Has this ever happened to you? A bidder doesn’t pay and you end up relisting. So, you give him bad feedback.

Well, you shouldn’t have done that. Even though you did everything right, E-Bay rules allow the bidder to return the “favor.” Suddenly, you have bad feedback counted against you, without doing anything wrong.

The excuses I have heard are ridiculous. “Was on a business trip”, “Couldn’t pay on time”, “Forgot”, and then, the worst, right-out no communication. I have received so far 5 bad feedbacks, all from bidders who never paid for their item.

This is then the moment when you realize that the feedback policy, which should serve as sort-of a reference about the seller and buyer, is inherently dishonest. How many of you have said “I am not going to leave negative feedback, because I don’t want to get it back. So, what it really is - when you look at somebody’s feedback - it is quite superficial. People have become afraid to tell the truth, and the bad apples continue to affect the batch.

Is there any feasable solution? I think so! For one, there should not be any reason for a bidder not to pay. If you go on a business trip, pay before you go. And if you forgot, then suffer the consequences for your bad memory.

The rules should be that non-payers have no right to give bad feedback to those who they just ripped off. For people like me, this is double punishment! First, I don’t get paid, then I can’t tell tell the truth about the bidder, because he ahs the opportunity to give me bad feedback too. Sure, there is the right to reply, however, the deadbeat has the same right too.

So, all that E-bay is doing is encouraging us to stay away from giving bad feedback, ergo, telling the truth. Because if we do, we will get punished.

The truth is back!