So here's my situation. I've had this account since 2007, with over 400 transactions at 100% positive rating.
I'm not a retailer or big-time seller. Just your average joe who bought some stuff over the years and sold some stuff.
I had an idea that I thought would work fine on ebay. It has to do with trying to get more referrals to an affiliate site I
am a member of that rewards you for converting new members by offering a coupon code buyers can use to save money.
I decided to post it on sale on ebay for 99 cents since you can't sell anything cheaper than that. Basically, I would post
the "products" of that affiliate site on ebay with pictures and description, and price it at 99 cents with free shipping. But
I wrote CLEARLY in giant bold red writing in the description that I don't have the item, nor would I ship it to them. But
that I would give them an email with a link that provides them info on how to get the product for free or at a huge discounted
price. All of this is true. It's not a scam. The question was only if the buyer was willing to check out my link and join the site
and make their first purchase using my code. If they didn't like it, I would offer a refund no questions asked. It's only 99 cents.
I didn't think it would be a big deal.
Turns out that 50% of the people who bought my 99 cent deals all assumed that I was going to ship out the actual product to
them for 99 cents free shipping! Wow, they didn't even bother to read the description which clearly said that I don't have the item
or that it would be shipped to them. They didn't read that the purchase was for an email. Of the nearly 60 sales I made in the past month
doing this, 30 of them kept writing back to me 20-30 days later, "Where is my item?" or "Item didn't arrive" etc. And I had to explain
to them that it was a misunderstanding they didn't read the description and that I sent them the emails to them on the day they purchased it.
I offered them refunds and most of them were refunded.
But sadly, in the last 2 days, I suddenly got 2 negatives. Even after communicating with the buyers to let them know A) it was clearly written
in the description, B) I fulfilled my promise by sending them the email, and C) if they didn't like it, I would refund them no questions asked. But two people accused me of being a scammer and left negative, despite my explaining everything to them.
Now in retrospect, I found out that ebay TOS doesn't allow for selling of links or outside/3rd party sites. So I have removed all the 99 cent deals and stopped doing it. At that point I was still at 100% feedback. But the problem is since these sales take 30 days or so to culminate, most of the people writing back are just starting to pour in now. I can't believe that ebay buyers don't even read what they are purchasing. Do they just look at the picture and the price and then press "buy it now"? Is there no such thing as buyer responsibility or buyer risk when they click on something to purchase? Should buyers also not be bound to the terms of agreement once making a purchase? These buyers just bought my stuff without reading the description even when I put it in the TITLE to "PLEASE READ DESCRIPTION BEFORE BUYING" and they still don't and write me back 30 days later saying "where is my item?". Since the new ebay feedback system doesn't allow sellers to leave any negative, the buyers have FULL POWER. They can leave feedback based on performance of the seller or simply how they feel and ebay can't do anything about it. I asked ebay several times to help me out because these couple buyers left negative feedback based on feelings and not seller performance. I technically fulfilled and did everything a seller should do. I clearly wrote it out, I delivered it to them, and even offered a refund if they were unhappy. But since the buyers didn't read, and didn't realize what they paid 99 cents for was simply the email link with info, instead of the actual item, they are free to blame it on me for their mistake of not reading and knowing what they were purchasing.
In any case, I've stopped selling that 99 cent idea. It's too confusing and I didn't expect that so many buyers actually don't READ the sale item. That's what surprised me. If they read it, they would know that it was for an EMAIL with info. Then they could decide whether or not
to try it or just not buy it. So if they buy it, that' the risk they take. But since it's only 99 cents, it's not a great risk at all since the email/link actually is legit and guarantees they will make more than the 99 cent back in savings if they use it. It's like going to the corner store to buy a lotto scratch ticket for $3. The buyer knowingly takes the small risk ($3) to buy a scratch ticket in hopes to win $10,000. So after the buyer pays for the scratch ticket, scratches it out, and sees the ticket is non-winner, they can't go back to the store and demand a refund or complain and say it was a scam, and misleading sale, right? They fully know that they are taking the chance (buyer risk), but since it's such a small price (in my case 99 cents), it's not much of a risk at all.
So am I going too far out on a limb here expecting that buyers should have read my sale posts and have responsibility for what they purchased or did I deserve to get the negative feedback (even though my logic says there was no way I was deserving of that since I really did truthfully post and deliver what I promised I would! It's just the buyer didn't read and assumed).
So anyways, I don't make many sales anyways, so these couple negatives has killed my rating down to 90% and I don't know if I can make up for it since I'm not a power seller and 500 positives in a month vs 2 negatives would easily overshadow it. But for me, 2 negatives is like a killer for my account and now I don't know if anyone would dare buy from me now (no more 99 cent deals....I now sell the actual item and ship it out to them).
Also, ebay only bases your rating on the past 12 months so even though I have a 370 positives versus 2 negatives, my percentage is 90% because I only got 18 positive feedback this year even though I sold a lot more but people don't always leave me any feedback (they forgot?). So 18 out of 20 is 90% which is an awful percentage. 370 wins 2 losses is a much more appealing way to represent my account than 90%. It sucks that they do that because it's not like even the greatest companies like Apple or Microsoft or Samsung don't get thousands of negative feedback all the time. But when you go their stores, you don't see a percentage or rating beside their brand name. If my seller rating appeared as 370+ and 2-, that is so much more accurate and truthful than to show my rating at 90% which in ebay world basically is a shit rating and means that seller is either a scammer or very bad and nobody should buy from me.
