"61-day cutoff for post-cancellation FB/DSRs"
Apples and oranges.
The buyer and seller both lose the ability to leave feedback 61 days after the time of the transaction.
Feedback stays on the record for 12 months.
"I've never understood why eBay permits dead-beat buyers to leave FB at all."
That is the problem. Who is the dead-beat?
eBay has no way of determining who is right and who is wrong.
For example: a seller shows $2 shipping in the listing. Buyer buys. Seller sends invoice showing $12 shipping (had made a mistake). Buyer refuses to pay. Seller files for non-payment. Buyer ignores communication.
Should eBay automatically consider the buyer a dead-beat? Of course not.
eBay cannot and will not waste valuable staff time trying to determine who is right and who is at fault in every instance where a dispute is started. eBay is a venue, not a mediation service.
" in preventing sellers from leaving honest FB about problem buyers"
I totally agree with eBay's decision. I agreed with it then and still agree today.
Why?
The assumption you and many other posters make is that a seller would leave "honest" feedback.
That is not what was happening. Shady sellers would hold buyers "feedback hostage" day in day out. Shady sellers would retaliate and leave negative feedback for buyers when they received well deserved negative feedback from buyers. All it did was punish many innocent buyers who got fed up and left eBay. eBay sellers lost thousands of customers.
The current system of restricting a buyer's ability to buy on ebay after so many strikes works more effectively. It would work much better if ALL sellers did their part and file for every unpaid transaction..
The reality on eBay is that feedback for buyers has little value. The vast majority of transactions are the results of "Buy-it-Now" when the seller has no opportunity to check the buyer's feedback. Even if there was lots of negative feedback, that information would be meaningless. It may have been different ten or twelve years ago when eBay was an auction site. That was then, this is now.
While on the subject of feedback, there is no logical reason whatsoever for a seller not to give positive feedback immediately upon receipt of payment. It makes the buyer feel good (if the buyer cares; many don't). Withholding feedback serves no useful purpose. On the contrary. Many neutral or negative feedback received by sellers could have been avoided if the buyer had been left positive feedback earlier. It is human nature. I am not stating it would prevent all negative feedback, no. But it may help in some cases.
To be honest, I've never understood why eBay permits dead-beat buyers to leave FB at all.
They don't!
If you open a a non-payment dispute, if/when the buyer pays they are not a non-payer anymore!
If they don't respond to the non-payment dispute then they are a non-payer and they are blocked from leaving feedback.
If you walk into a brick-and-mortar store, put an item in your handbag then stroll out without paying, I doubt the police would entertain complaints by the customer about the seller.
Not the same at all, when an eBay buyer doesn't pay the seller still has the item, the seller has lost nothing other than perhaps a small listing fee.
A more comparable situation would be walking into a store, taking an item to the cash and then changing your mind leaving the item at the cash and walking out. Store has to put the item back on the shelf, a small inconvenience but no loss.
" tips the balance"
???
I do not get it.
You have never received a negative feedback. How can you state the change " tips the balance"?
The problem is not really with sellers but buyers who left eBay - and all sellers feel the loss - because they had received unwarranted and retaliatory negative feedback.
The products I sell have little to do with it. Across all categories on eBay, sellers who leave feedback upon receipt of payment receive a higher percentage of feedback.
Why? While many buyers do not care about feedback, many will refrain from posting feedback since they have not received it.
As stated earlier, there is absolutely nothing to gain for a seller by withholding positive feedback.
"the whole FB system needs rethinking - which I know will never happen."
You are correct. So, why not use it to your maximum advantage?
eBay buyers are not equal to eBay sellers. Never were, never will be. Sellers receive money to sell their wares. As such, they have a greater obligation. Selling on eBay is a business, like any other business. Sellers need to cater to buyers, even if some of them are problematic.
Of course, technically you're right. I should perhaps not have used the word "dead-beat", but maybe have said that buyers who finally only pay after an unreasonable time, when subjected to "forcible payment" through UIC really should lose the right to rate the seller. Doesn't that seem fair to you?
No it doesn't! What happens if the seller sends the wrong item, does a really bad packing job, takes forever to send the item. the item isn't as described in the listing.....do you think the buyer should lose the right to rate the seller on these aspects just because they were a bit slow to pay (and slow could be as little as 4 days).
You have no Auctions running, if non-payers are such an issue for you just use IPR, end of problem, case closed.
:"far easier on eBay for buyers to take advantage of sellers"
Sorry, I cannot agree.
I have been selling by mail since 1987, well before eBay was created.
Buyers always have the ability to take advantage. That's business.
"That's probably more true for mail order than for a brick-and-mortar shop"
That is quite correct.
Selling on eBay is mail order.
Mail order business (also known as direct marketing) has been around for over one hundred years. eBay is only a venue, a new way for sellers to advertise their wares instead of or in addition to ads in newspaper, trade or general magazines, radio, TV, other media or a seller's own website.
Tens of thousands of sellers with experience in mail order (direct marketing) had no problem at all adopting to eBay and other similar venues. We all understood the requirement for "trust". We also understood that, at times, that "trust" would unfortunately work against us and losses would occur. Just a cost of doing business.
I still remember the good old days when "mail order" was king. Almost every one would subscribe to "get four 8-track tapes for $0.99 if you agree to buy four more in the next two years" or "book-of-the-month clubs" where one could order by mail and the seller trusted payment will eventually be forwarded. That goes back before the introduction of credit cards.
Yes, at times, a few buyers would take advantage, abuse the system and not pay. But that was a small minority and it did not prevent businesses to flourish.
What I find remarkable on eBay is that many sellers (mostly part-timers) do not have that mail order experience. Many are too young to even remember what it was like to trust a stranger. And we often see that inexperience reflected in posts on these boards.
Yes the world has changed and it is not as easy to trust today as it was forty years ago. Still, the concept is the same. Paranoia was non-existent in those days. Today you see it all over eBay (and other similar boards).
I will stick to my old ways. They worked just fine for me. 🙂
