Ebay Feedback

[Mike Cruz]

Just need to vent a little. I don't get it why some people don't leave feedback after you have already left it for them. Not saying they have to rant and rave over my super fast shipping or spectactular packaging or my great communication or that I am a Great Ebayer or that I'm A+++++++ if they don't think so, but even a Thanks! would be appreciated so that my numbers go up.

I'm at 45 right now. Not huge by any standards, but while it shows that I'm not a total newby, I have to be honest...I would have a feedback rating of about 30 if I didn't actually ask people to please leave a feedback after about a month after they recieved the product. I've had this problem with people with a rating of 1 to someone who is in the 30,000's.

Yeah, I get it that some don't understand that they are supposed to do it, and others that are just plain sick of doing it because they have done so many transactions, but it is the game...it is how Ebay works...if people stop giving their feedback, then what are the ratings for? How do we tell anything about the buyer or seller?

Likewise, and of course, this is another matter altogether, why are so many people averse to negative feedback? If things didn't go right, you should be able to say so. It seems to be the big no-no to give a negative. I think if you conduct yourself in a manner that begs a negative, you earned it and others should know about it.

End rant. Thanks... whew.....

[Dan Hintz]

Learned a new one last night. For my birthday, Amy purchased seasons 1-5 of Babylon 5 for me on DVD with free shipping. The boxes were slightly crushed, half of the CDs had fallen out of their clips, one of the included "magazines" wasn't there for season 4, season 1's magazine was stapled backwards (took me a few to figure out why the reading didn't flow nicely), and two of the boxes have fallen apart so far.

So she sent an email asking for a refund (no response so far), and handed me the paper included with the order. It stated the shipping fee of $3 charged to her card would be refunded when a 5-star feedback was left.

Holding a shipping fee hostage is definitely a new one on me! I told her to give the guy 72 hours to reply, after that start a chargeback.

[Chris Damm]

I used to sell on ebay until the fees got out of hand. If I got 2 out of 3 feedbacks I figured I was doing well. People are just too lazy or ignorant to follow protocol.

[Mike Cruz]

I usually try to sell on CL whenever possible, but I also try to limit the number of people that come to my house. And for little things like old remotes and computer speakers, you reach a wider audience with Ebay than on CL. I agree Ebay has its flaws. Hey, I HATE that PayPal keeps some of your money until you get feedback, but what can you do?

[Rick Gifford]

This has been a long pet peeve of mine as well. My feedback should be over 1000 but its much lower because people just wont return the favor. Now if Im a buyer I will only leave it after the seller does... the seller should post first I think. I do it when selling.

[G. Brad Schmidt]

Learned a new one last night. For my birthday, Amy purchased seasons 1-5 of Babylon 5 for me on DVD with free shipping. The boxes were slightly crushed, half of the CDs had fallen out of their clips, one of the included "magazines" wasn't there for season 4, season 1's magazine was stapled backwards (took me a few to figure out why the reading didn't flow nicely), and two of the boxes have fallen apart so far.

Ebay is notorious for passing off bootleg and gray/black market DVDs as authentic.

[Jim Koepke]

Learned a new one last night. For my birthday, Amy purchased seasons 1-5 of Babylon 5 for me on DVD with free shipping. The boxes were slightly crushed, half of the CDs had fallen out of their clips, one of the included "magazines" wasn't there for season 4, season 1's magazine was stapled backwards (took me a few to figure out why the reading didn't flow nicely), and two of the boxes have fallen apart so far.

So she sent an email asking for a refund (no response so far), and handed me the paper included with the order. It stated the shipping fee of $3 charged to her card would be refunded when a 5-star feedback was left.

Holding a shipping fee hostage is definitely a new one on me! I told her to give the guy 72 hours to reply, after that start a chargeback.

I would also send a complaint to ebay. This is extortion and unless ebay rules have changed, it is not is allowed.

