essential qualities' of the product. Whether it's 1970s or 1990s, 'Wool' is not 'Fur.' Furthermore, using a 1990s label to claim a 'Medium' size for a German 46 is a failure of conformity. Sizing standards (ISO 3635) have never classified a 108cm chest (Size 46) as a Medium. The seller intentionally misclassified the size and material to inflate the value."
I purchased a Capocine bag (Order #*******) through Catawiki. The item arrived in an unusable condition – it smells strongly of damp and moths, clearly from poor storage over many years. It is impossible to use and completely misrepresented. I contacted both the seller and Catawiki immediately to request a refund. To date, I have had no proper response from either. The seller has ignored messages, and Catawiki has failed to step in or provide any resolution. This experience has shown me that Catawiki does not protect buyers. Once they have your money, their "support" is non-existent, even when goods are clearly unfit for purpose and not as described. Warning to others: Do not trust this seller or Catawiki. If something goes wrong, you will be left fighting for your money back with no help. I will be pursuing this further through my payment provider and consumer protection authorities, but I want to warn others: avoid Catawiki and avoid this seller – they do not stand behind what they sell.
After winning a lot on Catawiki and immediately paying for the lot, I was waiting for an entire week and after I realized the lot hasn't been dispatched by the seller, I wrote to the seller, who replied in an obscuring manner that he's on a month-long vacation and that he kind of sold the lot to someone else. It is hard to understand what he really means as it is written in Spanish. I then wrote to Catawiki support and asked to clarify to me what is going on. Catawiki replied (see the screenshot # 1) that they DID COMMUNICATE with the seller and the seller offered an alternative solution. Then I wrote another couple messages to the seller asking to explain and to be more specific and the dispatch date of the lot. There was no more communication from the seller, so I wrote to Catawiki, who sent me conflicting replies. Then after a few "wait, the seller will ship it after his vacation" Catawiki finally admitted lying in their first message (see screenshot # 2) where they wrote they did NOT receive any reply from the seller, thus contradicting themselves. Catawiki held to my money for as long as they could and now they promise to refund it within 10 business days. I know they will, but the damage to their and their seller's reputation has been done on multiple occasions.
Date of experience: August 6, 2025
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I am a seller and unfortunately 2-3 times an item wasn't paid by the bidder, but their system reoffererd the item without us aware and someone bidded 2 euros and won without our knowledge, this item we sold before because people kept not paying. The issue is now the person left negative review which affects our reputation, I think they should offer more protection against such cases as this is not fair. We even offered the customer another free fossil, but they are not responding. This is very unfortunate and a lack of customer service from catawiki. Really disappointing as I've been on Catawiki for 4-5 years and got 100% positive feedback and we are a small business that cares for customers. Really shameful on catawikis part. As it was their systems issue, and we have checked and AGAIN, their system has uploaded the item again when I've told atleast 3 representatives that this item wasn't available and sold already? At very best they should neutralise the review and remove the item from their system. *******
Won an auction for some Gamboy games. Did my payment of 150€. After a week i get a notice that my paymeny is still pending. If not paid, i would recieve a fine + Some other threatening BS. I forwarded my payment note as proof, didn't exept. Called in a lawyer from my side to check upon this we replied with some return threatening from our side about fraud. After 2 weeks seller "cancelled" the order, i never got the games neither my money back. And the communication stopped after we threatened from our side. Note that i had bought stuff before on catawiki already but now it's just bad.
As I have already mentioned, in November 2024 I bought an item that was supposed to arrive in December. The item never arrived and Catawiki, instead of taking responsibility and holding the seller accountable, says it is not their problem. After many emails and messages to Catawiki and the Italian seller, I have had enough of not receiving any help from them. Today I received a message from the SEUR company saying that the item has been returned to the seller BRT Bartolini, who shows no signs of life and apparently has kept the money and the item. I have been very DISAPPOINTED with Catawiki. IT IS NOT RELIABLE. BE VERY CAREFUL.
Ho presentato piu`volte oggetti che non sono stati accettati dall`esperto a far perdere tempo.Lo stesso esperto,approva aste con stessi prodotti e con spese di spedizione da 100 euro. Solo per correttezza non pubblico il nome di questo esperto del nulla.Ma e`ormai palese che Catawiki e`ricca di incompetenti e collusi con altri venditori da cui certamente ricevono le mazzettine. La prossima volta scrivo anche il nome dell`esperto in: Complicazioni affari semplici.Piu`che esperti,molti in Catawiki sono solo: Braccia rubate all`agricoltura.
Not to be trusted, does vouch for its sellers, does not guarantee performance of its vendors. I've purchased an item and paid for it and for the shipping. When it was not delivered, Catawiki didn't do anything either to discipline or to delist the vendor.
The worst experience I've ever had with these guys. Long story short, the Support team is unresponsive, the fees they apply are huge, the bids are fake most of the time and only serve their interest, trying to squeeze out the most of your money. Don't put your trust and money in their hands, you'll be disappointed!
I bought a number of lots of vintage wine on Catawiki. Sometimes it went smoothly, but there are sellers who will not send you the lot you won if they're not happy with the price. Instead of severely penalising such dishonest behaviour, Catawiki just offers you a refund. One seller openly told me he doesn't care about being banned because he brings Catawiki profit and they make money off him. He had 4-5 negative reviews from buyers who never got the lots they won at auctions, but he just keeps selling like nothing happened. A dismal and short-sighted business model, not recommended.
