Anyone here sell on eBay? I'm a part time seller, and even though I am and am low-volume, I take my eBay business very seriously, and I focus on excellent customer service.
Their recent (as of today) changes to the Feedback system are really going to hurt honest sellers, and people are closing their shops and leaving in droves.
Does anyone else here sell on eBay? What do you think of this turn of events?
Jen M.
I'm not familiar with the changes. What did they do that will hurt the sellers?
Let me know if this link does not work, and I will paste in the text:
http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?t...1310683043
In short, they are taking away the ability for sellers to leave ANY negative or neutral feedback for buyers. I have never left either, but apparently, eBay thinks neutering sellers is a good way to do business.
Jen M.
I'm an ebay seller and I think it is horrendous. I have had AWFUL buyers. Those who change their minds after a purchase, don't bother to pay, don't tell me for over a week and cause me to have to relist the item or go to a second chance bidder. Or those who take forever to pay... I don't know why they are doing this!
It's insane.
I'm on Wensy.com, and I'm looking at Overstock, Bidville, and Google. Here's a site I found today that lets you track how different auction sites are doing.
http://www.powersellersunite.com/auctionsitewatch.php
The numbers on eBay do my fucked-over-seller's heart good. I'm really pissed.
Jen M.
I do more buying than selling, so here's my two cents on it.
If sellers were more scrupulously honest about feedback, this never would have happened. Here's the typical scenario -- a seller refuses to leave feedback until the buyer leaves feedback....in short, they want to make sure you say something nice, or else they will retaliate. Why should a buyer leave feedback FIRST? I paid, and in my case, I pay within 12 hours of an auction's end, sometimes the second the auction ends -- you say I paid swiftly in my feedback, and that should be the extent of the feedback you get to leave! After all, the buyer's part is done, and there's nothing to wait on, there's nothing further that's going to occur between us, if you have done your part honestly (shipped the correct item quickly).
If you ship me crap, or don't ship at all, or ship slow, or substitute the wrong item, I ought to be able to say that legitimately, without having to worry about you (the seller) retaliating. What's there to retaliate about? -- I paid, and paid swiftly! There's nothing you should be able to say -- or be allowed to say! -- just because I knock you down a peg for a LEGITIMATE complaint!
I do like other changes, though. They count all feedbacks, even if from the same buyer/seller, which is how it should be (I mean, if a person is happy enough to return, that's good, and should be counted!). They also remove negatives from your percentage calculation, if they are over a year old. So now, the ONE negative I got SEVEN YEARS ago is now off, and I'm 100% positive. WOO HOO!
Rather than implementing this rule, it would be better for eBay to make removing negative feedback easier -- and WITHOUT the need to mutually remove feedback. I had a non-paying bidder, a zero-feedback idiot. I went through the process to get my fees refunded (which they were), which means that, from eBay's point of view, I was right and they were wrong. I would LOVE to leave negative feedback on this person, but she'll probably leave a retaliatory negative -- that shouldn't be allowed! The minute I won back my fees, her ability to leave feedback on the transaction should have been blocked. I haven't yet left it. I might chance it on the last allowable day.
A lot of sellers don't operate that way, though. I feel eBay is punishing ALL sellers, not just the bad ones.
I only ever leave positive feedback. Of course, I've only ever dealt with one bad buyer. He did not pay, so I submitted a failure to pay-whatever report. I think he eventually paid, and I then sent him his item and thanked him. I don't think I left him any feedback,but I did contact him and thank him for paying.
I just think it's a badly-thought-out, poorly-implemented plan that is going to hurt a lot of honest business people.
I don't make much from my auctions, but it is a little extra income. I'm not going to stick around and let these people sabotage my already-puny business. I've already signed up on a couple of other sites.
Jen M.
I was unaware of what was going on until I read the link you provided. It sounds reasonable. I agree with PG... I cannot tell you how many times I paid INSTANTLY as soon as the auction was over, and the seller refused to leave me any feedback at all, or only if I did so first. I can see why eBay did what it did.
I have been lucky, I guess. I have never had a buyer fuck me over or not pay. Really lucky. I don't sell much, but I've sold probably 50-75 items over the years, and bought more than that. But my feedback doesn't reflect it because it's true, most sellers don't leave feedback for you.
I guess it's a buyer's market. I get it. It doesn't bother me. I think it might be good for ebay. We shall see. I will continue to sell on there, although I've been using Craigslist and Kijiji more and more these days.
To each their own.
I have never left negative or neutral feedback for a buyer, and I tend to leave feedback as soon as the transaction is done.
Sometimes, though, you don't have anything to say. "They bought from me. They paid for it. I shipped it." That's neutral feedback. *shrug*
I just see a lot of sellers getting potentially fucked over. I've been a lucky one so far, all of my buyers have been straight-forward, on the up and up.
I see a lot of people being hurt by this, though.
Jen M.
That is disappointing. I've been selling some things on eBay lately and most of my recent e-bay feedback is as a seller.
I haven't had any bad experiences with buyers but I have had a few instances with buyers not shipping things when they said, sending it via the wrong shipping method when I paid to have it shipped faster etc.
My only negative feedback is from an asshole who didn't ship the item at all, so after a month of contacting him and ebay I finally left negative feedback. He proceeded to give ME negative feedback and then asked me to remove the negatives- WTF?
I agree the system is not perfect, not even close, but by not allowing sellers to see the status of buyers it's causing more harm than good.
I'll sell the rest of my stuff on amazon or craigslist. Amazon doesn't charge fees (for non-auction items, I don't know about auctions) unless the item sells and they are easier to deal with.
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I think it's a foregone conclusion that a lot of good eBay sellers will see a lot more questionable feedback left, and I think those who pride themselves on a 99.9% or 100% rating can expect to see that change.
Assuming that every seller is going to get their share of butthead buyers -- let's just say 2% -- I'd expect the best sellers to be at 98%, which according to historical standards isn't very good. But the good thing is that the bad sellers -- the ones who forced this change -- will really sink like a rock. These are the ones who don't deliver as promised, who retaliate by providing negative feedback in response to negative feedback they deserved, and then get it cleared up by forcing "mutual withdrawal." These sellers can't get rid of their deserved negs by retaliating and then seeking that mutual withdrawal.
So while I think it sucks that good sellers will be "over a barrel" with asshole buyers, the cream will rise to the top with this system -- actually, it will just sink a lot less than the other flotsam and jetsam of crap sellers.
Of course, as a seller, you can also hit the "positive button", but then write so that your feedback will be noticed -- NON PAYING BIDDER! ~*~*~*~*~ THIS GUY SUCKS!!! *~*~*~*~*~*~ Somethign like that.