posted on March 19, 2002 06:19:51 AM new
I just viewed a seller whose bidders obviously don't read their feedback. This seller has a certain item listed, an item she has listed over and over either dutch or single auctions for months now. She claims they are a *authentic brand name* (not mentioning so not to give away seller). She has a total of 800 feedbacks, 78 negatives (15 within the past 6 months/50 total neutrals for slow shipping)all for selling this very item mentioned as the brand name when it isn't. YET she has them listed now, one in a dutch auction with 28 bids! The same item, the same photo! What will this mean? More negs from buyers saying it isn't the brand name, that she is a fraud and a liar yet they never once bothered to read her feedback, see all the other negatives stating that the item is NOT the brand she claims.
Time and time again I see buyers who leave nasty negative feedbacks to sellers calling them fraud and liars, which they may be, but some fault (if not the large majority of it) has to go to them for NOT reading the feedback before bidding.
I just don't understand why people don't read feedback before they bid. I have *never* bid without doing so first---why I came across this auction! I will give my bid to a seller who sells authentic items with positive feedbacks (usually the poor folks who have no bids while the bad seeds continue to thrive. Sheesh).
Edited twice for pathetic spelling errors.
[ edited by ThriftStoreQueen on Mar 19, 2002 06:22 AM ]
[ edited by ThriftStoreQueen on Mar 19, 2002 06:22 AM ]
posted on March 19, 2002 07:01:55 AM new
I always check feedback when I buy..you never know if a seller suddenly decides to start ripping people off. I remember about a year ago I bid on an item on Yahoo..he had a decent seller rating with 1 neg. I won the auction, had problems and had to neg the guy. Soon after..dozens of buyers were negging him yet people were still bidding on his items..you'd think that if a seller gets 30 negs in 2 weeks, people would wise up. Lucklily a few other buyers and myself got him kicked off Yahoo after filing several fraud complaints.
MEOW
posted on March 19, 2002 07:19:01 AM new
I am not wanting to start up another massive discussion on feedback. But sometimes people just dont bother to leave feedback also this compounds the problem specially negatives for whatever reason. Then in turn you read someones feedback think it looks safe enough when in essense it is not. If only everyone would leave feedback good or bad then you would really get a true picture about a seller.
posted on March 19, 2002 07:29:03 AM new
"If only everyone would leave feedback good or bad then you would really get a true picture about a seller"
Not true in many cases..there are lots of wackos that leave false negative feedback for sellers if they dont get thier way. I have 2 negatives that say I threatend her and used bad language and it wasnt true.
MEOW
posted on March 19, 2002 07:48:02 AM new
I read FB too and can't help but chuckle when I come across a seller with 100+ positives for good packaging/prompt shipping/great items and then there is a COMPLAINT-"FRAUD-TOOK MY MONEY NEVER SHIPPED BEWARE REPORTING TO FBI-CHEAT"
It's pretty obvious to me that this buyer didn't read FB either or they would have to realize that this seller is probably NOT a fraud and if they would just take the time to work with the seller instead of blasting them, it probably would all work out.
I immediately add this buyer's ID to my "blocked bidder" list...
On the other side of the coin, there was a report not long ago about an eBay seller who had great FB and lots of repeat customers and suddenly he went south with lots of folks money! So, I guess you really never know.
I also had a buyer with less than stellar FB. The most frequent "complaint"-impossible to work with...She had sniped my auction and I was prepared for the worse, but went through my standard routine (which drips honey) and I was paid by money order within a week and she left me great FB about how "friendly/professional" I was. Sometimes I guess folks just get off on the wrong foot with each other or they just don't mix well.
posted on March 19, 2002 09:17:11 AM new
When I have a problem with a customer it's not unusual to hear, "I wish I had read your feedback before bidding." Too bad those miscreants never passed sixth grade math, because my feedback is about 99% positive. The latest one just went on and on about my lousy feedback, ignoring the 5000 positives (that's about 20,000 transactions). Now her feedback is as "bad" as mine. Look at the feedback and DO THE MATH.
(BTW, this customer changed her email address, then accused me of fraud when I couldn't contact her. Typical wing-nut.)
posted on March 19, 2002 02:39:59 PM new
I totally understand sellers receiving bad feedback when it is undeserved screaming fraud even though a seller only has a few negs etc. My point on this certain seller is that all the negs were for the same exact items over the months, some stating the brand name and it not being authentic in the feedback yet still, she is able to get bids galore on the items. If the bidders would just read the feedback, they'd see that this person is selling the very item they are interested in claiming it is something it isn't and avoid trouble once they receive it.
posted on March 19, 2002 04:18:30 PM new
I think maybe the "composite" total of FB which shows behind the seller's ID is most of the problem. If a person had a FB of (-1) probably everyone would look. If they had (+10) maybe, but with (+700) showing, I doubt many do! That is why it is possible for a high FB seller to suddenly "go south". No telling how long they could rack up NEGS before buyers (who had been burned) complained enough to eBay to get them to at least send a warning to the seller if not NARU them!
