WARNING: I did not know eBay were doing this.

NotArobot24

I recently saw in the eBay community forums that eBay is now giving POSITIVE feedback for your purchase if you do not leave negative or neutral feedback.

I called eBay and they confirmed that they do this, they had a script with a convoluted argument justifying it, I asked if somewhere in their computer system the automatic positive feedback was linked to the sale, if only by a reference to the transaction, they said yes but they do not show my name publicly.

I find this obscene,I always felt no leaving feedback was effectively neutral, what makes this worse is that unlike Amazon, eBay limits your feedback to 60 days, barely enough time to see if the product will fail.

I spoke to the ICO who told me this was in their words fraud, they said they would investigate it if I made a complaint and they told me to contact Trading Standards.

The reason I feel so much about this is because as it is eBay has buried the negative feedback so you have to take six actions to see it, pictures say it better, identity of sell has been removed as the purpose is to show how very bad and emotive feedback is hidden.



This is another reason I do not like to use eBay anymore.

I am reporting it to Trading Standards and to the ICO, I suggest you do the same if you feel the same way I do, this seller had an additional 12,000 positive feedback which totally distorts the stats and does not even show over what period.

Isthisforreal99

There are many things in the world that could be described as 'obsence'. 

This falls well short.

soolin

I really can't get that upset about feedback, it is just a general annoyance now with everyone wanting some.

Yes positive bland statements are being left automatically merely to indicate that no issues were raised about a transaction, I don't see the real issue with that, as usual ebay is just copying the Vinted model which has always done that.

Leave feedback, don't leave feedback it's all a bit of a non event. It is neither obscene nor fraud. 

sonearandyetsofa

EBay state that any feedback you leave will override the automated feedback, so you can still do that. There's nothing stopping you from leaving feedback that says the transaction went well but you haven't had time to adequately try the product out, a lot of people do leave feedback like that.

NotArobot24

I see several issues

1. Being able to rely on Feedback when making a purchasing decision
2. Only having 60 days to leave feedback which is no time for consumer complaint (6 years)
3. Having feedback left effective in your name on your transaction

It was the ICO who called it fraud 

I am entitled to my opinion when saying I find it obscene.

All this will do is make me more prone to leave negative feedback at the slightest thing and to leave neutral feedback that whilst not negative will be detrimental, Also I will not be leaving positive feedback except in very rare situations.

I only sell for charity, for which I have a separate account, I have had these accounts for around 25 years, during this time eBay has become truly awful.  I made a post on eBay community about it and I get Kudos for that post every few days which triggers an email.

I do not care for feedback for myself, but I do want to be able to trust the eBay suppliers that it takes hours to find with no many scammers.

Ebay not only tolerates those gaming the system but it does not allow you to remove such listings from search.

Amazon tends to cost more but it takes less time and gives less frustration..

I hope Vinted improve their game to the point where I feel happy to open an account.   So far their mentions on Consumer shows suggest that is some way off. It seems scammers have found a plethora of ways to scam buyers and when this happens they take a month to sort things out and that is if they agree.

Spoonie_Turtle

You may not be aware but you can filter out automatic feedback when looking at someone's profile.

NotArobot24

Yeh that is in the image I posted but for me it is not about filtering it, it is about them doing it on the transactions I chose not to leave feedback on as if I had left positive feeback. It distorts feedback even more than existing policies and I agree with the ICO that it is fraud.

goodfella66

NotArobot24 said:

Yeh that is in the image I posted but for me it is not about filtering it, it is about them doing it on the transactions I chose not to leave feedback on as if I had left positive feeback. It distorts feedback even more than existing policies and I agree with the ICO that it is fraud.

Once Ebay leave feedback, you can still leave feedback yourself and that will override anything Ebay have left. 

Very few buyers leave feedback nowadays and I suspect that is messing with the service metrics that Ebay have put in place for sellers, hence they have done this so the feedback reflects a more genuine figure of items sold.

I can see it's a very slight annoyance to some people but I don't think it's a big deal in the grand scheme of things.

soolin

NotArobot24 said:

I see several issues

1. Being able to rely on Feedback when making a purchasing decision
2. Only having 60 days to leave feedback which is no time for consumer complaint (6 years)
3. Having feedback left effective in your name on your transaction

It was the ICO who called it fraud 

I am entitled to my opinion when saying I find it obscene.

