Good (or Bad) News for eBay Sellers

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Since the ebay feedback changes have taken place I have noticed an increase in buyers complaining about perfectly good items and sometimes using the negative feedback as a type of extortion technique against me.I have always taken care of my customers,if somebodys not happy with a purchase I always offer 100% refund..this isnt working anymore,I have recieved rude emails from buyers asking for partial refunds because "I wasnt completly satisfied with item or not as described" and these buyers have sometimes stated "you want to protect your feedback rating..dont you?" This feedback change is driving many sellers away from the eBay selling platform, I will soon be removing all my listings,cancel my account and sell elsewhere..Does eBay even care about us sellers that helped grow the website to what it is today..I guess not,Dont sell on eBay any more its a waste of time.

cfactor of CA 3:32AM September 21, 2008

everything e bay does revolves around the buyer .there are no benifits left for the seller .leave now

george weeks of 6:19PM August 24, 2008

Kimberly,
I think that Russell my have implied a certain amount of scarcasm behind his statement. Thanks for clarifying his point.
Take care,
Bob

Bob Henley of 5:44AM July 28, 2008

Listen to Jim Griffith, the mouthpiece for eBay. Do a google search, and you will see this guy has no business background and could not even keep his electricity paid. (basenotes.net) On eBay's "radio" broadcast, he sits slouched, and answers calls. (search for him on youtube) He is very arrogant & condescending. He says to "shrug" off negative feedback. "Ask the bidder what you can do to be better." He even describes a case where the word "vintage" is used. Based on the bidder’s perception, he has a right to leave a neutral if he does not know the definition of vintage. Per Jim, everyone has an opinion and it negative, that is OK. If you get negative, it is acceptable to eBay. Of course it is! It means you will pay HIGHER fees. The ignorance level is so high, it is unacceptable. If you have negative ratings and dimly lit little gold stars, your final bids will be low. I guess eBay will raise their fees to make up for the shortcoming.
Getting negative feedback is near impossible. If vulgar, per ebay policy, the feedback is easily removed. WRONG! These perverts have a list of what is vulgar and they only go by the list. When dealing with a pervert, nothing is vulgar. Only a few words are on their list. Yes, this happened to me.
The gold stars are subjective and there is NO standard for rating. A bidder can give you a "3" because there was a holiday and the post office did not work. Part of eBay's great plan to make you pay higher fees. I've read numerous messages about people that offer FREE shipping, yet their star relating to Shipping and Handling Fees are rated a 4 out of 5.
Non paying bidder alerts mean nothing. You can file one. You will get negative feedback. If a bidder protests, eBay will adjust the bidders account so that they are not penalized. I had to fight to get my final fees back.
The eBay reps are highly programmed to read policies to you. They do not have any discernment or reasoning or business acumen. Honestly, I think they were hired off the streets and given a script.
eBay is striving to be like Amazon which is ignorant. Where else can you sell a rare, one of a kind item. Amazon does not have that format.
Finally, avoid any investment in goods to resale. VERO is the group of manufacturers and lawyers that have exclusive right to end your auction if they THINK you should not sell. In many cases, they will say you are not authorized to sell their product. They will send a threatening email. eBay will follow-up and threaten you as well, but there is NO list of VERO items. It could be software or certain brands.
eBay is like a crazed heroin addict trying to find themselves. If you think you can make a living or a business on eBay, please read all of these comments. This is the best board I have found.