I guess what I am trying to say is FB is probably ignored all together by lots of folks if it is showing above a certain level.
I am guilty myself of rarely looking at FB of seller's showing a FB total of more than 50!
I guess my subconscious thought is, if they were very bad someone would have already notified safeharbor and these guys would be NARU. In actuality it probably takes them NOT paying their eBay fees to get noticed...
posted on March 19, 2002 05:06:59 PM new
I watched my brother the first time he went eBaying. He had no clue that you could check to see a seller's FB profile. And I think that's the real problem....buyers see that number and think they are dealing with someone who managed to get X number of positive FB, so they must be ok.
I am begining to think that new buyers should be required to practice bidding a few times before they are let loose!
posted on March 19, 2002 06:53:16 PM new
i have to admit i used to think someone with a high feedback was ok to purchase from but then after a couple of bad experiences now i have learnt my lesson check EVERYONES feedback just to see how many negs they have and what for.
posted on March 19, 2002 07:08:36 PM new
Even worse are the buyers who do look at feedback but don't know how to read it. I had someone e-mail me that they couldn't believe that I had the nerve to try to continue selling on eBay with 8 negs, and they were retracting their bids because they should have read my feedback first. Now those 8 negs make up less than 1% of my feedbacks, three of those negs are obviously retaliations from deadbeats,(two of the three are now NARU) and one has a follow up comment from the poster apologizing for leaving this to the wrong person. The little nitwit couldn't see my 900+ positives, only the 8 negs.
posted on March 20, 2002 06:05:26 AM new
I personally NEVER bid on anything without looking at /reading the sellers feedback , and I have a sellers policy that states 'bidders with negative feedback must ASK before bidding' . In my opinion, that helps decrease the possibility of a problom. A buyer whot took the time to read through the terms is more likley to understand what they're getting than someone who bids on impulse ,then whines if somthing isn't what they thought it would be . Any buyer (unless given previous permission to bid ) w/ negative feedback who bids before asking will automatically have their bid removed .
Before I started doing this I'd get tons of deadbeats, now I have none , so it helps in a lot of ways.
As far as this sketchy seller goes, a friend of mine recently dealt with someone who is also selling supposed designer peices that are actually counterfits ! A friend of hers who works at a high end store and KNOWS how to tell the difference from the real thing and a fake informed her that the item she bid on was fake. She pointed it out to the seller, who then offered to give her a better deal on the item- in exchange for NOT TELLING ! Can you believe it ?!? Buyer beware is all I can say >: ).
posted on March 21, 2002 01:02:10 PM new
I have decided to only give feed back after the buyer does. This seems to be working quite well. As a matter of fact I have gotten more buyers to place feedback this way. If they have to go first they do not dare neg you for no reason. They also haave more incentive to give feedback if they want to get feedback.
I could just see it. A newby to eBay registers their user name and downloads a program from eBay which is a training game for bidding. You are given a certain amount of money and you bid until it is gone. If you place bids on several items and the bids equal more than you have and you win all of them, you are rated a deadbeat bidder. If you bid on the cheap laptop from the Romania seller and Western Union them the money, you are rated an fool. Plus a bunch of other common scenarios sellers and buyers go up against everyday.
But if everything goes well and the user gets value for their money, a code is displayed which allows you to activate your user name on eBay....
SOMEBODY PUT THOSE PROGRAMMERS TO WORK!!!!!
And I want a cut of the profit for thinking up the idea......
Think up some other scenarios for it....
Like the user choosing media rate delivery and negging after two days for no delivery-Rated as an idiot
[ edited by mlecher on Mar 21, 2002 02:44 PM ]
posted on March 24, 2002 01:03:54 AM new
Well yeah, when it gets to negative 4... untill then you're good to go. Mine is horrible, I have a knack for finding the people who don't read TOS or miss directions, and my TOS is to let them sit and not delay/penalize the people who didn't do anything wrong. Then when I have the time I go back to them. So I have a 93%rating if you do the math by actual number of positives vs negatives (including duplicates). Over on the eBay boards they told me once that anything less than 98% or so is bad, so I'm horrible. I had one guy leave me 4 straight negs for his combined package (see the post I started on fraud complaints for the whole story) because it was close to 30 days after the first item ended and he went into panic mode (forget the 17 days before I got paid and the confusion over the payment).
As close as I can tell, some people just shouldn't be allowed access to the internet - it's like all common sense flies out of their head when they bid on the items. Now if they just wouldn't bid on mine!
