I’m not very good with numbers. Hopeless in fact. I’d got myself in a bit of a tizzy over my tax return and thought I owed a lot more than I did. In fact, the tax bill was much smaller than originally anticipated. Too late though as in a panic, I’d lobbed the Discovery on Ebay, where I discovered the downsides to selling just after Christmas. It made just £600. Yes, that was more than the utterly bargainous £450 I’d paid for it, but I’d spent a lot on it since then.

Driving it while the auction was live gave me a real sanity check. I really like it! With half a ton of sawdust briquettes in the back, it rides like a limousine – we thought we’d better collect the next load while we actually owned something capable of hauling it. However, I’m an honest man and when the auction finished for a feeble £600, I was fully prepared to honour the deal.

Things didn’t go to plan though. I usually ask people with less than ten feedback on Ebay to contact me with a phone number before bidding, in the hope it’d keep the timewasters at bay. So, I had a phone number for my ‘buyer’, who seemed reluctant to get in touch. I called the number – number not recognised. Great.

Looks like I can do more of this then!

Days ticked by, so I opened a dispute on Ebay, which you can do after two days. The ‘buyer’ now had four days to pay for the item. He occasionally dropped me a message – his phone had been stolen but he still wanted it – but the four days lapsed. I claimed my money back from Ebay and the ‘buyer’ got an unpaid item mark against him. Despite providing my PayPal details, a deposit was not forthcoming. Tough! Proving that the ‘buyer’ was perhaps just not very Ebay savvy rather than a malicious timewaster, he actually phoned me six days after the auction finished wanting to make arrangements for collection! No, sorry. You had your chance, failed to respond to the dispute, time is up.

So, I still own the Land Rover, and have had yet another hopeless Ebay experience. That’s two cars that have failed to sell now, and when you check the sales listings, it’s amazing how many cars are “relisted due to timewaster.” I think I shall try elsewhere in future.

However, after a lot of faff, I can now look forward to continuing with the Discovery’s restoration. I’m hoping to tackle some RTV trials too, for something a bit different!