Ebay needs to start making buyer prove or explain their feedback...

Question

Yes, I know it will never happen since it has taken Ebay 30 years to start making people pay instantly when doing a BIN. And even that doesn't work some times. Plus you would need trained employees to investigate. That would be more money and you know how cheap Ebay is. I am just sick of these passive aggressive buyers that purchase the item but then anonymously leaving less than five stars for whatever rating. I know one guy was trying to get free shipping and I told him I couldn't. He even sen...

skate_man1000 · Accepted Answer

Obviously Ebay does or they wouldn't keep it around. And many customers do since they make it a point to feel self righteous and leave low ratings. 🙌

itsjustasprain · Answer

@skate_man1000 wrote:
I am just sick of these passive aggressive buyers that purchase the item but then anonymously leaving less than five stars for whatever rating. I know one guy was trying to get free shipping and I told him I couldn't. He even sent another message after he purchased asking for a shipping discount. He definitely left lows stars for shipping cost as others have. If you agree to the price/shipping you should have no recourse to cry sour grapes later.

Speaking of which - your childishly homophobic but surprisingly detailed Feedback Left for Others suggests that you have some unresolved issues yourself.

shelbetty · Answer

You sound like sour grapes to me. Yeah, I GET that a buyer is aware of the shipping cost before purchasing, but if ebay is providing the option to rate a seller on that and the buyer thinks it was excessive (even though they paid it), why shouldn't they rate it? Why does ebay allow the option? Maybe ebay is encouraging buyers to send sellers who charge excessive shipping a message.

Look, if I go into a store and buy something I think is excessively expensive I have every right to go to Yelp or another rating site to say "XYZ store is overpriced". It doesn't matter if bought the item or not.

Paying you a ridiculously inflated shipping cost doesn't = I have to rate you well on THAT particular aspect of the transaction. Bottom line is that sellers who do that look like sharks. If you don't like it, maybe you shouldn't do it. If you do, quit whining.

Also, if I'm rating you an overall POSITIVE, does it affect your seller rating if I give you less than 5 stars on the shipping fees?

soh.maryl · Answer

Why would a seller continue to list and sell on a platform that he finds so unsatisfactory?

grann-4629 · Answer

Feedbacks = opinions

Ignore them. Hopefully eBay will make them all go away some day (the feedbacks, that is).

If I ever buy anything from you, regardless of quality, shipping time, etc., I will give you 5 stars on everything, and check every box that indicates you a perfect seller.

btw --- how do you prove anything on-line?

authentic*vintage · Answer

Oh I remember the days when we worried about those stupid stars.

My star for shipping costs is at a perpetual 4.7 and I can't be bothered with that -

Individual detailed seller rating (DSR) stars have zero direct impact on your account standing, search visibility, or fees. They are a legacy feature on eBay.

With that said, however, a buyer who is going to ding your stars is also likely experiencing some customer service issues so if you are seeing a lot of gray there, it may be worth addressing - but as for the stars themselves, I forget they are even there most of the time.

tobaccocardyahoo · Answer

Ebay is immune from legal action based on the content of FB. The limited actions it takes on FB are limited, in part, by a strategy to maintain that immunity.

All Ebay marketplaces know that FB is useless in the 21st century, but none of them is willing to deep six it for fear of bad PR. Some buyers have no clue how useless it is.

Some years back, Amazon voiced its intent to replace FB with an objective measurement system. It had deployed and tested two different measures. There were screams from sellers who had nothing to offer but their 100% FB (sometimes bought and paid for). The risk of bad PR frightened them off.

Its like why the government has not fixed the Social Security System which is running out of money, there will always be someone who will feel pain and scream loudly for any fix proposed.

druusilla4 · Answer

I don't understand the part of your comment about buyers not paying immediately with BIN...I've had my booth set to immediate payment for BIN for the past 20+ years with no problem. What am I missing?

babyers88 · Answer

the check box that can be set to require payment at purchase time has been around for a VERY long time.

I have had it set for a VERY long time, nobody can buy anything from me without instant payment on the spot.'

no pay, no buy..... easy peasy.

no waiting 3 days or i'll pay you on payday, etc, etc,

now there was a time...... that you had to wait for a check or money order to come in the snail mail.....then you had to wait longer for it to clear. Then you could ship your item and then at the end of the month ebay had there hand out. I begged them for years to just take out there fee's before paying me, now that part did take decades..

bashort · Answer

I would not want to see buyer left feedback removed, You can usually determine patterns about the seller

bashort · Answer

I remember a time when a buyer could give a 1 star rating on shipping cost with "free" shipping or on communications when there were no communications.

ebay fixed those and they could go further with something like if the ebay purchased shipping label is at least 80% of the amount the buyer paid then the buyer can not leave a shipping cost rating

grann-4629 · Answer

It would be a lot easier for eBay to: DELETE THE FEEDBACK SYSTEM COMPLETELY then there would be no more issues with that part of eBay. eBay tells us that feedback is only an opinion, not a fact, so it is a useless, meaningless method to allow hotheads to slam each other in the heat of the moment. Maybe eBay should add a delay feature in posting feedback to allow a cooling off period.

broto_64 · Answer

Oh that's nothing, I get the buyers demanding a full refund over some minute issue - These buyers have a wild imagination, claiming the listing states something that's not even real, screaming counterfeit and demanding a refund (without returning the item). And to top it all off, they leave negative feedback.

