EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT EBAY FEEDBACKThe eBay feedback system is one of the cornerstones of the eBay community. The feedback rating associated with each user ID conveys the user's reputation. Higher feedback ratings translate into a better reputation. For every transaction on eBay, the buyer and seller can leave feedback about how well they perceived the transaction was conducted. A seller with a long history of positive feedback earns the trust of the eBay community. This trust gives buyers confidence to bid and to bid higher. Feedback BasicsWhenever you buy or sell an item on eBay, you can leave feedback for your trading partner. There are three different feedback ratings that you can leave:
You can also leave a short comment with your feedback where you can provide more details about the transaction. The feedback and the comment that you leave become a permanent part of your trading partner's feedback record. However, there are ways of removing feedback. You have up to 90 days from the end of the auction to leave feedback. If you know the item number, you can actually leave feedback past the 90 day period. As you earn feedback points, eBay will award you feedback stars that appear alongside of your feedback score:
If you are leaving feedback for a seller, you can also rate the seller on the following:
The overall feedback score can tell you how experienced a buyer or seller is on eBay. A large feedback score indicates more experience, while a small score indicates an inexperienced user. New users who joined less than 30 days ago have a The other key component of the feedback system is the percentage of positive feedback.  The amount of positive feedback from unique users divided by the total number of feedbacks gives you the percentage of positive feedbacks. High quality sellers have 99% positive rating or higher. Building Up Your FeedbackWhile having good feedback as a buyer is good, it is absolutely critical to have excellent feedback as an eBay seller. Before you can be an effective eBay seller, you will need to have a feedback rating that buyers will trust. You need a minimum feedback score of 50 with a 100% positive rating before buyers will begin to trust you for moderately expensive (up to $500) items. A feedback of 50 is also needed to qualify for PayPal's $2,000 buyer protection program. Getting to a score of 50 starting from scratch is going to take some work. The first thing you should do is buy a few things on eBay to get your feedback started. You should buy things from different sellers that have a feedback score of at least 100 and 99% positive. Unfortunately, not all sellers will leave feedback, even if you leave your feedback first. If a seller has not left you feedback within a few days after you have left your feedback, you should email the seller once asking them to leave you feedback. Sending email more than once could cause an obtuse seller to leave you negative feedback for "harassing" them. After you have reached a feedback score of 10 (and your yellow star), you should begin listing things to sell. Start with inexpensive items. Buyers aren't as worried about losing $20 as they are $200. Stick with selling inexpensive things until your feedback score hits 50. Focus on building your feedback as a seller while supplementing your feedback score with occasional purchases.  In May 2007, eBay made significant changes to the feedback system. Prior to the change, it was difficult to determine if a user's feedback was given as a seller or as a buyer. It was fairly easy to pad a feedback score by buying inexpensive items. This artificial boosting of feedback was a common technique used by eBay scam artists. With the new changes, feedback can be sorted by "Feedback as a seller" and "Feedback as a buyer". A buyer can easily see how many feedbacks someone has as a seller. However, the total feedback score is the one displayed when you view an item, so it still helps to pad your feedback score with purchases. When you reach a feedback score of 50, you should stop buying with your seller ID. Create a separate user ID for buying. You want to protect your account from potentially bad sellers that will leave retaliatory negative feedback when they ship you inferior products. This issue is explained in more detail under When To Leave Feedback. Avoiding Negative FeedbackUntil you have a feedback score of at least 100, you can't afford to receive a single negative feedback. Having 1 negative with a score of 50 will give you a 98% positive, which will completely ruin your reputation as a seller on eBay. To be an effective eBay seller, you need to maintain at least a 99% positive rating at all times. The easiest way to avoid receiving negative feedback is to have honest and accurate listings. By properly setting the buyer's expectation, you can assure yourself a smooth transaction. Always respond quickly when a buyer contacts you with a question or a problem. Quick communications lets the buyer know that you aren't some scam artist trying to run away with the buyer's money. If a buyer is giving you grief about an item you sold, you should try everything you can to make them happy. Saying you are sorry, even when it is not your fault, can go a long way to defusing the situation. If you are having trouble reaching a solution, try offering a discount to the buyer. Giving a 10% discount is better than than being hit with a charge back when the buyer calls their credit card company to reverse the charges. As a last resort, accept the return of the item and wash your hands of the whole mess. You can always resell the item again. Getting a negative feedback and tarnishing your eBay reputation is not worth a fight over a few dollars. Leaving negative feedback to a buyer that didn't pay for their item can result in you receiving a negative feedback in retaliation. This is especially true for buyers with little or no feedback. If you are trying to build up your feedback, avoid leaving negative feedback unless you can absorb a negative retaliatory feedback and still maintain a 99% positive rating. Relist your item and forget about the deadbeat. Removing Negative FeedbackMutual Feedback WithdrawalIf you do receive a negative feedback, not all is lost. There is a way to remove the negative feedback. It is called mutual feedback withdrawal. If you have have resolved your differences with the buyer, you can apply to