What do YOU think would happen if ...
eBay completely removed the Feedback option?
This 'feature' seems to be near the top of the list for creating complaints and nastiness between those who look for help here and the unmentioned people who have burned them thru a bad or retaliatory feedback.
With the advent of automatic feedback to stroke those sellers who really need it, the system becomes even more useless.
82 comments
sir.koinz
·9 months agoWhen I put my buyer hat on I always check feedback before I pull the trigger on a buy. If I see a bunch of neutrals or negs with **bleep** comments about shipping delays by usps or any of the unjust whining a lot of buyers like to do, "seller wouldn't give me a 50% refund when usps delivered when i was at work" I'll disregard. I'll almost always side with the seller, except those that comment that the buyer is another "idiot" for asking legit questions or those that are just very bad at dealing with normal things that come up and resort to name calling put downs or outright losing their mind. That's why I check fb and it would be like a playing Russian Roulette with one empty chamber without fb. IMO anyway.
* the opinions expressed here may or may not reflect those of the three owners of said entity who go by, me myself and I. Information not intended as medical advice or a cure for any fluidy disease or expellants. Never bet more than you can afford to lose and if you lose please don't drip on my shoes. Call 211 if you cannot afford to pay your energy bill.
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gurlcat
·9 months ago@sir.koinz 100% yes, that's exactly how to get the most out of feedback for making a buying choice.
Wow you have a brain AND style; you should come here more often. I see this is your first activity since 2024 and you've mostly posted in the Mentors forum in the past. Just a heads up, the reason you don't get much response there is because only official Mentors can reply, and in instances like your most recent post you wouldn't get any replies at all because it wasn't a request for help, just a discussion starter. This Sellers forum (or Buyers, or any of the more specialized ones like Shipping, Returns, etc.) -are where you can get a lot more engagement, because anybody can participate.
squinkercat59
·9 months agoI base who I purchase from on the feedback. I will not buy from someone that consistently mails late, packs things inadequately (for example, throwing a fragile, breakable item in nothing more than an envelope with no padding), or misrepresents their items (for example, mailed without disclosing damage). That said, a few negatives don't bother me, mistakes happen and I realize it's not always the fault of the seller. It's the sellers, like booksellers, that have HUNDREDS of negatives within 30 days, that I stay away from. I am not going to take a chance on buying trash. If Ebay did away with the feedback, I would not buy here any longer.
tarotfindsandmore
·9 months agoAs a seller, I rely on feedback 1) to see how I'm doing and 2) to protect myself from lunatic would-be buyers. In the first case, if I suddenly see a lot of really blah, but positive, feedback I know I need to up my game and move more quickly, pack more carefully, describe things more thoroughly, etc. In the second, when I get messages that seem odd or rude, I look at the feedback left by the messenger for other sellers. If there are a bunch of red donuts or even just grey ones, with crazy ransom note looking text in the feedback they've left, that buyer goes straight to the blocked bidder list.
I don't need feedback but I sure do appreciate it.
nh_sales_lv
·9 months agoAll my negs the very few I have stem from some impatient weirdos or were deliberate and i know I'm not Perfect even Jesus Christ made mistakes which just leaves me to wonder was their a real red out there dissatisfied with my service or am i accumulating reds because I'm an Iced Tea drinker i'll never know.
grann-4629
OP9 months agoAll my negs the very few I have stem from some impatient weirdos or were deliberate
I rest my case.
chapeau-noir
·9 months agoA significant portion of the argument in this thread is DQ'd by the fact that eBay and Amazon are completely different sites.
luckythewinner
·9 months agoWhat do YOU think would happen if ...eBay completely removed the Feedback option?
I think there would relentless and endless discussion on this board.
A whole bunch of sellers would threaten to quit, and a handful actually would.
In the meantime, the eBay site itself would barely notice the change.
gloryglorygifts
·9 months ago"....dogs and cats living together — mass hysteria." Dr. Peter Venkman
lakefor94
·9 months agoI would buy significantly less on ebay if I could not vet the sellers thru feedback to weed out the yahoos.
janet9988
·9 months agoAny buyer can override ebay's automatic feedback system.
nh_sales_lv
·9 months agoNot allowing Sellers to post Negative Feedback is a Crime Against Humanity.
