I recently sold several items on eABay to benefit the horse rescue I volunteer at, donating the proceed 100% to them On the day the auctions ended, I got a note from one of the buyers saying that her daughter had bid on the item when she left her computer logged on and the kid didn’t have the money to pay for it so she was backing out.
I sent a second chance offer to the next highest bidder and they paid immediately. I wrote the first woman back and told her that since this was a charity benefit auction I was disappointed that she felt the need to back out since it was HER error, but that I had sold the item to the next highest bidder. I then left feedback that she had backed out on the sale even tho eBay only allows a seller to post positive feedback. I thought that was the end of it.
Now, today, she posts NEGATIVE feedback for me and said that I am a jerk- this is my FIRST negative with almost 900 positives. I am at work right now and the work computer is not letting me reply to her OR contact eBay.
I am beyond pissed about this. I did nothing wrong, just trying to raise some money for a cause I believe in, and now my perfet rating is gone. There used to be a way to respond to feedback but I cannot find it anywhere. What-if anything- can I do? I will try again to contact eBay when I get home tonight.
She was probably as pissed as you are. You got angry at her for an honest mistake and accused her of being a bad person for no reason. Then she got angry at you for being a jerk and called you a jerk. Now you’re like “No, YOU’RE the jerk!”
I don’t think 1 bad feedback in 900 is going to sway many buyers away from you. Just let it go, you’ve already taken it too far.
In this scenario, I think you were wrong. She explained the situation, she wasn’t the one who backed out. I would imagine any good parent would have dealt with their child being irresponsible. The story should have ended there. Feedback is to warn other ebayers of misrepresentations and unpleasant and/or dishonest people. She seemed to be neither. However, your lack of understanding and desire to get back at her makes you someone that I wouldn’t want to particularly deal with either and would be interested to know you handle things this way on ebay. I think her feedback was justified for you not letting it go.
I had one person on eBay bid on a book I was selling and wanted it shipped to France. The auction clearly stated US only. She bid, won, and then complained that I wouldn’t ship to her. I got negative feedback for that and didn’t get paid either. I escalated it to eBay and never heard back. Ebay is truly there for the buyer only.
And you didn’t think that she would use the feedback capability to respond to you? After scolding her and posting bad feedback about her? The fact that your auction was to benefit a charity doesn’t make it okay for you to be sanctimonious.
Her story about her cat or daughter or whatever accidentally bidding and winning is almost certainly bullshit, but you probably shouldn’t have reacted by posting feedback like that.
I think the appropriate course of action is to file a non-paying bidder report (explaining to the buyer that it’s a formality to get your fee refunded), then do the second chance offer thing.
That way, the buyer gets a NPB strike, which will only be a problem to her if it happens repeatedly, which, if her story is true, it won’t.
Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot where I was and how people attack here. >roll eyes<
I think any one of you would be pissed if this had happened to you.
If MY child had bid on something because I had left my computer loggecd on to eBay I would have done one of 2 things- either paid for the item myself or made the child pay for it out of their allowance. I would NOT have left the seller hanging and most certainly would not have called them a jerk and an idiot.
How I deal with my customers? Please. This WASN’T a customer, it was a deadbeat liar. I simply put up a warning for other sellers. If little precious did it once what is to stop her from doing it again on something more costly?
I will be contacting eBay when I get home to get that unwarranted negative removed.
The reasone I didn’t file a non-paying bidder against her was because I was under the impression that if I DID I would not be able to offer it on second chance until that was resolved, and I was desperate to get money to the rescue ASAP, because they are having financial problems to get hay.
Again… I forgot that I’m not one of the ‘cool kids’ here and pretty much most everything I do is wrong. Thanks a lot for the supportive feedback y’all.
It sucks that eBay doesn’t let sellers leave negs any more, under any circumstances, but what you did (leaving a negative comment in a positive feedback) was against the rules. The buyer can just ask eBay to remove it, and they will (and may penalise you in some way too, such as demoting your listings in the search results).
All you had to do was open a case to cancel the transaction. The buyer agrees, you get your fees back, and it’s over with. Unless this person did it 50 times, there is no need to sound the alarm to warn the Ebay population of anything. She didn’t ignore you or avoid you. She told you the day the auction ended, believe her or not.
Honestly, you went overboard and she hit the ball back into your court. What did you think was going to happen?
If your 10 year old kid bid on a motorcycle for $50,000.00, you “would have done one of 2 things- either paid for the item myself or made the child pay for it out of their allowance.”. Is there no limit to that statement? Or is it just when kids do stupid things like bid on your items?
No, you are just annoyed that you didn’t get the responses that agree with you that you feel you should have gotten. The fact that you didn’t should imply to you that you mishandled the situation.
It has happened to me, a few times. It’s fairly common, just as returns are common in brick-and-mortar stores. Be glad that she let you know asap and you were able to sell it immediately to the next highest bidder, instead of her letting you hang for a few days.
Come on, she made a mistake, bidding on something that she then regretted winning, and wanted to back out of it. You act like she tried to steal your item and rob your bank account. She contacted you asap, and now it’s over. Do you really think that future sellers are going to read through their bidders’ feedbacks looking for bidders who’ve backed out of sales?
Really, complaining that we’re picking on you because you’re not one of the ‘cool kids’ is completing disregarding anything that you don’t want to hear. This is advice from other ebay sellers and buyers. You should take it, instead of playing the “everybody picks on poor me” card.
I sell a fair amount of stuff on ebay and I have to tell you with all due respect you are way, way off the beam here. I typically have 2-3 sale cancellations a week I do because of bid errors, non-paying buyers, foreign non-paying bidders, non-communicative buyers etc. etc.
I almost never leave negative feedback as a seller, I just move on.
If someone says they made a bidding mistake I am more than happy to cancel the sale as it saves me the huge PITA effort of chasing them for payment, and lets me put the merchandise back in play ASAP instead of it being in limbo if they are non-communicative. You always let them off the hook unless you want your feedback littered with negatives. You were being incredibly petty and you got what you deserved. You should have been somewhat grateful she gave you a heads up.
EBay is a business and you’ve got to run it like a business even if clueless buyers annoy you to death. You can’t force a buyer to pay you of they are determined not to do so. It’s frustrating but you can’t get involved in personal battles, it’s not professional. Cancel the sale and move on.
Oh lordy. PapSett, evidently you are only interested in hearing from people who agree with you. This isn’t Facebook, sweetheart.
I mean this with all respect due, you are in the wrong.
As to whether the seller’s had to back out for the reasons she did or whether the story is a complete crock, you were able to sell the item with little hassle. There was no cause whatsoever for you to chastise the seller with your mildly worded rebuke other than for you to gain some modicum of satisfaction. The reality is that this makes you seem like an insufferable crank. For you to then dismiss the honest commentary you are receiving here confirms it.
Peace.
And this is why you can’t sit at the cool kids’ table.
You got a lot of reasoned responses which you didn’t agree with and then complained that everybody picks on you. In most of your threads, people are very supportive. The reason that they disagreed with you here is because of the situation, not some group effort to pick on you, for heaven’s sake. You got some great advice from astro and others.
