eBay

tokyotakeover · ‎11-01-2022

Hello everyone!

I'm not exactly sure what to do. I had listed an item on eBay and have it set so only people from the US or Canada can purchase. It's what I feel most comfortable in. I was away from internet yesterday and woke up to roughly 10 new messages from someone asking if I could ship to the UK. They then proceeded to purchase the item but could not pay because of the limitations on my listings. Furthermore, they had also been inquiring from a second one of their accounts. Once they purchased the item they said I'd have to send them a quote and that if I don't I'll be receiving negative feedback. I replied and told them I don't ship to the UK and asked if they had a US or Canada adress I could send to. They said I had to, so I told them I'd have to cancel the order since I can't do that. They've now left negative feedback stating they waitied ages to hear from me and that I waisted their time, even though they purchased the item before I even had a chance to reply. They were also using feedback as a way to threaten me. Is there a way to remove the feedback? I'm nervous I'll loose buyers now

ricarmic · ‎11-01-2022

I don't know if you'll be able to get it zapped but it is worth trying.

You can also respond/reply to their feedback. When you do this WAIT until you are not angry with them. Write it in a professional, non confrontational way. That will tell other potential buyers that are looking at feedback that you are professional and courteous, which is the important part.

Something like "Item was somehow purchased from a country I do not ship to. Buyer wasn't able to have it shipped to a country that I can ship to so the transaction had to be cancelled."

It sounds like you already had that country blocked, if you do, this does increase the chances that they'll zap the feedback, along with the threats.

If you don't make sure to verify ALL your items have the excluded countries in place. You can do this easily from account settings/shipping preferences/exclude shipping locations/edit/ then click the box that says "also apply to current listings" and then click "save" that makes sure all your listings are correct now. There are some bugs that excluded listings are not always being applied correctly.

lotzofuniquegoodies · ‎11-01-2022

@ricarmic wrote:
I don't know if you'll be able to get it zapped but it is worth trying.
You can also respond/reply to their feedback. When you do this WAIT until you are not angry with them. Write it in a professional, non confrontational way. That will tell other potential buyers that are looking at feedback that you are professional and courteous, which is the important part.
Something like "Item was somehow purchased from a country I do not ship to. Buyer wasn't able to have it shipped to a country that I can ship to so the transaction had to be cancelled."
It sounds like you already had that country blocked, if you do, this does increase the chances that they'll zap the feedback, along with the threats.
If you don't make sure to verify ALL your items have the excluded countries in place. You can do this easily from account settings/shipping preferences/exclude shipping locations/edit/ then click the box that says "also apply to current listings" and then click "save" that makes sure all your listings are correct now. There are some bugs that excluded listings are not always being applied correctly.

@ricarmic

@tokyotakeover

In reviewing all their current listings and several recent sales they all state Canada/USA only. Buyer(s) may be tinkering with their location prior to completing a purchase.

-Lotz

ricarmic · ‎11-01-2022

I had a buyer from Ukraine purchase from me, and that is an ebay wide restriction (as well as mine). I called that one in the CSR said something around the fact they'd done the same thing. That's also the one that began my quest to get the excluded listings working as that is when I decided I had some that were missing countries!

rocketscollectibles · ‎11-01-2022

Contact eBay. Explain the situation and ask them to remove the feedback. Say that you cancelled because you do not ship to this location. That the buyer also did feedback treatening. A buyer cannot say 'do that or i leave a negative' this is against eBay policies and should be easily removed imo

byto253 · ‎11-01-2022

If the buyer engaged in feedback extortion through messenger that is a BIG no-no. Absolutely contact ebay.

In these cases you can cance for problem with address reason and there is no ding on your account.

Sounds like you need to check your excluded countries list as well.

marnotom! · ‎11-01-2022

For what it's worth, you may not have the UK as a shipping destination on that listing, but you haven't actually excluded it from your list of shipping locations, either. This is what I see when I look at the listing on the UK site with my shipping location set to the UK:

I would suggest adding other locations to the exclusion list that eBay has already populated. Once the UK is part of that exclusion list, that note under "postage" should change to "Does not ship to United Kingdom" or something very similar.

ilikehockeyjerseys · ‎11-01-2022

https://www.ebay.ca/help/selling/selling/seller-levels-performance-standards/appeal-defect?id=4871

Scroll down there to the bottom of the page to where it says e-mail us. Click it. Contact eBay through there.

Explain that a buyer without a valid address to one of the locations you offer shipping to purchased the item. Explain they left feedback for something that was out of your control. In addition, you believe they may have engaged in feedback extortion by threatening you with negative feedback in exchange for something you did not advertise in your listing (shipping to the UK). Assuming 10 messages in one night isn't hyperbole, invite them to view the messages to verify that the buyer was harassing in nature.

If you actually did reply to their message within a day or so, you could also point out that they are not being honest in their feedback. When they say they waited ages for a response, it wrongly tells other customers that you don't respond to messages. If you actually did respond in a reasonable time, you might be able to get it removed on those grounds.

It's not a guarantee that they remove it. Feedback is supposed to be a buyer's subjective interpretation of the situation. They cannot leave feedback over something that was not your fault. They cannot lie in the feedback. They cannot use feedback to extort you for something that was not in your listing.

Whether it is feedback extortion might be a grey area, since eBay may see it that you didn't explicitely block their country from buying your item, even know it is pretty clear from the listing that you do not offer shipping to their country.

reallynicestamps · ‎11-02-2022

they said I'd have to send them a quote and that if I don't I'll be receiving negative feedback. I

That's a clear case of Feedback Extortion.

Not only will the FB be cancelled, but the transaction should be too.

You can cancel the transaction yourself as "Problem with Address."

thecrazyham · ‎11-04-2022

Helpful tip for anyone dealing with something like this... DO NOT REPLY TO THE FEEDBACK until after you contact eBay and see if you can get it removed. I had a negative from an abusive seller a while back and i replied to it, then he started sending threatening messages, i contacted ebay and was told that since i replied to it they couldn't remove it regardless of it meeting conditions for removal. Apparently once you reply to it the normal ebay CS can't remove it cause its like locked on their end. I had to escalate it to a supervisor who escalated it to some tech dept, they looked at all the messages from the abusive buyer and finally removed it, took over a month to handle it, in the end they told me if i hadnt replied to it they could have deleted it right away.