I guy asked me a question about something this morning and
sometimes when they do that I check their feedback to decide
if I want to deal with them or not. That may sound odd but
someone asked me about shipping a CD to Italy yesterday and
when I checked their feedback it was full of complaints
about shipping charges, I'm not dealing with them. Anyway I
checked his feedback and noticed he had received a few
negatives and neutrals lately so I investigated further and
here is some of his neutrals and negatives:

Neutral: Seats arrvd ok ...They are very nice....But you gotta lose the BOLDFACE TYPE!!


Here's your Sign: The title of the item was in BOLD, big
frickin' deal. If that bothers someone that much why bid.

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Neutral: should state that tool box is a product of china

Here's your Sign: Nobody does this, besides at the price
it was they should have known that.

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Negative: The package the sheets were in did not state POTTERY BARN.

Here's your Sign: Pottery Barn was in the frickin' Title!
The first line you read!

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Negative: 16 day's no box you will anser my e-mail's. I didn't get a UPS automatically

Here's your Sign: It was going Alaska according to his
response!

This is the type people we're dealing at times. They
don't read the description and obviously the title either
at times. I don't know if they can't read or what, they're
are plenty out there that can't.

BTW: The guy has 99.6% positive with over 4000 total, so
he's doing something right if he could just stop the stupid
people from buying his stuff..

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Grateful11

I left my first 'neutral' for a seller last month when it too him 10 days to ship a piece of paper Express Mail about 100 miles to my house. What irked me more than the long shipping times was that when I e-mailed him twice about expedited shipping options, I never got a response.

Only when I posted neutral feedback about the seller did I get a nasty e-mail from him. I told him that since I paid within 12 hours of the closing of the auction, the least he could have done was to wait less than 6 whole days to ship my product and respond to me e-mails.

I've left probably 7 or 8 negatives in all my years on ebay, and have received 2 negatives in response. I don't care though. One negative came from a guy who bid on a projector I was selling. Turns out he bid on and won about a dozen projectors that night. Never responded to my emails. I did a search and contacted all the other sellers... turns out he never responded to any of them either. But they were all afraid to leave a negative. So I left one... that spurred about 5 of them to do so as well. He did respond with a negative of his own... something along the lines of
"Johnson told me that the projector didn't work!" Thankfully ebay lets you respond, to which I said "I have no idea who Johnson is. Buyer is scam artist".

The other negative was from a buyer who thought a 10 pound item should only cost $3 to ship across the country. (my ad clearly stated that item weighed 10 pounds. This was before ebay had built-in shipping calculator). My response was "Buyer thinks 10 pound item should cost $3 to ship. Needs a dose of reality"

People are so scared of getting negatives on ebay that they refuse to leave them, even after they get screwed. That does nobody any good.

why should I be scared to get negatives on ebay? Maybe I'm just a bad ebayer ;) I know I have a few negatives in the past 6 years.

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---“What you permit, you promote. What you allow, you encourage. What you condone, you own.”

I'm one of those who thinks a seller should leave feedback first. However, I certainly recognize the validity of a seller protecting himself. I think you are wise to make an active decision as to whether you want to deal with someone. If a seller has a buyer who has left negatives that seemed at all unreasonable, I wouldn't expect the seller to leave feedback first. But, with my 100+ positives and no negatives, and paying immediately, I expect it first; however, I have enough feedback that it really isn't an issue for me.

It's interesting to me that sellers who have relatively little feedback (50), often don't leave feedback or communicate with me in any way. It seems to me that a seller who is interested in building their feedback record, might find it useful to check with me, ask me for feedback, or just leave me feedback, in anticipation that I'll reciprocate. I guess the fear of getting burned is just too great.

I'm also a believer in the seller leaving feedback first. I watch my auctions and as soon as I win I forward my contact info and pay *immediately*. I don't know what more I can do to earn positive feedback. As far as I'm concerned I've done my part.

The seller on the other hand now has my money and contact info. I expect that s/he will take as much care and consideration to get me my item as I have in paying them. In a perfect world this is the way it should work. But as Grateful11 points out there are nut jobs on both sides of this issue.

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- Jack D.




New tasteless sig coming soon!

Sometimes you do all the right thing and the other person is wrong. ...(for example doesn't email you or pay for a month or more. ..) and that person will inevitably leave neg feedback for you. ..


in the beginning (when you first start at ebay0, it feels awful and you try to avoid negative. . .

lately, I don't care. ..they done it wrong so I will say the truth. ..while that person will leave lies. ..

what can you do? You can only control what you do. . .non?

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_____________________________________

I reject your reality and substitute my own!

Feedback needs to be beefed up. The seller should be able to answer a simple yes/no to "did the buyer pay promptly?" right up front and then leave final feedback later if he so chooses.

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In the words of DharmaDog: "it may or may not be utter horse@#$%&, but it shouldn't be dismissed simply because it doesn't agree with your opinion."

Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

Trying is the first step to failure. -- Homer Simpson

elmo, I think that needs to be an option for both sides. Did the seller ship promptly, did the seller communicate in a timely manner, etc.

Feedback should answer basic questions from both sides and still possibly provide the comment field. But there is probably no way to prevent people from lieing just to torpedo the other users rating. eBay needs to do something though...

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- Jack D.




New tasteless sig coming soon!

eBay isn't going to change *anything* guys and gals.

I have more than 600 Positive Feedbacks, and zero Negatives or Neutrals, so I must be doing something right. I try and answer questions promptly, and like others here I check out the other person's feedback before answering or getting involved with them. I've been known to cancel bids from people with significant negative feedback, or a pattern/habit of retalitory actions. If you take the time to read someone's feedback, you can avoid a lot of potential problems before they happen.

I've also canceled bids from bidders with 0 feedback, especially on auctions with expensive items--my auction policies state up front that bidders with 0 feedback need to email me first, before bidding, or risk being canceled. I don't do it all the time, but it does happen if I feel it's necessary. I always email them first, and if I don't like the response I receive they're gone from the auction.

As a seller, I've run into problems that had to be overcome after the auction finished...anyone who'e been at eBay for awhile runs into that eventually. I try to be fair, and communicate with the nice people on equal terms, and so far that's resolved every bad thing that's happened. I've had packages/goods damaged by the shipper; I've refunded $$$ when a buyer wasn't 100% satisfied with the item; I've accomodated some winners in other ways to make certain that they were handled.

I leave feedback 1st if I'm the seller, as I see no logic in holding the buyer "hostage" until he/she leaves feedback for me. It encourages the buyer to leave feedback for the seller, IMO, to do so. It just pays to be fair and equitable with your winning bidders, in the long run. If you've represented the item honestly, and accurately, with an auction that has great copy, nice HTML layout, and photos of the actual item, I just don't see where things can go too far wrong. Sometimes there are unforeseen circumstances that happen post-sale, but I believe that even bad situations can be resolved amicably.

______________

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What's the difference between reality and fiction? Fiction has to make some sense.

rexrzer, not all sellers operate the same as you do. I've done some selling myself and as yourself, i find it's not too hard to make people happy...if you care to.

As a buyer, I am currently waiting 2 full days now for contact from a seller that got his money but will now not answer my emails. This is not the way to treat your customer. My only neg in 5 years of ebay was from a seller who ignored 5 emails and 2 phone calls. He then negs me and reports me as a non paying bidder! I was trying to request a total so I could pay him. This is the part of ebay that sucks.

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- Jack D.




New tasteless sig coming soon!