99% of my Buyers are Very Good People
1% are Heathens
It's really really hard to get into the Heathen Category yet somehow there are participants.
dhbookds
·9 months agoSome buyers would raise cain........they may remove it someday, but not now.
mamacassidy
·9 months agoI believe on a platform like ebay it would hurt sales.
On a platform like amazon.com or walmart.com, you're basically buying from a huge corporation and people mostly feel safe that if there's a problem, that corporation will take care of it pretty quickly and easliy.
On ebay, you're mostly buying from individual people (not counting drop-shippers) who are complete strangers, and a lot of buyers like to see what others' experiences have been with that seller. As @roccotacodad54 said, the MBG is always there just like a credit card chargeback is always there, but those things can be a huge hassle and can be avoided if you see a seller has a history of problems.
I believe this sentiment applies to all small businesses, not just ebay sellers. When my family wants to go to Outback Steakhouse, no one looks anything up because we all know what we're getting into. But when my family wants to try the new local steakhouse, they all want to look at the online menu and the reviews so we can determine if it's worth a go.
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months agoIf by a platform like ebay you mean a website with a well earned reputation for buyer beware you would have been right, years ago.
Every Ebay CEO since Meg Whitman attempted to lose that reputation and whatever bad sellers remain are no greater than on Amazon or Walmart. But many good sellers by clinging to the FB system help keep that bad reputation alive.
gurlcat
·9 months ago@tobaccocardyahoo
Can you clarify what you mean by this^?
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months agoWhat I mean is that sellers who come to this forum and dissect the FB of others and advocate for the continuance of subjective evaluations of sellers by anyone who has any dissatisfaction with any seller lowers the opinion of the entire class of Ebay sellers.
People cling to the image of Ebay as it was 30 years ago and FB and its defense makes them feel validated for holding that image.
It is not the only reason that image remains, but it is most obvious.
gurlcat
·9 months agomamacassidy
·9 months ago@tobaccocardyahoo wrote:
"If by a platform like ebay you mean a website with a well earned reputation for buyer beware you would have been right, years ago.
Every Ebay CEO since Meg Whitman attempted to lose that reputation and whatever bad sellers remain are no greater than on Amazon or Walmart. But many good sellers by clinging to the FB system help keep that bad reputation alive."
What I meant was that in my experience, dealing with problems and returns as a buyer are much simpler on those big corporate websites than they are on ebay. Therefore, I believe many buyers on ebay still like to take a look at feedback prior to making a purchase to see if there are any known problems they should be aware of.
Example:
-The last time I needed to return an item I bought on ebay, I had to pack the item back up and either print out a label or take it to the post office to have one made. Then, I had to wait and watch the tracking to make sure it got back to the seller. Then I had to wait for the seller to refund. (Or if the seller didn't want to refund, I'd have to ask ebay to step in on my behalf).
-The last time I needed to return an item on amazon, I didn't need to pack anything up. I took the item as-is to a Staples store near where I go grocery shopping. They scanned a barcode and an email was immediately sent to me with a confirmation of acceptance, and within 24 hours my account was credited.
gurlcat
·9 months agoExactly. eBay's MBG isn't so great that it saves buyers from having a bad experience, which is why sellers' feedback is still an important tool for avoiding that. -Not the only tool of course; it's also important to study listings carefully, ask sellers questions if anything is unclear, etc.
But just the fact that we'll get a refund for unsatisfactory items isn't fully reassuring when it means going through hoops and waiting.
fern*wood
·9 months agoSince you mentioned Amazon, do buyers receive feedback there?
I can see eBay eliminating feedback for buyers, but doubt they would get rid of feedback for sellers.
mamacassidy
·9 months ago@fern*wood
I have not received feedback as a buyer on amazon. At least not to my knowledge.
I have no idea if there is some sort of internal rating/ metrics system applied to buyers' accounts that we don't see. (I have heard of some stories online where people claim that they made too many returns on amazon and amazon quit accepting returns from them, but I have no personal knowledge of this)
gurlcat
·9 months ago@mamacassidy eBay has that too. -It might not be from sheer number of returns but returns reported as abusive by sellers, not sure. But buyers definitely can lose their MBG privileges.
gurlcat
·9 months ago@fern*wood Now that I wouldn't mind. I suspect the main reason eBay has kept it is (some) sellers' reliance on it to boost their %, especially new sellers. I wouldn't be surprised if it gets eliminated sometime after September, when the full impact of automated feedback is in effect (as every seller's % will be based on all the sales of the full past year, at that point).
