I've been selling on EBAY for several years. For the most part, I've had the opportunity to do business with some fantastic EBAY users. Several past customers have become friends and we dwell in the same social circles on other internet sites. Unfortunately, there are bad apples in every crowd. With the changes EBAY made with the feedback system, this compounded the situation of sellers receiving undeserved negative feedback.  Let's face it, you just can't please everyone. Since the buyer no longer has to worry about receiving negative feedback from sellers, they have the definite advantage in the playing field. They don't have to contact the seller first to resolve any issues before leaving the feedback; and, if they do contact you and they don't like your response, then look out. Your feedback score is in jeopardy.

I wanted to share my negative feedback experiences to let other EBAY users know they cannot just rely on reading a seller's feedback to get the true picture of what occurred with a transaction. There are two sides to every story, but one cannot always tell what REALLY occurred by reviewing the feedback. Now, don't get me wrong, there are unreliable sellers out there who may have tons of negative feedback. I'm not referring to them with this statement. I'm referring to the sellers who have hundreds of positive feedback comments and then receive a negative feedback that stands out like a black eye. This is what I am referring to in this guide.

Over the past few weeks, I have experienced three undeserved negative feedback comments (and one neutral which started out as a negative, but was revised by the buyer) and I want to explain what REALLY occurred in order to show other EBAY users what can happen as a result of this unfair feedback system.

THEY WANT TO HAVE THEIR CAKE AND EAT IT, TOO:

I received two negative feedback comments from one of my regular customers recently.   We've been doing business together for many years and she was a fixture in my store.  At one time, she even left me feedback saying I was her favorite EBAY seller. I'd show my appreciation to this customer on a regular basis to thank her for her business. When she made purchases from my store, I frequently gave her several free handmade jewelry items with her order. This went on for many years.

About a year ago,there was an issue with one of the jewelry items this buyer purchased from me. The ear wire had slipped off of a pair of earrings. This is actually a minor issue and can be easily fixed. She contacted me about it and expressed her frustration over the issue. I immediately refunded her payment and included additional funds so she could return the item to me at my cost. I then made her an identical pair of earrings and mailed them to her as a replacement pair for the earrings she had purchased. She never did return the original pair of earrings to me, but at the time, I figured it was a small price to pay to maintain my business relationship with this customer. Boy, was I wrong.

After this, I started experiencing similar issues with this customer. After years of doing business together without any issues, she started alleging that her jewelry items arrived broken. I'd attempt to rectify the issue by replacing the items; in addition, I requested return of the original items. To this day, she has never returned any of the “broken” items to me, even though I paid for the return postage of these items. I strive to make quality handmade jewelry items. All of my other customers expressed pleasure at the quality of their jewelry pieces and no one else indicated there were any issues with their orders.  My excellent feedback comments from them supports this statement. It dawned on me that something just wasn't right with this whole situation. This time around, the buyer had purchased a lovely one-of-a-kind necklace which consisted of hundreds of little beads and a very unique pendant. She informed me that the clasp was broken on this. Because this was truly a one-of-a-kind item made with the limited beads and pendant, I asked her to mail the item back to me.I informed her that once I received the item back, I would refund her money. The buyer informed me that she wanted to KEEP the necklace, but she ALSO WANTED A REFUND.I stood my ground. I explained that I have been going out of my way to accommodate her, but the continued cost of doing business with her was getting expensive. Not only was she keeping the original items I mailed to her, she was getting refunds AND replacement items each time she complained about the quality of an item. I explained that any other reputable mail order business would request return of their items before giving refunds.

Unfortunately, this irritated my customer.She felt I was being unreasonable and ending up leaving me negative feedback which stated "lousy workmanship” and “fell apart”. Needless to say, I won’t be doing business with this customer any longer. I have blocked her from bidding on any more of my items.It’s simply not worth the hassle.

PEOPLE DON’T READ DESCRIPTIONS AND THEY DON’T READ CONTACT MESSAGES:

In my auction listing, the shipping area clearly states that I ship all items within 3 business days. When I ship items to my customers, I always send them a message through the EBAY contact system letting them know that their package has been shipped. As much as I try to communicate this information to my customers, it’s inevitable that at least a couple of times a week I get emails from people asking where their packages are and about the shipping information.

Recently, I mailed a package to a buyer within 3 business days of receiving the cleared payment, just as my listing indicated. I informed the buyer of this through the contact message system; I also used PAYPAL to ship the item so the package could be tracked through the Postal Service. This particular buyer paid for her item on a Thursday and it was shipped to her on Monday, which is the third business day. Out of the clear blue sky, I received a negative feedback from this individual stating that it took me two weeks to ship her item, which of course, is totally inaccurate information.  I immediately requested a feedback revision from this buyer. I provided her with a copy of my original contact message to her, and I also informed her that according to the US Postal Service package tracking system, she received their package exactly 8 days after she paid for it. The buyer did end up changing her feedback from a NEGATIVE to a NEUTRAL. Some people just can’t admit they are wrong and this is a perfect example of that. Instead of doing the right thing, it was more important for them to be right.

THERE IS JUST NO PLEASING SOME PEOPLE:

Another example of abuse of the feedback system occurred recently with a woman who contacted me about the status of her package. She indicated that she never received her item.  I immediately responded to her question just as I had in the situation described previously. The buyer did not respond back to me.

Four days later, the buyer left me negative feedback citing that “it has been 10 days and I still have not received my package.Seller unresponsive.” Once again, I requested a feedback revision and I sent the buyer a copy of my original message to her to prove that I DID respond to her original question.I also asked her to be patient. For whatever reason, sometimes there will be a delay in shipping AFTER the package is mailed, but I don’t have any control over this. I have encountered this before but the Post Office will not take any reports about the missing packages until after 30 days has passed.I explained all of this to the buyer. For some reason, I just could not get through to her. No matter how many times I explained this, she just didn’t get it.I finally told her that by reviewing her feedback numbers, I can see that she is new to EBAY. I explained that before leaving negative feedback, she should have contacted me and allowed me the opportunity to rectify the situation before doing this. New EBAY users tend to have trigger fingers where feedback is concerned; in all honesty, any negative feedback received from my experiences and those of other sellers is usually from newer EBAY buyers who don’t know how to use the system.  They don’t realize the implications they cause when they immediately leave negative feedback before trying to work things out with the seller. Apparently, when I mentioned this to the buyer, she told me I was rude, and she also left that on my feedback. Go figure! By the way, she did end up receiving her package from the post office.  I mailed it 3 days after I received payment from her, but it took her 13 days to receive her package. I was penalized for something that is out of my control. There was just no reasoning with this customer, and there is no making her happy.Oh, sure, I could have personally delivered her package to her clear on the other side of the United States, but I have a feeling she still wouldn’t have appreciated this extra effort on my part.On another note, this particular buyer had only 13 feedback points at the time she left negative feedback for me. In reviewing the feedback she has left for others, I saw that she left three other negative feedback comments for sellers and ALL were shipping related.  This is clearly a situation where no matter what you do, you will not please the buyer.  There is just no pleasing some people.

IN CLOSING:

It is not my intention to sound like a wise guy in describing my experiences with you. I know there are lots of fantastic EBAY users out there – both new and old to this venue– who have been wonderful to do business with. Thankfully, these have been the bulk of my experiences. The most important thing I want to relay is that 1) you can’t always trust the negative feedback that someone has received because it may be grossly inaccurate and 2) if you were the unlucky enough to receive the feedback, don’t let it give you an ulcer.  It’s not worth it and you simply will never be able to please everyone.

Good luck with future feedback and don’t let the “trigger fingers” out there get to you!