Very, very bad for sellers. Super low realized prices. Lots of mistakes on age/origin assessment by the "experts" who review the lots. One "expert" will declare an object as Japanese in origin while a later "expert" will state it is Chinese. Meanwhile, many weeks/months have passed. Same goes for determining genuine antique from new modern articles which are sometimes confused at Catawiki by the "experts". It seems the experts rush through your listing without carefully considering it might have greater merit than they understand. Catawiki tries to force all listings to start with no reserve, if you don't agree they won't allow your listing. Their prices realized results are very poor compared with other auction houses for comparable items. Sellers have to pay out of pocket for many costs which Catawiki makes no mention of such as taxes, bank fees, exchange rates, transfer fees and more. They also try to force you into very tight shipping costs parameters and pressure you to fall within these which often results in the seller losing money on shipping. There is no compensation for your time in wrapping the item, filling in the paperwork, travel to the post office, purchased on wrapping, packing material, tape, scissors, pens, etc., and follow up correspondence with the buyer/Catawiki/ the postal authorities in case of inquiries on the package which can be considerable. Very often, buyers will wait a long time before they pay - it could be weeks or months - you as the seller have to idea when this will happen - if ever. You can't be sure if the buyer will follow through which leaves you hanging on when/whether to prepare the package - a big issue when you have other work to tend to - also bad since Catawiki rates on your shipping performance when such issues are not your fault - their Customer service also takes weeks/moths before they respond and sometimes they ignore you all together. Then, with the non payer,after many weeks, Catawiki will announce they have cancelled the sale, leaving you out of pocket time, money, effort, and reputation which they in no way try to help alleviate even though this is a crime according to European law and they have been informed many times over via email of this - they don't care at all. And finally, the submission forms a seller has to fill out are complex and time consuming which adds to your time investment as a seller which you will never get back if the sale is cancelled – and again Catawiki offers no recourse or actions to alleviate this situation for future sales. Despite Catawiki stating they will relist you items again at the same starting price in these cases, they don't usually. They wait again a couple of weeks and then come back to you asking you to remove the requested reserve price before listing. If you don't conform, your listing allowed. And finally, sometimes buyers refuse packages, and the package gets sent back to you at your cost, creating further nightmares in communication with the buyer, the post office, and Catawiki of which again are not compensated. Having tried selling and buying on Catawiki since 2017, overall it has been a net loss when all considered and I can't recommend it to others as a result.
I used to buy 2-5 things evey year. And this time I did buy. Nice bottle of springbank but oh boy then shipement should have arrived and it didn't crap started to show. I contacted seller first but only information from him was sending tracking number and claiming its already at pick up point. After calling dpd multiple times I opened a claim through catawiki. And look what happens its my problem I could not pick up order (even though I could not because there was no notification or possibility to pick it up) and they will pay my money to seller regardless if he delivers it to me. Wow thats top notch customer care
WORD OF WARNING FOR THOSE THAT WANT TO SELL ON CATAWIKI: I decided to sell Apollo 11 Nasa photographs and at the beginning it went ok but after a while I noticed Catawiki were not letting some countries see my entries but were sending another person's across all countries, because they sell far more items on Catawiki than the average seller so they pay Catawiki far more commission. Catawiki staff are obviously behaving in a corrupt manner. I have attached photographs to back up my point regarding their favouritism towards big sellers. If you look at the pictures its blatantly obvious how corrupt catawiki is and how they are breaking fair competition laws as laid out by the EU. They have made it a nightmare for the average seller, and this should be taken up by a legal official as the photos I sell are identical to the other sellers, but it is clear from the pictures attached that there is corruption. All of the high figures are for the other seller and their 'x' is inside the bracket. Catawiki have no problem with me buying from them but they block most of what I try to sell. Their experts, when questioned, know little about their specialist areas. They should hang their heads in shame. I have so much proof there can be little or no argument regarding corruption
I am so disappointed. The problem is that the delivery does not correspond with my address delivery, and it is not the first time when such an incident has happened here! I have an order that online is marked as delivered, and the updates are showing that they still need to deliver it to my address. Anyway, be aware of the sellers that have bad reviews and also the time that it is saying the delivery is done and the 3 days when you can submit a claim on Catawiki! Check and let them know, otherwise, they will say cannot help you and it is between you and the seller! My experience buying here online ended, I am going to buy from another trusted auction site! Hope is helpful and be aware! Regards
I thought I should shear my experience Following some broker on Instagram, I end up losing my saving money and profits. With the help of ' WIKIHELPDESKS@ G-MAIL. COM ' I was able to retrieve my losts
Catawiki is all fake. Expertise does not exist as Catawiki claims on its website, nor do guarantees. Catawiki suggests sales amounts, but these are also fake, as you are always outbid. When you finally stop bidding higher, it turns out your previous bid is the highest after all. Their policy states that you MUST BUY at the highest bid, which is yours.
They sell junk that sellers can't get rid of. These products are also offered on second-hand sites, which is why it takes a while for you to receive them from Catawiki. They need to have your money first to then buy it from second-hand sites. And so on and so forth... Datum van ervaring: 10 oktober 2023
اشتريت ساعه من مزاد بقيمة 139€ مع الشحن لم يصلني الساعه ولم يردوا مالي حاولت التواصل معهم لا يردون والبائع ايضاً لا يجاوب يبدوا ان هناك اتفاق احتيال بينهم وبين بعض البائعين أين مالي ؟ لماذا يقومون بغش الناس والاستيلاء علي أموالهم واين الرقابه علي تلك المواقع المحتاله لن اتركهم أبدا مهما كلفني الامر
Answer:There is customer support but you'll have to be patient. It can take weeks for them to get back to you. Buyers are protected, you just need to push and keep pushing. Sellers are required to send everything with tracking and insurance, so you should be OK.
