Ebay buyer facing lawsuit over feedback

grim_tales · Post by **grim_tales** » 25 Oct 2008, 11:35

Digital Spy wrote:An eBay user is facing legal action after leaving negative feedback for a seller following an unsuccessful transaction.

Chris Read, a 42-year-old mechanic from Kent, used the auction website to purchase a £155 mobile phone from Joel Jones. When the item arrived, he discovered that it was the wrong model and was dissatisfied with its quality.

After receiving a refund for the phone, Read used the website's feedback facility to write: "Item was scratched, chipped and not the model advertised on Mr. Jones's eBay account."

Read has now reportedly received a letter from the seller, which warns that he will face court action, substantial legal fees and costs of £175 if he does not remove his comments.

"I am being punished on eBay because of this as sellers who have negative feedback appear lower down the screen in searches than other people," Mr. Jones is quoted by The Times as saying. "I'm losing money by the day and my business could go under because of it. I've been left with no option but to take legal action."

Meanwhile, Mr. Read has made a public response to the complaint, arguing: "All I had done was left an honest opinion and everything I said was true. I thought that was why the feedback service was there. It's not like I wrote anything malicious or nasty."

An eBay spokeswoman said: "We are very disappointed that this seller has chosen to sue rather than to attempt to resolve the buyer's problem amicably."

If the guys losing money, that's tough shit! He shouldnt have sold shoddy goods in the 1st place?

:shock:
Surely if a guy has a bad experience with a seller, neg. feedback shows what he thinks and people know if they should avoid that seller or not?!
A lawsuit is madness. The guy paid £175 for a shoddy/unsatisfactory phone and HE is being sued?! WTF!

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 25 Oct 2008, 11:44

I doubt he has a legal leg to stand on. The eBay T&Cs are very clear, you can leave negative feedback if you so wish, end of.

That said it was very unfair of him to do so, the guy gave him a refund. Tosser! I'd be well pissed off if I gave a refund and then got negative feedback. I always go out of my way to be polite and give the buyer what they want (within reason). I've had to issue refunds before, it sucks but it's life.

As yet I've not received negative feedback after it. That was very unfair of the buyer. He did it of course as sellers can no longer leave negative of neutral feedback against buyers. A rule which I find very unfair.

grim_tales wrote:A lawsuit is madness. The guy paid £175 for a shoddy/unsatisfactory phone and HE is being sued?! WTF!

Correction, he's threatening to sue him. I doubt the seller will actually do it.

The seller is taking it too far but he has a point. The buyer was given a refund and still left negative feedback, that's not right. What more could the seller do? It could've been a genuine mistake, even if it wasn't the seller could do no more than issue a refund.

grim_tales · Post by **grim_tales** » 25 Oct 2008, 12:05

He got a refund and thats good.

He could have left neutral feedback then I guess.
Oh right, sellers cant leave neg feedback against buyers but buyers can against sellers.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 25 Oct 2008, 12:45

grim_tales wrote:He got a refund and thats good. He could have left neutral feedback then I guess.

That's almost as bad, it still sticks out like a sore thumb. I'd have left no feedback, that's the fair thing to do.

grim_tales wrote:Oh right, sellers cant leave neg feedback against buyers but buyers can against sellers.

No, buyers can against sellers but sellers can only leave positive feedback. It's how Amazon has always worked and eBay changed it a few months back.

A seller now has no bargaining at all if a buyer mucks them around, which happens. You can open a dispute against them but they can still leave you negative feedback. It was fairer before.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 25 Oct 2008, 13:11

OT but are the rumours true that sellers soon have to offer free p&p for dvds,they cannot charge postage

grim_tales · Post by **grim_tales** » 25 Oct 2008, 13:24

I thought you had to leave feedback for every sale Brad?

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 25 Oct 2008, 13:42

grim_tales wrote:I thought you had to leave feedback for every sale Brad?

eh? feedback is optional though recommended.

Shingster · Post by **Shingster** » 25 Oct 2008, 16:04

saltysam wrote:OT but are the rumours true that sellers soon have to offer free p&p for dvds,they cannot charge postage

No item on ebay should have an independant postage charge, the seller should factor the postage into the item price. Then it would be easy to rank search results by price.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 25 Oct 2008, 18:10

Did you fail maths at school Shingster?

I'd not heard that Salty. I hope not.

It's not exactly difficult to work out the total price. It will mean I have to charge £4.50 a DVD when I used to charge £2.50 + £2 postage. Both are the same total price but people are much more likely to buy a £2.50 DVD with £2 postage than a £4.50 DVD with so called free postage.

When is it supposed to happen?

grim_tales wrote:I thought you had to leave feedback for every sale Brad?

How on earth did you think that?

grim_tales · Post by **grim_tales** » 26 Oct 2008, 00:19

I just thought you were supposed to, you know - leave comments for the seller/buyer on how it went.

Shingster · Post by **Shingster** » 26 Oct 2008, 01:00

bradavon wrote:Did you fail maths at school Shingster?