A few years ago, someone sold a bunch of chisels and hid the damage to one handle in the photos. There response to me was that is the way business is done on ebay. They also said if I gave them a negative feedback they would do the same to me. I did not get the negative feedback, but they didn't sell on ebay after that.

jim

[John Coloccia]

Learned a new one last night. For my birthday, Amy purchased seasons 1-5 of Babylon 5 for me on DVD with free shipping. The boxes were slightly crushed, half of the CDs had fallen out of their clips, one of the included "magazines" wasn't there for season 4, season 1's magazine was stapled backwards (took me a few to figure out why the reading didn't flow nicely), and two of the boxes have fallen apart so far.

So she sent an email asking for a refund (no response so far), and handed me the paper included with the order. It stated the shipping fee of $3 charged to her card would be refunded when a 5-star feedback was left.

Holding a shipping fee hostage is definitely a new one on me! I told her to give the guy 72 hours to reply, after that start a chargeback.

I bought a screen cable for an HP laptop not too long ago. It was listed as new. When it came, it was obviously used and still had residue on it from the tape HP uses to stick it down behind the monitor. Fine. I tried it, and it didn't work.

So I e-mailed the guy and asked for a refund. He said he wouldn't give me a refund without mailing it back. I said that I already paid for the item and the shipping to me, and I'm not going to pay another $10 to mail it back to Taiwan considering that YOU SCAMMED ME and sent me a USED, BROKEN cable that was listed as NEW. If he wants it back, he can send me a pre-paid box and I'll be happy to ship his garbage back to him.

We opened a dispute and went back and forth for a little bit. E-bay's dispute process is USELESS, and so is Paypal's. Finally, I left negative feedback and sent an e-mail that I would initiate a chargeback if I didn't get a response in 24 hours. Now THAT got his attention. I eventually told him I would retract the negative feedback only after I saw the complete refund, including shipping costs, hit my credit card.

And that's the last e-bay transaction I ever did, or ever will do.

re: when to leave feedback
Assuming you still use fleabay, my opinion is the proper time to leave feedback for both parties is after they completed their part of the deal. After the buyer pays, you should leave feedback. After the item arrives in stated condition, the buyer should leave feedback. If the other one doesn't reciprocate, that shouldn't affect how YOU do business, should it?

[David G Baker]

I won't leave feedback until I get feedback from the person I dealt with. It has been a while since I checked my feedback but I think that I have received feedback on at 98% of my sales and purchases and I think I have over 200.

[Glenn Vaughn]

Let me preface this by saying I have always left honest feedback.

IMHO the feedback system on EBAY is pretty much useless. It is difficult to trust feedback ratings when you realize that much positive feedback is given in order to receive positive feedback in return.

EBAY seems only to be concerned with protecting their revenues and has little concern for what is being posted. The gemstones section is a very good example of the problem. Sellers are listing stones as natural tht are not. The also use false descriptions - there is a listing for an 11+ carat "chatham diffused" ruby for $5.99; this is a man made stone and is not a Chatham stone - they wholesale for hundreds of dollars a carat in this size. The seller has a 99.7% positive feedback with a rating of 1523.

This was just the first one I clicked on. The site is rampant with false description and/or deceptive descriptions. Yet the sellers have high positive ratings.

I have pretty much quit buying on EBAY because of the problems there.

[John Shuk]

The funny thing about ebay is that when the founder invented it he was looking to perform an experiment creating a hyper efficient marketplace.
I used to use ebay some to buy and sell stuff but not so much anymore. I think the efficient marketplace has gone off the rails along the way.

[Mark Maleski]

For my birthday, Amy purchased seasons 1-5 of Babylon 5 for me on DVD with free shipping. .... the order. It stated the shipping fee of $3 charged to her card would be refunded when a 5-star feedback was left.

If all had gone well with the purchase, I'd still leave negative feedback for that alone, and let the seller know that he could either refund the shipping charge himself or I'd have the credit card company do it for him.

[Dan Hintz]

The seller contacted Amy the next day and said she could get an exchange or a refund. She's rightly going for the refund.

I also forgot to add, one of the DVDs was delaminating. I could see it by looking at the non-label side... it looks like a pool of water, so I checked the edge. Sure enough, it was split into two layers.