Has anyone noticed how bad eBay's handling of feedback has become?
I've been selling on eBay for 22 years (on my seller account) and eBay used to be fairly understanding when it comes to protecting our feedback. However, it seems lately that their departments have become far less sympathetic, arrogant and have taken a 'computer says no' stance to addressing unfair feedback.
In summary, what I've noticed, is that buyers seem to have more protections then sellers, which allows them to slander eBay sellers, leave dishonest negative or neutral feedback, and eBay do very little to counter it.
I just had a case with what must be one of the worst eBay buyers I've ever had to deal with in 22 years. They purchased an item from us just before New Year's eve. I had the item sent out on time, on a 48 hour delivery cycle. As you can imagine, the bank holidays caused some expected disruption to services, but here is the timeframe; with their order being placed Monday at 9pm, NYE being Tuesday, NYD being Wednesday, the next working day is Thursday. Still, we gave Royal Mail the item Tuesday afternoon. By Thursday, the buyer was already complaining that the item had not been dispatched. This is not helped by Royal Mail disruptions meaning they didn't scan receipt of the item until the Saturday.
Our stance with the customer was clear, they needed to allow the 48 hour working day time for the item to arrive on Monday. This buyer wouldn't even allow this. Apparently they needed the item by the weekend for a birthday present, and rather than opt for a 24 hour delivery option, or message us politely, they decided to just flood us with messages accusing us of falsifying the dispatch, demanding a refund and even opened a non-received case on the Saturday demanding a refund. Just have a look at their messages!
Annoying, as said, Royal Mail acknowledged receipt of the item on Saturday and delivered the item on the Monday morning, on time and within the window we stated. What does the buyer do when it arrives? No apology about their behaviour, instead they throw a load of negative feedback on us. Having bought multiple items, they could leave several feedback, calling us disgusting, telling lies, just overall criticism of us.
Obviously none of this was fair and eBay have a feedback removal option for cases like this. It has a section referencing removal due to factors outside of our control (ie courier) buyers demanding refunds, abusive behaviour/profound remarks etc. This buyer met several criteria, so you would think this would be easy... NO! All our requests resulted in "Update: Your feedback removal request was not approved".
This was very surprisingly given how clear the case was. The expediency of this decision also suggests nobody had read through the string of messages. We contacted customer services and explained the situation and asked them to read through the messages. They agreed the buyer was in the wrong with how they behaved, however, he explained that they could only remove individual feedback that specifically went against eBay policy, and even then, WIPE the comment, not remove the feedback. So what we are left with multiple negative feedback comments that go against our score, with no comment or rebuttal from us to apply context. This is where eBay shows a serious flaw with their 'policy'.
If a buyer displays clear prejudice against a seller from the start, as with this case, making unfounded accusations, unfair demands, failing to wait for stated shipping times before complaining and opening a case (which remains open despite delivery) and abusive messages, they are showing a clear lack of good faith in the transaction and are already in breach of eBay policy. When they lie and are caught, it throws doubt on anything else they might claim without evidence. This is typically known where if a witness is caught in a lie (perjury), their entire statement is pretty much worthless and likely to be thrown out.
eBay currently, allows buyers to leave negative feedback, claiming whatever they want, and unless it specifically goes against policy, the most they will do is wipe it. This presents 2 flaws:
1. Wiping a negative feedback is not a fair resolution. The negative mark itself can be harmful to business reputation, and wiping the comment, including any reply, takes away context and prevents the seller from defending themselves, or pointing out the flaw in the buyer's argument.
2. If a feedback comment contains a provable lie or distortion, then the entire comment should become inadmissible. Feedback must be honest, by eBay 's own standards, so if a buyer is caught in a lie, then how can any of it, including additional negative feedbacks, be trusted? By lying, or extorting the truth, they have abused the feedback system and should lose the right to comment on that particular transaction entirely.
Hopefully, this seems reasonable. The problem is the call handler I spoke to didn't seem to have any influence on doing anything more than wiping the negative feedback comments. When I asked to have them restored (point 1), he said he couldn't. He even started complaining that 30 minutes on the phone was an issue. I guess bringing in £180k a year on eBay isn't quite enough to warrant 30 minutes with customer services...
I asked to speak to his manager, not to complain about him, but to try and address the policies being applied over feedback. This manager would only say the right decision had been made. I asked if he had read the messages from the buyer, and he said he had not. So how could he know if the right decision had been made? He didn't like this point claimed he wasn't taking a side, but clearly had no interest in going over the facts or really doing with this. I tried explaining my case as above, but honestly, this guy wouldn't stop interrupting me. I asked him to stop this and be professional and listen, but he kept saying he was 'interjecting'. This was really going nowhere and rather than take this case seriously, he just ended the call.
It's quite shocking to consider how much business I bring to eBay through my store and then have to deal with managers who do not care to review the facts of the case, or even listen to concerns of a business owner. When you are growing a business, building a brand on eBay, there is an element of trust in the site having your interests in mind. However, it seems that they have become so stuck on policy that they cannot see how they could be harming their business customers . Business that have likely started on the side from a spare room at home, so when eBay allow your reputation to be damaged unfairly, under cover of THEIR flawed policy, it can be VERY personal.
So in summary, the issue here is where eBay used to be reasonable in their feedback removal policy, it seems they have lost interest in dealing with these cases fairly. Wiping feedback instead of removing it seems to be the norm now and they act completely ignorant to the idea that this doesn't resolve the problem and can make it worse for sellers. Buyers now have free reign to threaten and damage a business if they don't get their way, so yet again, business sellers are less protected. It doesn't matter if you do everything right, if you don't cave to unfair buyer demands, they are very likely to damage your reputation through negative feedback, and even if they go against eBay policy, a wipe is the best you will get.
Time to start moving some of my £180k a year to Amazon...
I've attached evidence from this case (identifiable information remove per community rules). Please have a read and comment.