I have no earthly idea where these individuals are coming from, but I can believe the general education level of most people has gone downhill in the past 30-40 years... In fact I'm sure it's been going on since before I can remember, people are getting dumber, not smarter.

So I would not expect these buyers to be hindered much by "qualifying" questions.

Here's the thing, I remotely suspect some are simply fishing for a free item - They know their claim likely won't hold water (since it isn't true) but they're looking for anything and everything they can think of to see if the seller will cave. Some will keep their lie going, all the way to leaving less than positive feedback. Certain people are desperate and fishing for refunds over minutiae is something that appears worth it to these individuals.

The other possibility is these individuals came over from another platform (AMZN, WMT) and have been well groomed by hordes of dropshippers who have no inventory control, and now they're faced with OOAK sellers who do things differently.
That is a very real possibility as well.

However, if a buyer leaves a false negative (aka positive feedback with negative wording, not sure if stars fall under this) that feedback is against policy and can be contested and perhaps (slim chance) removed.

In closing, perhaps you should rethink how you're replying to the negatives?

kibble-net · Answer

@skate_man1000 wrote:
Yes, I know it will never happen since it has taken Ebay 30 years to start making people pay instantly when doing a BIN. And even that doesn't work some times. Plus you would need trained employees to investigate. That would be more money and you know how cheap Ebay is.

1. No website in the history of the internet has ever "forced" buyers to explain their rating. I am not sure what planet you have lived on previously, but here on Earth that is not something that happens.

2. Immediate Payment has been an option for sellers since 2010. Again, I am not sure what planet you're from, but 1995 to 2010 is not 30 years.

> I am just sick of these passive aggressive buyers that purchase the item but then anonymously leaving less than five stars for whatever rating.

And I'm sick of sellers who lack PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY

fern*wood · Answer

I bet there are some buyers that would like for sellers to prove how their shipping costs were determined.

luckythewinner · Answer

I am just sick of these passive aggressive buyers that purchase the item but then anonymously leaving less than five stars for whatever rating How often does that happen to you?

soh.maryl · Answer

How does a buyer leave anonymous feedback?

And, if you are uncomfortable with questions from a buyer BEFORE he makes the purchase, you can block him for any reason or for no reason at all.

Your suggestion about eBay requiring that buyers "prove" negative feedback, as you know, is not going to fly. Can you imagine what that would cost eBay in terms of payroll? And who did you believe would bear the increased fees?

bonanza125 · Answer

It's a 12 month average. Not many buyers really click on those star ratings. Yours is 4.8 which is still good. I wouldn't worry too much about it. No Ebay doesn't need to investigate this. You had a buyer who claimed they didn't receive so naturally that buyer is going to leave lower stars than say others.

christworks · Answer

@skate_man1000 wrote:
He even sent another message after he purchased asking for a shipping discount.
That is a policy violation. You could have reported the buyer and cancelled the order for at fault of the buyer. You would have been protected by eBay. Even if you had already shipped the order, you could have still reported him and been protected from negative feedback.

Ideally Ebay needs to start making customers prove their ratings.
I don't even know what this means. Do you mean they need to cite specific reasons why they rate 3 stars instead of 4? Honestly when I have to give star ratings I determine it by tossing darts at the dartboard in my office. If I nail that center circle, you get 5 stars. 😜

I'm going to address your negative feedback since others brought it up. I have to disagree with @albertabrightalberta and @inhawaii. I do not have an issue with your responses, though I acknowledge some buyers might. What I do have an issue with is that you seem to not know a dang thing about what protections are in place for sellers. I've already clued you in on one.

When you ship something using eBay Standard Envelope, you are protected by eBay should a buyer file an Item Not Received. Did you take advantage of your seller protections? I doubt it. If you had, it would not matter one iota whether the buyer lied.

The feedback. That buyer violated multiple eBay policies throught he content they posted in the feedback. You could have had the feedback removed entirely, which would have negated responding and making you look foolish to some. I believe the star ratings the buyer left would have also been removed, but I'm not 100% certain on that. You also would have enjoyed a 100% feedback rating.

You are worried about something that doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. Of all things to worry about start ratings is at the bottom. Nobody is looking at them, except you. Yet you are allowing yourself to get upset at things that can easily be fixed.

albertabrightalberta · Answer

@skate_man1000 wrote:
I know one guy was trying to get free shipping and I told him I couldn't. He even sent another message after he purchased asking for a shipping discount. He definitely left lows stars for shipping cost as others have.

Although I don't disagree that buyers are aware of the shipping cost before purchasing, I suspect you have no idea if buyers left fewer than 5 DSRs for shipping or not. (There is a way to figure out who dinged stars but it's a bit complicated and time-consuming, something I doubt you've done.)

In fact, per ebay, DSR ratings are anonymous and although most people don't even look at them or care about them, i did look at yours and for shipping, it doesn't appear that many (if any) buyers have left <5 stars.

In my opinion, your responses to the buyer's negative feedbacks make you look worse than the buyer.

If you ship without tracking, you need to expect that items aren't going to get to their recipients and if that happens and you have no proof of delivery, you will be refunding them.

But to accuse them of theft doesn't make you look good!

inhawaii · Answer

I don't even know how I would know what star rating I received from a buyer. That's how little I care about it.

chapeau-noir · Answer

Blast from the past. 5 = Exceptional, above and beyond 4 = You did your job

inhawaii · Answer

Who even pays attention to star ratings?