EBay abandons negative comments about buyers

[Sweetpea]

All buyers and sellers are equal in the virtual auction world of eBay, but buyers are about to become more equal than everyone else.

From May, eBay, the world's biggest online auction house, will block sellers from posting any negative or neutral comments about buyers who purchase their goods to coax more of them on to the site.

The move means that anyone selling an item will have little recourse to complain that the purchaser of their Britney Spears T-shirt or antique Whitby egg-timer had been a late payer, or had become a persistent troublemaker, grumbling unfairly about their acquisition.

At the moment, eBay buyers and sellers are encouraged to give a rating about their counterpart on the auction site's feedback system, which alerts other customers about bad experiences and helps to self-regulate the auction site. A buyer or seller with a bad rating is effectively blacklisted. At present customers can scroll through several months of comments about both buyers and sellers to decide whether they feel comfortable doing business with them. Frequent gripes include a seller over-charging for postage, a purchased item delivered late or one party being generally dishonest.

EBay abandons negative comments about buyers - Times Online



I am pretty happy about this. The only bit of negative feedback I have had has been as a buyer, from a really antsy American git.

[easyg]

At the moment, e bay is the king. I think they are getting arrogant. And as with all arrogant people, the users will desert them in droves when a better service comes along, as it most surely will.
What comes around goes around. The sooner people learn this little truth the better.

What eBay in its wisdom seems to be overlooking is the fact that if it weren't for the sellers there'd be nothing for the buyers to buy.

I think they have shot themselves in the foot with this idea. It's already an uneven playing field with the star ratings for sellers but none for buyers. How about speed of paying after winning the auction?

Then there's the buyer from Hell who pays late, complains about the postage even after they've paid - it's not as if they don't know the postage cost before they bid - and leaves an unjustified neg when the seller has fulfilled every obligation.

At present there is also the opportunity with tit-for-tat negging of coming to a mutual agreement to withdraw - but presumably if the buyer can't be negged then that can't happen either.

I think it's another nail in the coffin.

[Sweetpea]

Time for some competition perhaps?

Trouble is, the competition never seems to get off the ground.