Don't be afraid to leave Negative feedback!

Jellicle

What do you do when as a buyer you check a sellers feedback (it being < 100%) and find that he/she leaves rude and obviously "retalitory" negative feedback?

- I go and find what I want elsewhere, NO WAY do I want to deal with a seller who behaves like that when things don't go right straight away!

Conversely, when I see a measured and polite response to negative feedback by a seller it gives me confidence that they will do everything they can to sort out a problem if it arises, that's the sort of seller I want to do business with!


And as a seller I check the feedback of my buyers if I can just out of interest, but I always check the winning buyers feedback to see if there is likely to be problems. If there is then I am much more careful, waiting for cheques to clear and checking their latest feedback before I send the item by recorded delivery instead of first class post.


I raised this question because people shouldn't be afraid to leave truthful feedback:

If you feel that you don't want to leave positive feedback (although that can be carefully worded to express your concerns) then either leave a neutral or leave none at all. Leaving a neutral may evoke an unwarranted response from the seller if they are very unhappy with your comment (or are simply having a bad day). You should check what sort of feedback the seller leaves for others when he gets a neutral/negative feedback to help you decide.

Whatever feedback you leave remember that you have the opportunity to add a comment both to your initial comment ("follow-up") and to the sellers comment ("reply") later.
- Polite factual comments left by you are powerful statements and even if the seller leaves you a negative that will only direct people to your responses.

I have often bought & sold items with people who have shown that they are reasonable human beings by responding reasonably to an unreasonable buyer or seller, (no matter what their feedback "score" is). However I never deal with people who leave rude feedback and make it obvious that they are a pain to deal with if anything goes wrong, like an item lost by the Post Office.

Don't be afraid of receiving negative feedback, it gives you the opportunity to show you are a reasonable person and directs sellers/buyers to your comments. It can show that you are trustworthy and should give them much more confidence in you than even a 100% score!

masonic

This is an issue close to my heart. I get wound up by people who leave negative comments wrapped in a positive and people so afraid of retaliatory negs that they avoid leaving any feedback when faced with someone who deserves a neg.

As I am not a seller, I have absolutely no issues about leaving fair and factual negs/neutrals, since my own feedback is not so important. I would rather warn others of potential danger than protect a flawless feedback rating (who am I kidding... I do it out of spite )

However, if I see negs in the feedback of a seller I am interested in, I look at what is said, the reply if they make one, and also at the negs they have left for others.

I recently bought from a powerseller with <97% feedback. I know... asking for trouble What impressed me about this seller was that they were able to blow every negative comment out of the water with their reply and gave what appeared to be very fair feedback in return.

Feedback is the only insight you have of someones personality, so those people who don't look good in the feedback forum, don't get bids; at least not from me.

slowen

It's hard on ebay sometimes to leave a truthfull negative feedback for a poor service or bad goods as you just know the seller in 99% of times will just leave a negative feedback to get you back.

I had a bidder with no feedback win one of my items and he kept me waiting for payment for 2 weeks and after still no responce I decide to leave a negative feedback as in the meantime he has refused payment to two other sellers. The thing that pi**es me off is that I am stuck with a negative feedback that ebay wont remove even though the bidder had no intention of paying for the goods and he can just set up a new account as feedback will not matter to them

Ebay do my head in sometimes as if it was not for sellers then ebay would be out of business as sellers create alot of money for ebay

Mark7799

masonic wrote:

This is an issue close to my heart. I get wound up by people who leave negative comments wrapped in a positive and people so afraid of retaliatory negs that they avoid leaving any feedback when faced with someone who deserves a neg.

As I am not a seller, I have absolutely no issues about leaving fair and factual negs/neutrals, since my own feedback is not so important. I would rather warn others of potential danger than protect a flawless feedback rating (who am I kidding... I do it out of spite )

However, if I see negs in the feedback of a seller I am interested in, I look at what is said, the reply if they make one, and also at the negs they have left for others.

I recently bought from a powerseller with <97% feedback. I know... asking for trouble What impressed me about this seller was that they were able to blow every negative comment out of the water with their reply and gave what appeared to be very fair feedback in return.

Feedback is the only insight you have of someones personality, so those people who don't look good in the feedback forum, don't get bids; at least not from me.

Hear hear. I agree with these comments. People should look at the words - not the figures. Incidentally, I write as one with 99.5% feedback - one retaliatory negative - against six I've felt it appropriate to give :T

Wig

I agree with OP, but, I might wait untill I have a few more greens saved up. Hopefully I won't need to leave a red.

But I reckon the system should be more complex

-5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5

Like that,

You have to be really bad in my books b4 I'll issue a red. If there were more options It would be easier to assess someone.

Jellicle

slowen wrote:

It's hard on ebay sometimes to leave a truthfull negative feedback for a poor service or bad goods as you just know the seller in 99% of times will just leave a negative feedback to get you back...

- This is what I'm trying to get at Slowen, if people leave you negative feedback then it is critical that your response reveals it is not deserved, and a polite factual response is essential. You ought to thank that guy because now people are actually reading your response to this unwarranted negative feedback and warming to you!

- Mind you, you did do the NPB process before leaving any feedback didn't you, in an attempt to resolve the problem?

slowen

Jellicle wrote:

- This is what I'm trying to get at Slowen, if people leave you negative feedback then it is critical that your response reveals it is not deserved, and a polite factual response is essential. You ought to thank that guy because now people are actually reading your response to this unwarranted negative feedback and warming to you!

- Mind you, you did do the NPB process before leaving any feedback didn't you, in an attempt to resolve the problem?

I went through the whole NPB route and got my fees back after two weeks waiting for payment that never turned up but it just cracks me up when people win auctions or "buy it now" having no intentions of going through with the auction.

I have followed up the negative feedback with comments regarding a problem buyer and everyone beware