There have been a few times looking at feedback for buyers gave me useful info though, namely when sellers break the rules and write negative comments about a buyer. That has even gone both ways: helped me identify unhinged sellers, and (in at least one instance I can recall) identify a buyer not to trust, because the seller who broke the rule described exactly what I'd want to avoid with that buyer, so instead of accepting their offer I chucked them into my BBL.
But I could see eBay wanting to ditch it, if only for having to use man hours dealing with rule-breaking false positives.
grann-4629
OP9 months agoI used to purchase stuff on Amazon and the feedback that was useful to me before purchase dealt with the quality of the item only, battery discharge times, etc. - not shipping or packing issues. In my mind I was buying stuff from the Amazon warehouse, not some dude in China, and I didn't need to rate Amazon. Their packing and shipping was always first class.
They use a simple 5 star rating on each item - if it was less than 4 stars, I wouldn't even look at buying it, nor would I read the feedback.
Easy Peasy!
ETA: I never got a thanks from Amazon for any of the things I purchased there ... thousands of dollars over 10 years. I never got customer 'service' from them when I needed it either. Woe is me 😢
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months agoThat is product reviews which are different from Feedback on Amazon.
Feedback which is a product review is removable on Amazon.
Amazon has an AI function called Rufus which answers buyer question about products based on product reviews. It frequently answer say that reviewers have left conflicting information. The product reviews are as flawed as feedback.
It is common for that
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months ago@fern*wood
Buyer feedback was discontinued on Amazon more than 15 years ago.
It was gone when Amazon attempted to remove seller feedback.
roccotacodad54
·9 months agoThe last time I had a bad experience on Amazon I contacted them because an item was missing from my order. It was an adjustable three legged shooting platform for uneven terrain or in my case so I could stand and not sit to target shoot at the range.
The table top portion was missing but the tripod (like an surveyors adjustable tripod) was there. The table top was easily replaceable with plywood (the origional was synthetic), the tripod was a very nice quality tripod.
Long story short I was told not to send anything back and I would be sent a whole new package. Two or three days later I had what I origionally ordered and a free tripod (first one) to boot. Now I either have two adjustable shooting tables or one long one with two independant tripods (plywood provided by me) or an extra tripod for camera or range spotter etc.
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months agoThat was an order which was sold by Amazon or a Third Party seller which was fulfilled by Amazon.
Was that a seller fulfilled order, you would not have been able to do that.
You chose an Amazon Gift Card for your refund. If you chose a refund to your payment method, it would not have arrived as quickly. Refund on first scan is limited to refund to gift card.
Ebay offers to refund as an Ebay credit which appears more quickly than a refund to your payment method.
You could also have brought your return to Whole Foods or Kohl's. Recently there have been complaints about returns like yours which were left at Staples being delayed for several days.
If you bring your returns to Kohl's you will get a coupon for a discount on a Kohl's purchase that day, and a receipt.
If you bring your return to Whole Foods you will not even get a receipt for your return. An hour or two later you will receive an email notification.
mamacassidy
·9 months agoMost of what you said is correct, however, I did not get a refund in the form of a gift card. The money was refunded to my credit card within 24 hours.
grann-4629
OP9 months ago'an email was immediately sent to me with a confirmation of acceptance, and within 24 hours my account was credited'
The email probably included a postage paid label to cut out and tape to the package, and the credit was issued before they even got the item back, right?
eburtonlab
·9 months agoMany buyers are hesitant to purchase expensive items from "zero feedback sellers" -- and rightly so.
If eBay removes the feedback system and does not replace it with something very similar that allows buyers to look at what sellers have previously sold and whether their buyers were satisfied (or at least "not unsatisfied"), then suddenly all eBay sellers -- good and bad alike -- instantly become "zero feedback sellers".
