8mm Forum: E-bay question

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Posted by Michael Clark (Member # 369) on May 30, 2005, 07:16 AM:

Hi everyone, I've got a question about e-bay and was wondering if someone here might know the answer. I just sold an item and the winning bidder paid promptly via paypal. Now I've got 52 e-bay transactions under my belt, so even though I'm not as professional as those who have hundreds of transactions, I'm not a newbie either. However, I made a dreadful mistake this time. When I was leaving feedback for this buyer, I gave her very positive remarks, and then I clicked on the positive radio box and then clicked submit. And then, I realized, I clicked the wrong radio box. I accidentally clicked the NEGATIVE radio box. So now this buyer has a red NEGATIVE icon next to a very positive comment.

I e-mailed e-bay through their customer support page about getting them to fix this awful mistake, and that was yesterday, and I haven't heard from them yet. The buyer is rightfully upset, and wants me to fix this asap.

I did see where we could do a mutual feedback retraction. My only problem with that, for her, is that from this point forward, folks will see that she had one feedback mutually retracted, and even though there won't be any negatives, people may question her as to why she has a feedback retraction.

Does anyone have any opinions or ideas on how I should handle this? I have been so upset by this. I wouldn't blame this poor woman if she hated me. This was such a STUPID mistake. I think e-bay should give us the option of correcting our mistakes!

Thanks,
Michael

Posted by Jan Bister (Member # 332) on May 30, 2005, 08:38 AM:

I agree there should be a way to correct such mistakes. Bugger. [Frown]

But my suggestion would be for the both of you to go ahead and mutually retract your feedback. Then, once that's done, leave a follow-up comment explaining that the retraction was because of a mistake of yours and has no effect on the buyer's trustworthiness. This follow-up comment will always show up, along with the original feedback comment, in your buyer's profile so people will see what happened.

That said, I wouldn't necessarily view a retraction as a negative. It actually shows evidence of the seller and buyer being able to work out differences and come to a conclusion that satisfies both sides. Kinda. [Wink]

Posted by Chip Gelmini (Member # 44) on May 30, 2005, 10:23 AM:

Mike

Sad to hear that you make a simple mistake, and everything about it seems more terrible than the positive of the sale, if that makes sense to you.

If you haven't done so yet, mail a card to the buyer and simply apologize for what happened. There are some that say an apology is infact, an admission of guilt or error. In this case that is true. But it was just that, and nothing else.

Saying I'm sorry can say alot more than the damage that was done previously. Do this because your customer is a woman, and do it promptly....the sooner the better. Even if the reason your saying I'm sorry doesn't seem justified on your part (for example if there was one other person who made this happen besides yourself, and it was really there fault. You're aplogizing as if it was you when it was someone else who really should apologize to both of you).

I have often read sales adds that has fine print, "not responsible for typo errors." You then have to ask yourself, "if you're not, then who is?"

CG [Razz]

Posted by Michael Clark (Member # 369) on May 30, 2005, 11:31 AM:

Thanks everyone. I have sent an apology to this buyer, and in the apology asked if she had any ideas or suggestions as to how she would prefer for me to handle this, but I haven't heard back from her yet. I was really hoping that e-bay might manually make the correction so it would be transparent to everyone, and there would be no need for a mutual retraction, but I don't know if e-bay will do that or not. I'm still waiting to hear back from them. Thanks for the feedback! [Smile]

Michael.

Posted by Jan Bister (Member # 332) on May 30, 2005, 02:42 PM:

eBay won't do anything... I can pretty much promise you that. Waiting for them to respond to your inquiry is rather futile. Seems you're already taking the right steps toward a resolution, though, let's just hope your customer is willing to work with you. [Smile]

And Chip's idea is simply great, I would never even have thought of it. He must be rather successful with the ladies in general... [Big Grin]

EDIT, did you actually just say, "thanks for the feedback?" [Wink]

Posted by Michael De Angelis (Member # 91) on May 30, 2005, 10:24 PM:

Try noodling around, I'm sure that there is a method to change the feedback.
And there is a way to contact eBay by telephone. They are located in California.

Posted by Michael Clark (Member # 369) on May 31, 2005, 08:20 AM:

Jan, I actually sent a very heart-felt apology to my customer, so she should know how sorry I am. And, late yesterday I received an e-mail response from e-bay basically saying there was nothing they could do to help me. They quoted legal precedent type stuff and lots of fine-print type rules, and said really the only thing that could be done was a mutual feed-back retraction. So me and the customer went ahead and did a mutual feed-back retraction, that removed the red negative sign and number, but left the good comment. So all seems well now, and I learned a very VALUABLE lesson. BE VERY VERY CAREFUL when leaving feedback!! [Smile]

Posted by Jan Bister (Member # 332) on May 31, 2005, 09:32 AM:

Hooray for you! [Smile]

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