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Sorry, but I couldn't help myself re. the subject, after reading the tear dripping story about the shipping to Australia. When the seller her-/himself has miscalculated S&H, they can only blame themselves for that and it is certainly not something to complain about afterwards. When the buyer's gives detailed seller ratings, it is anonymous and the seller is only showed AVERAGES. Can't see how it makes any sense that a seller should think out that this or that buyer must have given such or such rating and then contact eBay to complain about it, asking for it to be removed.  If a seller truly is honest and provides good service, both feedback and ratings will show it in the long run. And I bet that we will have to get used to sellers having lower feedback percentages, because buyers for the first time EVER can be HONEST. I have a perfect feedback and never gave even one negative. But I have been downright defrauded by several sly and horrible sellers who have threatened me with negative feedback and ruining my feedback score if I dare give them a negative. E.g. as one seller who charged me around $100 EXTRA for upgraded shipping and sent the item off surface/boat for $15 and refused to refund me after first telling me over and over again that they would do so, effectively stalling until it was too late to report them. Eventually I had to give up, as they wouldn't even answer my mails, even if I was nice and polite to them all the time (something they sure weren't!). God only knows how many others they have done that to, I bet I'm one amongst many. In my book stealing $100 from somebody is a quite big deal. And, yes, I admit it, I let myself be threatened by bad sellers, as many others, not wanting retaliatory feedback ruining my perfect score. I am always generous with positive, individualized feedback to good sellers and now also taking time with detailed rating.  I honestly think that this change will be a good thing for sellers and buyers both in the long run, as long as eBay is focussing on what they say they will be, on handling reports from sellers re. the real bad buyers. They need to get caught and booted off eBay, we don't need them there, just as we don't need those dishonest sellers. And we all need to participate in the community control eBay is based on, by reporting the ones who are out to be dishonest. I e.g. try to do my deal by searching for fraudulent auctions and reporting suspicious listings, something many others do too. Most buyers and sellers have one thing in common, they want eBay to be a great place for us all. 

And, BTW, I always use toolhaus.org to check the neutrals and negatives for a seller. A good seller that gets negatives from buyers who are inexperienced, unfair etc., is quite easy to see in that environment, especially if the seller also post follow-up in an objective and factual manner (also a great way of seeing what kind of seller you are dealing with, their comments to buyers often speaks volumes!).

Uhmmmm..... no.  If a buyer pays is not good enough for a positive feedback.  I had a buyer demand overnight shipping on an item or I would get reported.  The problem was I had only charged the buyer $10 in the auction.  It would have cost me over $50 to overnight it.  I ended up with a Neg.  Why shouldn't I be allowed to return the "favor"?

Wow, I am a buyer and a seller.  And your comment that nothing is wrong with the feedback is pretty offensive.  Are you kidding me. Maybe you might be a good buyer. But there are idiot buyers all over the place.  A customer was upset because I did not inform him before I shipped it. And after I explained to him that the only reason why I did not inform him is because I tried to surprise him by shipping it before his payment (because I dealt with him before)  And that it was impossible to inform him before shipping because of the fact that I shipped it out the same day.  He paid 3 days later and was in Canada. Do you know that he got the package a day after he paid and kept focusing on why I did not tell him ahead of time that I was shipping it instead of thinking. WOW, that was awesome.  Or a customer in Australia that paid $59 shipping and it cost us $69.50. Complained about shipping when we took a $10 loss! A customer like that should be dealt with by ebay.. They should be held accountable. So what, you paid right away.. It has nothing to do with the overall experience between the buyer and seller.  I am a fair buyer and I would never treat a seller the way some of these idiots do.  Whats worse is some buyers dont even communicate, they just blindly throw the wrong feedback at you. and if feedback is supposed to factually reflect the transaction. Then ebay should be held legally liable to protect both the seller and the buyer.  Not just one side. 

So a Buyer can pay as you say and then immediately leave a seller negative feedback for whatever reason they want?  My item got damaged in shipping and I am very mad at the seller therefor he deserves negative feedback, to be verbally abused and ridiculed, threatened.  Without ever giving the seller a chance to fix the problem with the shipment that is fully insured and can easily be replaced.

At least before when a rookie Ebay buyer leaves neglegent and unfair feedback it was possible for the seller to contact them and work out the problem to get the unfair feedback removed. Now the feedback is written in stone, no matter how nice and honest and fair the Ebay seller is. 

An over reaction from an inexperienced Ebay buyer should be reflected in a seller's feedback proile not matter what???  That is insane.

I can tell you that the fear of negative feedback is what will get the seller to fix the problem immediately and promptly. But if the buyer leaves the negative feedback without contacting the seller first.... Why should the seller even lift a finger to fix the shipping damage problem .... Since the damage has already been done to their feedback reputation, and there is nothing they can do to fix that.  

I agree that there are probably some problems with the retaliatory feedback from sellers, but this Ebay policy change is deinately not the answer. And killing the "mutual feedback withdrawal" process makes ebay an very unfair marketplace or sellers.

...so how did this Canadian manage to win two of your auctions if you don't even ship outside of the U.S.? Did you not set up the listing to preclude it? You can, you know - non-U.S. bids are automatically rejected. From what little you say this sounds like your fault for not setting up the listing right, not the Canadian's.

Your suite will never make it.  Your attorney will tell you this.

i WOULD LIKE THE NAME OF THE AUCTION YOUR ARE NOW USING.  I AM THINKING OF JUMPING THE EBAY SHIP.