That sort of "level playing field" would be very good news for scammers; not so good news for sellers that have built up long term reputations as trustworthy sellers and that want to be trusted by new buyers that can no longer judge any seller by past reputation.
chapeau-noir
·9 months agoPlus, how often do people use reviews to evaluate merchant and product reliability? Pretty often, I would say. Ebay is not the world, just a tiny piece of it, and a not very innovative piece at that. What it does with feedback doesn't matter.
The problem as I see it, is the obsession people get over the subject, as if their very souls are being weighed.
grann-4629
OP9 months agoThe problem as I see it, is the obsession people get over the subject, as if their very souls are being weighed.
That's exactly my point. I think it does way more damage than good. But, I do understand the reluctance by some sellers to scrap it.
eBay needs to have a hard look at this and come up with a better system. Maybe just numbers on a scale with no verbiage allowed?
eburtonlab
·9 months agoI think it does way more damage than good.
As a buyer, I don't really care at all if a few sellers get their noses out of joint because a negative might hurt their precious spotless record -- I just want to be able to identify if the seller is an obvious scammer or if the seller has a pattern of negatives that constitute a problem I should be concerned about. If a seller gets a negative for using the wrong color packing peanuts, as a buyer I can ignore that.
eBay needs to have a hard look at this and come up with a better system. Maybe just numbers on a scale with no verbiage allowed?
One problem with a numbers-only solution is that not all negatives are equal; I want to be able to decide for myself and count the ones that should count ("seller delivered a counterfeit coin") and ignore the ones that should be ignored ("shipping cost was too high").
Edited to add: "The problem with averaging star ratings" by XKCD:
https://xkcd.com/937/
gurlcat
·9 months agoI'm dying to know why you think that would be be better. I can't even guess, try as hard as I just did for several minutes.
grann-4629
OP9 months agoWhy? Because most of the issues I am reading regarding feedback relate to the words chosen by the person giving or responding to the feedback. People get nasty with each other.
There is also a bar graph that sums up the seller's performance in various categories. The graph is much easier to 'read', saves time searching thru pages of feedback, is based on a seller's full experience, not just the last couple of months, and makes words useless.
JMHO ... time to watch the next ep of The West Wing 😎
gurlcat
·9 months ago@grann-4629 In the (relatively uncommon) instances when the seller replies to negative feedbacks, many buyers (myself included) find it very useful to see if when the seller got "nasty" rather than be professional. But to each their own I guess. I did ask why you don't want to read after all.
But .... a bar graph? Where is it? I have never heard of it. You must be thinking of another platform.
roccotacodad54
·9 months ago"There is also a bar graph that sums up the seller's performance in various categories. The graph is much easier to 'read', saves time searching thru pages of feedback, is based on a seller's full experience, not just the last couple of months, and makes words useless"
Is this bar graph available to buyers? If not then the words aren't useless...at least to me the buyer.
grann-4629
OP9 months agoI see this graph on every listing under 'detailed seller ratings', or does this mean something different?
Four bars, starting with 'Accurate Description".
roccotacodad54
·9 months agoI only buy and have had very few problems because I read feedback left for sellers and their replies to said feedback.
If feedback was scrapped altogether I would more than likely be hesitant to spend much as I find the MBG a pain. With a total lack of feedback I would be buying in the blind.
I have only had to resort to the MBG on rare occasions and if that were to increase I'd get sick of it pretty fast.
As far as the automatic feedback...I just ignore it anyway. Feedback scores go up which makes me not trust them as much. The up side is that I actually read alot more actual human feedback which may or may not be good for the seller. Alot of times I see red flags hidden in a high feedback score and pass..................
gurlcat
·9 months agoEven in the Sellers forum I can't believe it took until the 10th reply (by a buyer-only) before someone brought up the concept of the buyer's experience. All of you saying feedback is useless and a vestige of the past must not shop here, or you'd realize how valuable a tool it still is, to decide which sellers to buy from and not buy from. @roccotacodad54 Hear, hear!!
If anyone here thinks the MBG is sufficient "protection" for buyers, you lack imagination. Picture buying something you need soon and it costs a lot of money. With no feedback from prior buyers, you have to choose the seller blindly (even their stated location could turn out to be false, happens all the time, and is one of the things buyers report in negative and neutral feedback). So then say the seller you choose stalls a long time to ship, ships from China rather than Ohio or whatever, and/or sends you the wrong item (or the item is a total FAKE of whatever it was supposed to be). Sure you can do an INAD return, but that adds time to how long you have to wait until you can actually acquire the thing you wanted.
