Guilty Without A Trial – eBay Policy??

In our household, I’m not the only one trying to make some money online. My husband has a pretty successful eBay biz selling seventies watches. Whenever he succeeds in claiming the PC, that is… (which is, I must say, not very often – since I spend loads and loads of hours using the thingie, and unfortunately our online business haven’t been lucrative enough to buy a second machine).

Last week, his account got limited – or you can say suspended, ‘cos he can’t add listings anymore. All because of two unfounded feedbacks…

Below, you can find the message like I posted it on the eBay forum(s). Please feel free to leave your comments, tips, stories, …

eBay has just limited my seller account…

It all started with unfounded feedbacks I received from two different customers.

I’ve done some reading in the eBay feedback policy, and there are a few things that make me raise my eyebrows:

In Feedback policy, eBay states they can’t check if given feedback is founded because they have no way of following up the transaction itself. But… their suspension of my account is based purely on this feedback. And this without giving me any chance to defend my case. Without hearing me, they’ve decided the buyers were right when they gave the negative feedback. Guilty without a trial…

Ebay demands that I make sure this negative feedback is withdrawn, threatening with further sanctions if I can’t.
This looks a lot like manipulation of the feedback system to me. Not to say that threatening someone under further conditions is absolutely illegal.

The two cases in which negative feedback was given are these:

- one buyer claims the item he received was not as in the auction picture: a part was missing. In my auction ad, however, was clearly stated the item came without that part. So when he asked about it, I referred to the auction ad. He gave me negative feedback in return.

- the other buyer complained both items were not working. Again, this was stated clearly in the auction ads. So, I sent him a message telling him that. I even offered him a refund for one of the items – not because it wasn’t working, ‘cos he could have read that in the auction ad – but because I delivered it with the wrong strap (it was a watch, b.t.w.). A couple of days later, I received his negative feedback for both items. He didn’t even bother to send me a reply about the refund I suggested.

And now I need to get both buyers to withdraw their negative feedback…. Forgive me if I think the chance that they will actually withdraw it is pretty small.

This entire situation got me thinking… if I want to eliminate a concurrent seller, i just buy two of his items and give him negative feedback. His account will be limited and later on suspended, unless he can make me withdraw my negative feedback (which, of course, I won’t do).
It’s that easy…

It has been 4 days since my last message to eBay. I haven’t received any reply. Meanwhile, I can’t list any auctions, and my account is at risk of being suspended. I find it hard to accept this is the way eBay works!

I can prove both feedbacks are unfounded (the facts are right there in the auction ads), but eBay just won’t listen. Like I said before: guilty without a trial.

I’m planning to contact a legal adviser about the case.

Please feel free to leave your comments, tips, stories and so on…

Regards,
Pol

P.S.: my total feedback score is 3 negative for 600+ positive)