All this will do is make me more prone to leave negative feedback at the slightest thing and to leave neutral feedback that whilst not negative will be detrimental, Also I will not be leaving positive feedback except in very rare situations.

I only sell for charity, for which I have a separate account, I have had these accounts for around 25 years, during this time eBay has become truly awful.  I made a post on eBay community about it and I get Kudos for that post every few days which triggers an email.

I do not care for feedback for myself, but I do want to be able to trust the eBay suppliers that it takes hours to find with no many scammers.

Ebay not only tolerates those gaming the system but it does not allow you to remove such listings from search.

Amazon tends to cost more but it takes less time and gives less frustration..

I hope Vinted improve their game to the point where I feel happy to open an account.   So far their mentions on Consumer shows suggest that is some way off. It seems scammers have found a plethora of ways to scam buyers and when this happens they take a month to sort things out and that is if they agree.

The issue with leaving poor feedback is that many (most?) sellers tend to look at a buyers feedback left for others where offers are to be made or have been made. I personally would block serial complainers, so in some ways these problem buyers self regulate themselves out of the process. Obviously that doesn't work for my items that are bought by BIN.

Any buyer that routinely runs into problems is obviously not that careful when buying, and then gets in a habit of leaving poor feedback to justify buyers remorse, or 'slights' they feel they have had from seller. Also any seller in good standard can get some poor feedback removed anyway if they can show it was not justified.

I had a buyer purchase something earlier this year, told me how to pack it with one of those rather nit picking cut and pastes that they said  they felt obliged to send sellers as people no longer know how to pack things in a correct manner. Told me how to address package, told me exactly when I should post it etc. It arrived a day after the EDD and buyer left me a neutral stating that 'my courier' did not deliver in time and that I had used clear packing tape when I was told to use brown parcel tape which was stronger. I could have got that removed, but I have left it, my only neutral, as I think it showed more about the buyer than it did about me, I also of course blocked the buyer. Buyer has since messaged me saying that I have dome something to my settings as it is not allowing them to buy something else from that set that they want, and could I sort it out. I never did respond. 

RFW

Amazon actually has a similar system, albeit not visible. For sellers, if feedback isn't left then it's counted as a positive. Given that on there I barely get 1% leaving feedback I rarely look at it.

On Ebay buyer feedback is automated and I don't check seller feedback particularly.
Ebay are trying to make feedback irrelevant. It used to be fairly unique to them but only a dwindling number of buyers and sellers really care about it any more.

NotArobot24

goodfella66 said:

NotArobot24 said:

Yeh that is in the image I posted but for me it is not about filtering it, it is about them doing it on the transactions I chose not to leave feedback on as if I had left positive feeback. It distorts feedback even more than existing policies and I agree with the ICO that it is fraud.

Once Ebay leave feedback, you can still leave feedback yourself and that will override anything Ebay have left. 

Very few buyers leave feedback nowadays and I suspect that is messing with the service metrics that Ebay have put in place for sellers, hence they have done this so the feedback reflects a more genuine figure of items sold.

I can see it's a very slight annoyance to some people but I don't think it's a big deal in the grand scheme of things.

Not according to the customer services woman who called me back, she said it is applied after 60 days if I do not leave a review and I am not allowed to leave feedback after 60 days.

All of the obfuscation in getting to see negative feedback was bad enough, this just makes a farce of the whole thing.  Currently I don't think eBay is a safe place to trade.

It appears to be full of scammers including all of the Chinese fake Battery Cells with impossible mAh, fake USB Data sticks claiming terabytes of space.  Iphone cables that last barely a week.  LED bulbs that rarely last more than 30 days with some DOA.  I found it cheaper to buy a new lightfitting.  Plus the clone fakes of kit where the manufacturer of decent hardware that moved their manufacture to China only to find a clause in their contract that said they had right to clone the device with a lower quality model.

My impression of Chinese products is that they simply do not operate quality control or if they do they knowingly sell goods that fail quality control.  

I have to ask myself why does eBay go to such length of coding to HIDE the negative feedback and invest this system of creating fake positive feedback?  They are complicit just as as complicity as advertisers on social media and YouTube selling junk products.