That's not protection. That's just reparation, and not even full reparation if you understand the concept that time is money. All that time, the seller got an INTEREST-FREE LOAN from you. If you don't think they ever do that on purpose, again you lack imagination.
Without feedback, it would be easier for bad sellers to be worse, and it would attract more of them here, while simultaneously driving good buyers away.
And just to add: What rocco said about not "trusting" the rising seller scores due to auto-feedback may be misleading. They're not calling it useless or bad, just saying it means a wise buyer should rely less on that % number and more on what buyers actually SAID in their feedback comments, and that is absolutely true.
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months ago@gurlcat
All of you saying feedback is useless and a vestige of the past must not shop here, or you'd realize how valuable a tool it still is, to decide which sellers to buy from and not buy from.
Every bad transaction I have had on any site was with a seller with 100% FB. It is not a reliable warning system.
Many of those sellers still had 100% FB up to the time they were NARUed. Others got the negatives between when I bought and when they were NARUed.
I have never lost any money buying on Ebay. Between sellers who stood behind their goods, the Ebay MBG and my credit card issuer I was protected.
Buyers with no clue what they are buying suffer more from their ignorance than they do from unscrupulous sellers. In some ways, Ebay is safer than Amazon, no returns is a warning not to buy what you like any knowledge of, and many buyers, including some of mine get the message.
gurlcat
·9 months agoYour reply shows you missed rocco's and my points completely. Of course a 100% seller could be bad. A seller could have 100% based on 3 sales -I wouldn't buy from them, but maybe you did. Meanwhile, a seller with 95% could be awesome, because the few negatives they got were from buyers making petty complaints or obvious partial refund scammers.
This is what we meant by the comments being far more useful to look at than the number -if anything is useless it's the number. It tells you almost nothing.
Also you missed my point about the MBG not being real protection. Maybe you didn't mind losing your money temporarily, but you did. And you also had to go through whatever efforts it took to get your money back, which maybe you didn't mind but many buyers do.
Your experience as a buyer is just one data point. It's not irrelevant, but in the grand scheme it's not much.
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months ago@gurlcat
It is not the number of FB which matters.
Good sellers get bad feedback.
Bad sellers get good feedback.
Good sellers get good feedback when they should get some bad feedback
Bad sellers get good feedback when the should get bad feedback.
We can see it happen when a seller does things which are wrong and posts on this forum, or when a seller does something which is perfectly permissible. There are some posters who defend the evil doer and others who denigrate the good sell.
FB could be replaced by a happiness scale. rating how the buyer feels about the transaction. 1 - 5 stars and it might then be easier to ignore it like the DSRs. Or add it to the DSRs so that buyers do not think that it is a predictor of how their transaction will go.
I just had a wrong product shipped to me by an Ebay seller. It was the right manufacturer but the wrong part similar to what was listed. The seller shipped fast. I messaged him as to whether he wanted me to open an MBG claim or deal with it without an INAD claim. He opted for a refund but did not answer my question.
He had not refunded so I opened the INAD claim. Instant refund. Should I have told the story in his feedback? Some sellers would have in a neutral, some would have in a negative. I left no FB, which means he will get an automatic FB. I can live with that.
What should be done, if anything, to warn other buyers about this seller. IMO not a darn thing. But I know other buyers will make another choice.
The system is fatally flawed. It cannot be fixed.
gurlcat
·9 months agoWell the OP of this thread @grann-4629 disagrees, views the numbers as important and the words unimportant (and/or nasty).
I say it's great that we have BOTH, so people can look at numbers or words, as they each prefer! 😀
grann-4629
OP9 months agoJust to be clear, I don't like the whole feedback idea of feedback even tho I use it - I think sellers somehow 'need' it to keep going.
I was just thinking that using numbers instead of words might reduce the animosity between members.
jonathanbrightlight
·9 months ago@tobaccocardyahoo
I have to correct one thing in your story. You said the seller will get the automatic positive feedback, and you can live with that. But you opened an INAD claim, so regardless of the outcome of that claim, the automatic feedback will not be left by eBay.