Maths was one of my strongest subjects, almost chose to do a degree in it. Either way, it's annoying doing a search on ebay then ranking the results by ascending price only to have products listed first that are like £5 for the item with a £20 price hike for the shipping.

Many sellers on Ebay use this tactic to make their products appear much cheaper than they are.

Markgway · Post by **Markgway** » 26 Oct 2008, 03:22

Exactly. Ebay sellers offer a cheapish price for the item then bump up the postage. It's just a mean trick to catch out users searching for the cheapest list price.

The seller threatening legal action has no case. Negative feedback is allowed and in this case is true. The item wasn't as described. If I'd gotten a refund I probably wouldn't have left any feeback and left it at that.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 26 Oct 2008, 07:59

When you sold on ebay Mark did you offer free postage? how hard can it be for a prospective buyer to check postage before bidding? you don't like the postage charge don't bid,simple. anyway ebay now have an option to search for lowest price with p&p and also without.

degeneration · Post by **degeneration** » 26 Oct 2008, 08:26

Having a low listing price and a high postage price is more of a tactic to avoid paying eBay more money in final value fees. At the moment on DVDs that is 9%.

So if you bump up your postage price, your final value will be lower, but hopefully the total the same, meaning more of the money goes to you.

If you don't like listing items that are cheap only to have expensive postage charges, sort by "Acending price inc. P+P".

And yes, as of 29th Jan or something like that next year postage rates are being capped and for DVDs they are capping the price at FREE. Meaning you have to offer free postage for buyers on DVDs. You can offer alternative postage methods as well that have a price value but what buyer would choose those options?

The result of this postage capping will mean people have to start their auctions at a higher price to ensure they cover their postage costs, which means more money in listing fees for ebay, and the final sale price of the item will probably be higher than it was before because of the preivous seperate postage charge, which also means more money for ebay from the final value fee. Gee, I wonder why they are doing it?!!

If I still list on ebay when this comes into place, the free postage option I will offer will be to leave the package with an address at the side of the road with a sign for where it is going, hoping that it will be able to hitch a lift to its destination. 1st class royal mail will be my non free option and it will cost.

Shingster · Post by **Shingster** » 26 Oct 2008, 09:45

saltysam wrote:When you sold on ebay Mark did you offer free postage? how hard can it be for a prospective buyer to check postage before bidding? you don't like the postage charge don't bid,simple. anyway ebay now have an option to search for lowest price with p&p and also without.

Whether you list a postage charge or factor it into the price, you've still got to figure how how much the item is going to cost you to post! Usually this is piss easy to do anyway, as most online couriers charge by the dimension of the package rather than weight. If you've kept the original packaging for the item you're selling, it'll probably have the weight listed on it anyway.

All myself and Mark are advocating is that the seller gives potential buyers the courtesy of only listing one price and improve the accessibilty of the site a little.

degeneration wrote:If you don't like listing items that are cheap only to have expensive postage charges, sort by "Acending price inc. P+P".

Aye this is the best option, although there are browsers who aren't aware of this and fall for the P&P trick. Eliminating the P&P charges altogether would ensure this would never happen.

I didn't know ebay only charge on the item price and not the total price though! That pretty much throws my argument out the window!

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 26 Oct 2008, 12:00

degeneration wrote:The result of this postage capping will mean people have to start their auctions at a higher price to ensure they cover their postage costs, which means more money in listing fees for ebay, and the final sale price of the item will probably be higher than it was before because of the preivous seperate postage charge, which also means more money for ebay from the final value fee. Gee, I wonder why they are doing it?!!

Thieving Bastards. Like Google and Microsoft they've grown so large they can do whatever they like. They've already made it much more unfair for the seller by removing the option to leave negative feedback against time wasting buyers (which has happened to me a few times), without this.

grim_tales wrote:I just thought you were supposed to, you know - leave comments for the seller/buyer on how it went.

You are but it's optional.

Shingster wrote:Either way, it's annoying doing a search on ebay then ranking the results by ascending price only to have products listed first that are like £5 for the item with a £20 price hike for the shipping.

I completely agree. It would be make much more sense for eBay to add the postage into the price then, when looking at the listing page.

Shingster wrote:Many sellers on Ebay use this tactic to make their products appear much cheaper than they are.

It's hardly a tactic. The postage price is clearly shown next to the item price. If people cannot be bothered to work out the total price that's their problem.

It does work though, it makes the item appear cheaper and people fall for it. If eBay do make it compulsory to include the postage in the DVD price you'll just see all DVDs suddenly jump in price and it will make it much harder to sell DVDs.

There's no such thing as Free Postage, someone has to pay for it and it will still be the buyer.

Shingster wrote:All myself and Mark are advocating is that the seller gives potential buyers the courtesy of only listing one price and improve the accessibilty of the site a little

WTF! You're blaming the seller for how "eBay" display their listings?

Shingster wrote:Aye this is the best option, although there are browsers who aren't aware of this and fall for the P&P trick.

People who buy from eBay are adults (or they should be) and as such it's their responsibility to work out the total price of what they're paying.

Extra charges are part and parcel of life, eBay isn't exactly alone. If you and Mark sold on eBay you'd soon change your mind. You have to do things to make your item stand out from the rest, otherwise you'll never sell anything.