Bill Davis of NV 9:53AM June 20, 2008

I am another former Ebay buyer and seller. I also refuse to use paypal.
They have forgotten who helped them get to where they are. I have been buying and selling since 2001. No more. In the mean time I am having fun watching their stock go down, and watching the auction site counts, Ebay goes down, iOffer goes up. :) iOffer for one is growing at a very steady rate.
I think you should investigate the Ebay and their new greed policies, maybe even contact some of the former members. You can find many on powersellers unite and run another story.
If you look closely you can find many people who have 'me' pages on Ebay and are using that to direct ebay members to other sites.
What would also be great is if you could run a story on some of the smaller and upcoming auction sites. Exposure is good for them and great for so many of us who have moved to venues other than Greedbay. I personally have moved to four other sites.

lp of WI 4:13PM June 09, 2008

Even after I heard eBay's new rule about sellers no longer being able to leave other than positive feedback for buyers I tried to chin up and chug along as usual. I mean, I haven't had any customer service troubles in the past, why should I worry?
Here's why: In the two weeks since the rule was enforced I have lost about $50.00 of merchandise to two different sellers whi got their items and claimed the weren't satisfied and intended to leave negaitive feedback if I didnt refund their money. That's okay, I have a return policy I tild thm... just send the items back and get a full refund. BOTH stated they would NOT pay to ship the items back and so... to spare the feedback rating... I refunded and got nothing back.
To add insult to injury, SIX bidders have neglected to pay for their auctions they won. Why should they care? I cannot leave them bad feedback. In fact, I cannot do anything except file an unpaid item strike which is basicly harmless to them.
I closed my store. The new fees, the hassles, the headaches, and now the invasion of the "get something for nothing crowd" at eBay's invitation have all ruined my reason for selling on ebay which was to make money.
These rogue buyers are basicly cyberspace armed robbers... with eBays blessing.
I may sell an item or two now and then again on eBay... but they will not get the huge cut they were getting from me. And frankly, I won;t give a damn about feedback anymore then.

Brian of TX 5:10AM June 06, 2008

I just closed my ebay store and am in the business of moving all of my items out the door to Amazon. New crazy fees and neutral as a negaitve on eBay ! Sellers can only leave positives, no negs. Bye bye ebay !
! Only in Bush's World !

Tom of MN 8:07PM June 01, 2008

I need to know if anyone else has been blackmailed by eBay on this suprising new policy. I have used eBay to sell numberous items over several years. When attempting to set up an auction to sell another item my type of payment options were automatically reduced to PayPal and none of the other means I have always used before. The notice on the page is,"because of your limited transaction history on eBay I must offer PayPal." I have never used PayPal and don't want to use that for payment. I have never had a problem on payment including use of "Personal Checks.." I have an unblemished "feedback" with 100% acceptable rating.
This action, that if I do not set up a PayPal account I am no longer able to sell on eBay, appears illegal and to be pure unadulterated blackmail by eBay and PayPal.
Please let me hear from you if you have encountered the same demand by eBay.

Bob of GA 12:28PM May 28, 2008

In addition to the absurd 3% hike in the final value fee and the elimination of negative feedback for bad buyers, most people may be unaware that the reserve price fee will is also no longer being refunded.
I frequently sell used high-end photo equipment and often use the reserve. I noticed that on my eBay statement that the fees were not being refunded, so I looked on the website for information about possible changes. I couldn't find any, so I called customer service and was told that eBay sent out sellers an email back in January. I told her I had never received it and asked if I could have the reserve fees refunded since I listed my items with the assumption that they would be refunded as they always have. I was transferred to billing where I explained the situation again. This time I was told that eBay doesn't send mass emails to users and that the announcement was posted on the message board. So I looked again at the message board. No direct mention of it. I was told it was under an announcement by Bill Cobb on Jan. 29, so I clicked that and still didn't see any reference to a change in the reserve refund. I had to click several links before I finally found an well-hidden FAQ list which made brief mention that reserve fees will no longer be refunded.
This is obviously an attempt to hide a change which could cost sellers a lot of money as it has myself. It is absolutely unethical business practice. Apparently ethics have flown out the window and have given way to corporate greed. The best way to punish eBay for this is to vote with our feet. They need to learn a hard lesson that just because they are the biggest, doesn't mean that they can continue to get away with this kind of greedy behavior.

Mike of MD 9:55AM May 09, 2008