Right now I am faced with a new buyer (fb 8, I think) who has been telling me that the check is in the mail and, with a non-paying bidder dispute opened, apologized "for the delay" and again, the check was in the mail.
This buyer, like many new eBayers, does not like to use PayPal, and opted to send a Money Order rather than use PayPal.
Tomorrow, it will have been three weeks since the close of the auction.
Today I am applying for a final value credit and relisting the item; if the check finally arrives, I will have to send it back, postage paid on my end. I suppose I could deposit it and send it via PayPal, thus encouraging the person to establish an account....
I believe I read in the eBay notes on the new policy that the recourse for sellers would become turning people in as non-paying bidders and issuing strikes against them. When a dispute is opened and the buyer keeps saying the check is in the mail, how long does eBay expect us to wait for payment??
The options for applying for the FVF refund have changed; I can't say the buyer never contacted me, one of the options.
The feedback for buyers was helpful in establishing the good habit of paying promptly as well as that of leaving seller feedback. Those of us who have been with eBay for some time were "trained" under that system and it stays with us.
With the new system, buyers have no encouragement to do the right thing, only the punitive non-paying bidder strike, which is avoidable with the "training system" of two-way feedback in place.
Of course leaving negative feedback for a buyer who paid, no matter how long it took, is not something sellers would do. On the other hand, non paying bidders are not always reported -- sometimes just a negative feedback is left.
The negative feedback option was useful for buyers who were a huge problem or whose attitudes were something that should be appended with a caveat, and the red dot helps to draw attention to it when another seller has a problem with the buyer, so it had its function beyond simply being an encouragement to do the right thing in a timely manner.
Anyway, if I read the brief correctly, eBay is encouraging the use of non-paying bidder strikes and not that of the option of possible negative feedback.
Commentary within a positive feedback will not serve its purpose as a warning to other sellers, as it will be buried in all the other comments.
Maybe I'll just stop leaving feedback.
eBay should learn fairly quickly that after perhaps 50 positive feedback points as a buyer, the new positive only feedback policy could be put in place.
below is original passage by YourAuctionNews 28 May 2008 to which the above is a response (and on which the above is an expansion):
quote:This is why I really dislike the current feedback system. I'm not woried about the veteran buyers. I'm more concered about the new buyers. The veteran buyers do the right thing and try to contact the sellers prior to leaving any feedback.