Shingster wrote:I didn't know ebay only charge on the item price and not the total price though!

Not only do they do that but they charge you three times:

1. The item price
2. The final value fee - A percentage of what it goes for
3. A PayPal fee - eBay own PayPal, bastards

They don't charge for the total price as the postage price is supposed to be purely to go to Royal Mail etc.... PayPal is optional but try selling something without offering it, you'll be like to get rid of it period.

I can see another reason why eBay are doing it, people do charge much higher postage than it costs to actually post it. They do this to cover their eBay/PayPal fees too, personally I think this is fair. Most buyers know this and are intelligent enough to work out the total price and then see if it's still a bargain/fair.

Shingster · Post by **Shingster** » 26 Oct 2008, 16:04

It's hardly a tactic. The postage price is clearly shown next to the item price. If people cannot be bothered to work out the total price that's their problem.

It does work though, it makes the item appear cheaper and people fall for it.

Holy contradiction there Bradman! If you don't think it's a tactic, why do you think people "fall for it"?

There's no such thing as Free Postage, someone has to pay for it and it will still be the buyer.

Yes, thank you for pointing that out, none of us in this thread was aware of that!

WTF! You're blaming the seller for how "eBay" display their listings

No, all sellers have the option to either list the shipping charge seperately or factor the charge into the item price and leave the shipping field as zero/free. E-bay does not arbitrarily assign a shipping cost!

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 26 Oct 2008, 17:10

Shingster wrote:Yes, thank you for pointing that out, none of us in this thread was aware of that!

I'm surprised, given that you seem to be expecting the seller pay for it.

degeneration · Post by **degeneration** » 26 Oct 2008, 17:12

Shingster wrote: E-bay does not arbitrarily assign a shipping cost!

Yet... They will be severely capping the shipping charge in many categories soon. Then who knows what will happen after that? Fixed rates for shipping? Free shipping mandatory on all items?

Markgway · Post by **Markgway** » 26 Oct 2008, 17:50

saltysam wrote:When you sold on ebay Mark did you offer free postage? how hard can it be for a prospective buyer to check postage before bidding? you don't like the postage charge don't bid,simple. anyway ebay now have an option to search for lowest price with p&p and also without.

I never sold on ebay. Just bought shit. I would've only charged about a £1 for postage for a DVD. Some people charged 2 or 3 times that after listing their item low. It's just a trap.

degeneration wrote:If you don't like listing items that are cheap only to have expensive postage charges, sort by "Acending price inc. P+P".

I don't think they had that option when I was a user.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 26 Oct 2008, 18:09

A trap? Bollocks.

The postage price is clearly listed next to the item price. I'd agree it's a trap if it was hidden (as it is on the listings which say see item description) but most listings it's clearly listed.

If you had charged £1 postage, how much would you charge for the DVD? £2-3 maybe, a good portion of that you'd be giving to eBay meaning you have naff all left for yourself. £1 postage plus £3 for the DVD would mean £4 total and at the end of the day the same charge to the customer, and your point?

When did you stop using them?

gasteropod · Post by **gasteropod** » 26 Oct 2008, 20:21

degeneration wrote:If I still list on ebay when this comes into place, the free postage option I will offer will be to leave the package with an address at the side of the road with a sign for where it is going, hoping that it will be able to hitch a lift to its destination. 1st class royal mail will be my non free option and it will cost.

And for the case in the original post, I'd have left neutral feedback for that.

Markgway · Post by **Markgway** » 26 Oct 2008, 21:43

bradavon wrote:The postage price is clearly listed next to the item price.

The lowest item price gets bumped to the top of the page doesn't it?

If you had charged £1 postage, how much would you charge for the DVD?

Whatever I felt it was worth.

a good portion of that you'd be giving to eBay meaning you have naff all left for yourself

I haven't sold so I don't know the ins and outs but I'm not the type of person who would use ebay to make a profit.

When did you stop using them?

Couple of years ago maybe?

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 26 Oct 2008, 22:11

Markgway wrote:
I haven't sold so I don't know the ins and outs but I'm not the type of person who would use ebay to make a profit.

i don't get you there.are you saying people who run a little operation and make a few extra pennies out of it are wrong to do so? a few years ago,i regularly imported copies of a war movie called Wheels Of Terror from Denmark at about £3 a disc. i placed them on ebay at a start price of £4.99 and sold maybe 40-50 copies ranging from £7-£45 a disc.what did i do there that you would think was wrong.?yep i made a nice profit from people who couldn't be arsed importing themselves but my conscience is clear

Shingster · Post by **Shingster** » 27 Oct 2008, 00:04

bradavon wrote:
Shingster wrote:Yes, thank you for pointing that out, none of us in this thread was aware of that!
I'm surprised, given that you seem to be expecting the seller pay for it.

No one is advocating that the seller pay for shipping. We were just saying that it is easier on the casual ebay browser for the seller to factor the shipping into the item price. At the time I stated this I was unaware that Ebay do not add a surcharge on the seperate shipping price.