There have been some interesting things written on some of the eBay related blogs during the last week or so. Here are a few articles that caught my eye. I hope some of them get you thinking.
Steve Lindhorst provides every seller with something to think about with his post Are your PayPal funds safe?
Steve also provided readers with an excellent post analyzing a recent speech given by John Donahoe - eBay’s Disruptive Innovation, How’s that workin’ for ya?
If you either have an eBay store or are thinking about opening one, you should read what Mitzi Swisher has to say about The Future Of eBay Stores. I tend to agree with her. I think the days of the eBay store are numbered.
TheBrews News offered eBay Needs To Find A New Set Of Tools To Motivate Sellers In 2009 and a few days later followed up with Some Observations About eBay Trends From An eBay Seller’s Perspective. Both are well worth the time it takes to read them.
In What eBay needs to do Sue Bailey showed me she’s probably more qualified to run eBay than John Donahoe. Another post by Sue sellers should read is PayPal transactions reversed without warning.
Photograph by David McDermott.
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September 30th, 2008 at 7:29 pm
I kind of wish you didn’t agree with me about the eBay store situation - it scares me! I just can’t talk myself out of it, it all makes too much sense…
September 30th, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Mitzi,
The other way to look at it that, as you say, “it all makes too much sense…” And, a lot of what is coming out of eBay these days makes no sense at all.
But I’m afraid stores are probably doomed.
Gary H.
October 1st, 2008 at 11:27 pm
Hi Gary:
I had to finally register so I can spout off about what ebay just confirmed they are allowing with seller’s DSR’s. I believe this is a very abusive practice against sellers & deserves scrutiny. This is what happened to me. I am a small seller, usually selling 10 - 20 items a month. An item I listed for auction ended on 8/18/08. My listing clearly stated contact timelines for the buyer including payment being required within 7 days. After no payment, no response, nothing from the buyer, on the 8th day, I filed a non-paying bidder dispute. Still no response from the buyer. After waiting 3 more days, I relisted my item. On the 14th day after the listing ended, 9/1/08, the buyer responded to the dispute that they would pay. By this point I already had bids on my relist & the Final Value Fee was available. I informed the buyer that the item was no longer available to them & filed for the FVF. The kicker is…. On 9/22/08 this non paying bidder gave me feedback & destroyed my Detailed Seller Rating for shipping time. What was a 4.8 or 4.9 suddenly became a 4.5. It dropped me from raised status to standard status. Ebay acknowledges that this is what happened & refuses to remove or discount this negative DSR rating. How can they let a non-paying bidder rate you on your service, especially your shipping time when there was no completed sale? What is ebay thinking? As a seller you can’t rate the non-paying bidder honestly, but they can destroy your ability to sell & have your listings showing highly in search. I have asked ebay to reconsider & have a supervisor review this. I guess they don’t want you to even file non-paying bidder disputes anymore. They have to squeeze every penny out of you & then punish you if you try to get the pittance of a credit that is due for the uncompleted sale.
Has anyone else had this happen? I had no idea ebay was allowing non-paying bidders to rate the sellers they stiffed on the sale. Thanks for letting me spout off about this.