EBAY WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU AS YOUR TV REPORT SAID FEEDBACK WAS MADE TO GRADE SELLERS AND BUYERS NOT IT IS 1 SIDED AND BUYERS CAN HOLD YOU RANSON AND ITS NOT FAIR AT ALL PRICE INCREACES AND NOW WHOS IDEA WAS THIS EBAY FEEDBACK REFORM. NOT AS EBAY STARTED AS A FAIR TRADING CONMANY NOW IT IS 1 SIDED AND WHO EVER THOUGHT OF THIS 1 SIDED FEEDBACK PROGRAM SHOULD BE FIRED. OUR COMPANY AND OTHERS AT A CONVENTION IN LAS VEGAS SHOWED A OVER 98% RUJING OVER NOW EBAYS ONE SIDED FEEDBACK AND ALL 4500 MENBERS AT THIS CONVENTION ARE PULLING TOGETHER TO DESIGN A ONLINE AUCTION SITE WHATS GOING ON WITH EBAY???

I think your idea about blind feedback is a great idea. I am surprised that Ebay managers didn't put more time into researching the underlying Game Theory in order to come up with a fairer and more accurate feedback system.

Really - Allow positive, neutral or negative feedback from both sellers and buyers, or no feedback at all - but don't show the results to either until a week or two has gone by, then post the results and not permit changes.

Additionally, such a two week delay should be extended for final results if either party has filed a dispute or interim hold with Ebay on the transaction notifying them that there is an informal dispute going on that has not yet been resolved.

And finally, if there is a unresolvable dispute, both sides of the story should be able to present their positions in the feedback area, with links to further information on the matter and/or documentation.

That is the way to do it, not muffle any source of reliable information on the credibility of a buyer or seller.

The new policy is great and should have been put in place years ago.

A buyer meets their requirements as soon as payment is received by the buyer.  At that point, the seller should enter positive feedback.  Not after the buyer enters feedback.

I purchased a item for $3.50 on ebay recently and paid $3.50 for shipping.  I paid immediately.  When I received the item it wasnt what was pictured.  In fact it was quite different.  I contacted the seller and he said that I should return the item and he would refund my money plus the original shipping.  I explained to him that taking the time package and return an item for $3.50 wasnt worth my the time or expense.

Considering he knowingly sold an item that was different than what was photographed, in my mind, he should have sent me a check for $7.  He didnt agree.  I never left feedback because he threatened to retaliate with negative feedback.

 

 

 

i agree that eBay appears right now to be a bully from a lot of different angles - I know they have upset a lot of sellers recently - they stopped allowing listings of e-items such as ebooks etc. - lots of sellers had built their livelihoods around products like that; the feedback changes, and of course the constant rise in fees.  Lets face it, sellers and buyers are all used to lots of bugs and problems in eBay software too..

But the thing I find most worrying right now is the way eBay has (mis)handled the move from Commission Junction to eBay Partner Network as their Affiliate Engine. 

Not only is it very clear that there are lots of bugs and issues with the eBay Partner Network software, but these bugs seem to be resulting in lots and lots (at a guess around 50%) of eBay affiliates being paid a lot less than they are owed (in some cases zero!),  It would seem there is some kind of tracking problem, but its not at the affiliates end - that is very clear.

Not only is it very clear there is a problem given all the evidence, eBay has even kind of admitted to it - "Steve H" seems to be some kind of eBay Partner Network engineer tech lead, and he posted that they are aware of the problems and are working on a solution - but nothing has been heard since (I believe that was three weeks ago)!! 

Given the number of affiliates having problems, eBay's official silence on the matter (a recent list of outstanding issues being worked upon by engineers on the ebaypartnernetworkblog.com had one glaring ommission - the tracking problem!!) and the very poor response from technical support, many affiliates are refusing to send traffic to eBay now, some are threatening lawsuits, others are threatening to talk to major news agencies and others are just raging and thumping their pcs cos they dont know what to do. 

Personally, my own business was completely tied to the launch of eBay Partner Network - so of course, I am extremely angry about it!

Thanks for eListening.

Michelle Sollicito

CTO and President

eBarster LLC

Make your website pay with eBars and eBay!

www.ebarster.com

As a seller for several years, and a 20,000++ feedback rating, I can tell you that I absolutely don't CARE what a buyers feedback is.

If eBay had cared about it's sellers, which they clealy don't, then they would have EDUCATED the buyers to NOT WORRY about their feedback, instead of protecting even the rare dishonest buyer from negative feedback at the expense of ALL sellers.

This policy change is idiotic, and has resulted in my company starting new selling at AMAZON, Ubid, bidville, ioffer, ecrater and "onlineauctions.com" sites.  Our combined sales from these sites have now, nearly, eclipsed our eBay sales.

It's more work, but it's LESS hassle!

:)

I have run a shop on ebay for a couple of years and sold at the same price that the manufacturer sold direct, cant see thats a rip off. Other sellers of the same product charged more, if they get the sale rather than me or the manufacturer surely thats the buyers fault for not shopping efficiently rather than the others sellers fault. Shop around find the best deal wherever.

I also buy quite a lot on ebay and usually find the service quick and competitive there are a lot of items you just cant find easily elsewhere.

Like in everything let the buyer beware, I have had mainly good experiences with customers and sellers and never got a fair bad or neutral feedback from a disatisfied customer that bothered to get in touch.

I always left feedback on despatch, before the buyer left me feedback and only ever got bad feedback once or twice from malicious customers, or ones who didnt bother to complain first and yes I did have a go at them in the reply because they are bad ebayers,but they already had the feedback they deserved for the first stage of the transaction. Feedback from sellers should be in two parts part one for payment part two so that awkward customers can be hilighted if they threaten or ask for unfair refunds.

I dont quibble I just trade fairly and expect the same from those I deal with including ebay and pay pal.  I stopped selling on ebay due to the excessive fees that left me with about 5% return for the effort and reduced visibility which just made it impossible to get enough turnover to make it worth it at that margin. The new feedback will probably stop me coming back, thats another 500+ a month they've lost