worth a punt or ill advised? looking at spending £250 on a handset that retails for £350 in shops, foolhardy?

just check the seller feedback / history.

any other thoughts?

Bought my iPhone 4 from eBay. No problems whatsoever. Paid 470 just after they came out so saved a fair bit.

I would watch out, I sold a very scruffy sony X1 on fleabay, expected about £30-50 for it and went for £102, I put extrememly detailed photos up of all the damage and scratchs but even then people went wild for it.

A fair number that go on there have wrong descriptions, ‘good, excellent condition’ often refers to ‘dropped a few times, sticky buttons and virtually buggered battery, as people are either ignorant or just playing dumb.

i suppose that’s the danger hmmm might play it safe on this occasion

Be very carefull, Friend of mine bought a HTC recently only for it to get blocked a 2 weeks later when the previous owner reported it as stolen. No amount of calls to the service provider would sort the problem. Ended up chasing it through ebay which was as much use as whistling underwater.