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months agoI stand corrected. Thanks.
grann-4629
OP9 months agoGood thoughts @tobbacocatdyahoo
What strikes me as odd about the feedback system is a 95% feedback is considered below average and risky. I was an average student when I went to school, and if I got anywhere near 95% on an exam, I would be considered a genius.
Alas ... 😎
eburtonlab
·9 months ago@grann-4629
What strikes me as odd about the feedback system is a 95% feedback is considered below average and risky.
Think about it this way: a 95% feedback rating means that one out of twenty buyers had a problem serious enough to leave negative feedback. You may be among the 19/20 that don't have a problem, but you may be that 1/20.
Looking at the last six sellers you have received feedback from, all were above 99%. Other than a few starting sellers with zero feedback, the average feedback rating for sellers that have received feedback for selling is probably above 99%. A rating of 98% is probably below average. A rating of 95% is well below average.
grann-4629
OP9 months agoThanks.
That is a different way of thinking about the high per-centages, and I get your POV. I probably just lucked out by working with sellers who have a rating of 99 point something.
All of my buying experiences, so far, have met or exceeded my expectations. I don't mind taking a minute or so to thank the sellers who made that happen. I have even contacted a seller thru private email to commend him for his outstanding performance, provision of a product that no one else had at a great price, and getting it to me from the other side of the world in 7 days with a very reasonable shipping cost.
gurlcat
·9 months agoYou can't imagine how much you make a seller's day when you do that, because it's really rare. Most buyers seem just "satisfied" at best, and a lot of them don't seem to know that we are individual sellers, but just "eBay." I don't think we NEED personal praise but it sure is nice once in a while.
roccotacodad54
·9 months agoThank You Gurlcat I think you explained my thoughts very well (better than I did). Especially reparation vs protection........................
stainlessenginecovers
·9 months agoWhat's feedback?
books_n_more
·9 months agoI wouldn't be surprised if they eventually got rid of it since they are now doing the automated feedback. There really isn't much point to it since most issues are resolved regardless of feedback.
soh.maryl
·9 months agoDo you really believe that "most issues are now resolved regardless of feedback".
Just reading on these Boards makes me believe that there are quite a few issues that are NOT resolved, but it seems like a whopping percentage of those are not resolved because buyers are not well educated about their options if/when a transaction goes wrong.
There should be a way to better educate buyers about the MBG as well as about opening INR cases more quickly.
tinsoldierunderground
·9 months ago+1 to what @soh.maryl posted
If you spend enough time hanging around on the forum pages, you'll see how many unresolved issues members have. A good many people post here having no idea what to do when an issue arises in a transaction, and an equal number show up for help when it's too late to do anything.
iamalwaysright
·9 months agoebay would get a lot of feedback for the lack of feedback. 😉
grand-and-glorious-purpose
·9 months agoIt became mostly useless in 2008, a bit more so when toolhaus stopped, even more so when DSRs replaced it as a performance metric.
It pretty much is nothing but a character cosmetic unless you are a dropshipper or sell plastic junk from China
slippinjimmy
·9 months agoThe whining would explode due to the fact that there are many sellers who seem to feel that feedback is more important than money.
meme6253
·9 months agoMoney is much better!, But the unfortunate part of this scenario is if you get too much bad feedback you could cease to make any money!
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months agoA bunch of cry babies and Karens would go to the press and social media to decry the loss of protection that this reckless act is causing for all Ebay buyers.
Unless other marketplaces simultaneously eliminate this worthless vestige of the wild west days of Ebay, no one will.
Ebay management is not stupid enough to do that. In fact, they have a strong grip on reality much of the time.
chapeau-noir
·9 months agoFeedback is still a big part of many markets. Sorry.
tobaccocardyahoo
·9 months agoAmazon considered eliminating Feedback in 2010. It devised two potential replacements for a public means of providing a seller rating. Both were objective and relevant. They backed off because of the negative reaction from sellers who have nothing to offer but their 100% FB rating. Sellers who provide no value added.
Any internet marketplace smaller than Ebay is irrelevant when considering what Ebay should do, and in the larger marketplaces the amount of FB left for most sellers is in the low to mid single digits. It is as useless as the surveys some stores print a link to on their register receipts.
iamalwaysright
·9 months agoThe world would implode.