I'm not a retailer or big-time seller. Just your average joe who bought some stuff over the years and sold some stuff.
I had an idea that I thought would work fine on ebay. It has to do with trying to get more referrals to an affiliate site I
am a member of that rewards you for converting new members by offering a coupon code buyers can use to save money.
I decided to post it on sale on ebay for 99 cents since you can't sell anything cheaper than that. Basically, I would post
the "products" of that affiliate site on ebay with pictures and description, and price it at 99 cents with free shipping. But
I wrote CLEARLY in giant bold red writing in the description that I don't have the item, nor would I ship it to them. But
that I would give them an email with a link that provides them info on how to get the product for free or at a huge discounted
price. All of this is true. It's not a scam. The question was only if the buyer was willing to check out my link and join the site
and make their first purchase using my code. If they didn't like it, I would offer a refund no questions asked. It's only 99 cents.
I didn't think it would be a big deal.
Turns out that 50% of the people who bought my 99 cent deals all assumed that I was going to ship out the actual product to
them for 99 cents free shipping! Wow, they didn't even bother to read the description which clearly said that I don't have the item
or that it would be shipped to them. They didn't read that the purchase was for an email. Of the nearly 60 sales I made in the past month
doing this, 30 of them kept writing back to me 20-30 days later, "Where is my item?" or "Item didn't arrive" etc. And I had to explain
to them that it was a misunderstanding they didn't read the description and that I sent them the emails to them on the day they purchased it.
I offered them refunds and most of them were refunded.
But sadly, in the last 2 days, I suddenly got 2 negatives. Even after communicating with the buyers to let them know A) it was clearly written
in the description, B) I fulfilled my promise by sending them the email, and C) if they didn't like it, I would refund them no questions asked. But two people accused me of being a scammer and left negative, despite my explaining everything to them.
Now in retrospect, I found out that ebay TOS doesn't allow for selling of links or outside/3rd party sites. So I have removed all the 99 cent deals and stopped doing it. At that point I was still at 100% feedback. But the problem is since these sales take 30 days or so to culminate, most of the people writing back are just starting to pour in now. I can't believe that ebay buyers don't even read what they are purchasing. Do they just look at the picture and the price and then press "buy it now"? Is there no such thing as buyer responsibility or buyer risk when they click on something to purchase? Should buyers also not be bound to the terms of agreement once making a purchase? These buyers just bought my stuff without reading the description even when I put it in the TITLE to "PLEASE READ DESCRIPTION BEFORE BUYING" and they still don't and write me back 30 days later saying "where is my item?". Since the new ebay feedback system doesn't allow sellers to leave any negative, the buyers have FULL POWER. They can leave feedback based on performance of the seller or simply how they feel and ebay can't do anything about it. I asked ebay several times to help me out because these couple buyers left negative feedback based on feelings and not seller performance. I technically fulfilled and did everything a seller should do. I clearly wrote it out, I delivered it to them, and even offered a refund if they were unhappy. But since the buyers didn't read, and didn't realize what they paid 99 cents for was simply the email link with info, instead of the actual item, they are free to blame it on me for their mistake of not reading and knowing what they were purchasing.
In any case, I've stopped selling that 99 cent idea. It's too confusing and I didn't expect that so many buyers actually don't READ the sale item. That's what surprised me. If they read it, they would know that it was for an EMAIL with info. Then they could decide whether or not
to try it or just not buy it. So if they buy it, that' the risk they take. But since it's only 99 cents, it's not a great risk at all since the email/link actually is legit and guarantees they will make more than the 99 cent back in savings if they use it. It's like going to the corner store to buy a lotto scratch ticket for $3. The buyer knowingly takes the small risk ($3) to buy a scratch ticket in hopes to win $10,000. So after the buyer pays for the scratch ticket, scratches it out, and sees the ticket is non-winner, they can't go back to the store and demand a refund or complain and say it was a scam, and misleading sale, right? They fully know that they are taking the chance (buyer risk), but since it's such a small price (in my case 99 cents), it's not much of a risk at all.
So am I going too far out on a limb here expecting that buyers should have read my sale posts and have responsibility for what they purchased or did I deserve to get the negative feedback (even though my logic says there was no way I was deserving of that since I really did truthfully post and deliver what I promised I would! It's just the buyer didn't read and assumed).
So anyways, I don't make many sales anyways, so these couple negatives has killed my rating down to 90% and I don't know if I can make up for it since I'm not a power seller and 500 positives in a month vs 2 negatives would easily overshadow it. But for me, 2 negatives is like a killer for my account and now I don't know if anyone would dare buy from me now (no more 99 cent deals....I now sell the actual item and ship it out to them).
Also, ebay only bases your rating on the past 12 months so even though I have a 370 positives versus 2 negatives, my percentage is 90% because I only got 18 positive feedback this year even though I sold a lot more but people don't always leave me any feedback (they forgot?). So 18 out of 20 is 90% which is an awful percentage. 370 wins 2 losses is a much more appealing way to represent my account than 90%. It sucks that they do that because it's not like even the greatest companies like Apple or Microsoft or Samsung don't get thousands of negative feedback all the time. But when you go their stores, you don't see a percentage or rating beside their brand name. If my seller rating appeared as 370+ and 2-, that is so much more accurate and truthful than to show my rating at 90% which in ebay world basically is a shit rating and means that seller is either a scammer or very bad and nobody should buy from me.