have the negative feedback removed, You have up to 90 days from the end of the auction or 30 days after the feedback was left, whichever is later, to initiate the process. This process can be initiated only once per transaction, so be sure the buyer has agreed to do it before you start. You can start the process from the Mutual Feedback Withdrawal help page. Feedback Abuse and Automatic RemovalUnder certain conditions, eBay will automatically remove negative feedback from your account. The case in which you will most likely encounter this is when a new eBay user purchases an item but never pays for it. When you hit them with a non-paying bidder alert, the buyer may retaliate with a negative feedback. Usually such buyers will have their account suspended when they have too many unpaid item strikes in a short period of time (the exact number of unpaid item strikes to be suspended is not explicitly defined by eBay). EBay will then automatically remove the offending negative feedback from your account. See the Feedback Abuse, Withdrawal and Removal for more details. Square Trade
For $9.50 a month, you can sign up for square trade. This will give you the privilege of displaying a square trade seal on the bottom of your eBay listings. You also gain access to Square Trade's Online Dispute Resolution Service (ODR). If your trading partner did not respond to your mutual feedback removal request, Square Trade may be able to remove the negative feedback on your behalf. Unfortunately, this service is not free. It cost $29.95 for each negative feedback removed. However, preserving your reputation my be worth the cost. See www.squaretrade.com for more details. Is Square Trade worth it? That is a question that is often asked by eBay users. If you are a new eBay seller trying to build up your reputation, I think it is worthwhile to have the Square Trade seal displayed on your listings as it will give your auctions more credibility. If you are selling high-end products, having the seal will help give buyers more confidence in your products and bid higher. Once you have become an established eBay seller, the need to have the Square Trade seal on your listing diminishes and you can sell your products just as well without it. When To Leave FeedbackIt depends on whether you are the buyer or seller of the transaction. BuyerFor a buyer, when to leave feedback is very simple. Feedback should be left for the seller after the item has been received and inspected. If you are happy with the item, then go ahead and leave positive feedback. If you are satisfied with the item, but you are dissatisfied about some other aspect of the transaction (i.e. the seller took over a week just to ship the item) you might consider leaving a neutral feedback. If you are completely dissatisfied with the item that you received, you should contact the seller prior to leaving any feedback. Often things can be worked out to everyone's satisfaction. If the seller is unresponsive to your problems, then you should leave a negative feedback for the seller. You need to be aware that some sellers will retaliate against your negative feedback by leaving you a negative feedback. This is one of the shortcomings of the eBay feedback system. There is nothing you can do other than make a response to their feedback comments. This is precisely the reason why you shouldn't use your seller account for buying on eBay after you worked so hard to build it up. SellerThere are two schools of thought on when sellers should leave feedback for buyers. Some people believe the seller should leave feedback immediately after the buyer pays. Others believe feedback should be left after the buyer leaves feedback first. Experienced sellers soon realize that the second method is the best approach. Critics claim that the only reason for not leaving feedback after the buyer pays is for the sole purpose of retaliating against a buyer who leaves a negative feedback. While this may be true for some sellers, the transaction really isn't complete until the buyer states they are satisfied or dissatisfied. By leaving feedback first, the buyer completes their end of the transaction. Feedback left for buyers should focus on whether the payment was made in a timely manner. A Speedy payment warrants a positive feedback. If the payment takes longer than one week, then you may consider leaving a neutral. Only leave a negative feedback if the buyer does not pay for the item. Feedback ScamsUnscrupulous sellers try to artificially inflate their feedback in order to gain the trust of the eBay community. Once the feedback is over several hundred or even several thousand, the scammer will begin to sell-high end products at prices too good to be true. Of course it is too good to be true and once the scammer has your money, they will disappear, and you will never receive your item. One method scammers use to boost their feedback is to create hundreds of additional eBay accounts. They will then use these fake accounts to buy hundreds of non-existing products from the scammer's seller account. Fortunately, this scam is fairly easy to spot if you inspect the seller's feedback. You will notice nearly all the feedback will come from accounts created at roughly the same time and with similar feedback scores. You may also notice an unusual number of new user  A more sinister method of feedback fraud involves the use of one cent ebooks like the one above. The scammers typically set up a dutch auction listing a large quantity of ebooks selling for one cent with digital delivery. The subject of the ebook could be anything, but somewhere in the listing will be language about leaving positive feedback. Sometimes photos of scantily clad women will be included in the listing for no apparent reason. A scammer's feedback can increase amazing fast using these techniques. In less than a week, the scammer's feedback can go up by several hundred. It can be tough to spot the scam by examining the seller's feedback. There are so many eBay users willing to trade feedback that sometimes you can't see the pattern of fraud in the seller's feedback. Detecting Feedback PaddingThere are telltale signs in the seller's feedback that can indicate the feedback is being padded. They include:
If you notice one or more of these indicators in the seller's feedback, find another seller. Don't take a chance on being scammed.
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