eBay run feedback test: Stars out, Drop down selection in

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Edited to add: It’s not a new feature after all, please read our update to find out what it’s all about!

eBay is running a feedback test which may delight you or may fill you with horror depending on how much you like it. The test replaces the option to pick a 1 to 5 star rating for Detailed Seller Ratings with a drop down selection.

Leaving Feedback Detailed Seller Ratings Test

I appear to be in the test group so I’m seeing the drop downs (at least in one browser), in another I see the normal star rating options. The questions asked and options to choose (which doubtless map to a five star rating) are:

How accurate was the item description?

Very accurate
Accurate
Neither inaccurate nor accurate
Inaccurate
Very inaccurate

How satisfied were you with the seller’s communication?

Very satisfied
Satisfied
Neither unsatisfied nor satisfied
Unsatisfied
Very Unsatisfied

How quickly did the seller ship the item?

Very quickly
Quickly
Neither slowly nor quickly
Slowly
Very slowly

How reasonable were the shipping and handling charges?

Very reasonable
Reasonable
Neither unreasonable nor reasonable
Unreasonable
Very unreasonable

Is the test good or bad?

So the question is, will buyers be more likely to click very accurate/satisfied/quickly/reasonable or would they be more likely to give you a five star rating? Which system would you prefer?

From a buyer’s perspective, the trial is a pain in the neck. It’s tedious enough to click, click, click, click to leave a star rating for the four Detailed Seller Ratings. It’s even more tedious to have to click a drop down and then select an option four times for the five items I’ve just left feedback for.

37 Responses

  1. No doubt a “Neither unreasonable nor reasonable” will be damaging to the sellers account when will they learn are they just trying to drive all their customers away from ebay?

    They need to stop messing about and fix the site and do some advertising to draw some sales in the site is dead

  2. My paypal business report for last month showed 87% of my sales from ebay were made using a mobile device. Feedback received has dropped as it is. I can only pressume it will drop even further.
    The modern world of tablets, phones and apps, ebay seems to be falling behind when it comes to make shopping on the go simple for buyers.

  3. Seriously, what is the point?? who cares?? eBay need to focus on running a great site and stop with all this nonsense. Trying to click click click on a phone is tedious … will anyone bother?? (as eBay says most sales are from phones)… number 1 eBay fan here, then all this nonsense, defects etc came in…

    Facebook is where its at. Paid my Facebook bill there of £485 which brought in 4 times in sales to my website in 3 weeks, than eBay does for the same timeframe. No fees only my website only the $29 a month. No feedback, no one interfering in my business, all my customers happy… even one man who wanted to return an item as it “wasn’t like the picture”. He returned I refunded and no one cared. He even bought 3 times since. Focus on keeping your customers happy, and they will keep there customers happy. Win Win.

    Move on with the times eBay…. life is too short for all this nonsense.

    Another not thought out idea, like when you say people want fast and free and there deliverys now, but yet promote chinese overseas listing on your website that takes 30-50 days to come!, shows how out of touch you are becoming.

    You even had to remove the review/feedback section from your facebook pages….. hmmm I wonder why? Would Facebook not remove your negative feedback?

  4. OMFG….

    eBay need to fix things that are wrong rather than spending any time introducing new nonsense.

    A couple of puerile everyday examples demonstrating all that is wrong with eBay:

    If someone choses click and collect, why is the VAT invoice made out to Argos?

    If you have a saved search that just returns one match, why does one receive an email with the subject ‘Best Matche’ Obviously in the world of eBay, removing the ‘s’ makes Matches singular….

    Leave it alone for a minute and fix things?

  5. Feedback rates have dropped in line with purchases via mobile. At it’s peak I was getting around 75% or more feedback rate, a year ago it was 50%, today it’s around the 30% mark. I can’t see how this will make any difference.

  6. I don’t understand.

    They’re now only using the delivery metric to assess sellers.

    So why this?

    Bombarding buyers with hoops to jump through means most won’t do it.

    How often do you bother to leave feedback for Ebay purchases.

    Chances are you will only do it 100% if there is a problem.

    Ebay wastes its time solving problems that don’t exist whilst ignoring the ones that do.

  7. I never leave feedback on Amazon. Don’t feel the need to as I trust that Amazon police their marketplace properly. This fetish ebay have with feedback gives its visitors and users the entirely opposite impression.

  8. Oh dear, casual buyers of a single item might well sit down and give each option some thought, but those who buy lots of stuff from various sellers are unlikely to have the time or patience. These more frequent buyers are perhaps more used to things going wrong now and then, and in my experience are less likely to punish a seller if the problem is not of their making, for example missing or damaged in the post.

  9. the holy grail of internet commerce is one click to buy and pay , yet ebay are trying to find ways to go backwards with feedback

  10. I’m not really seeing the sense in this. The only part about this that makes any sense is that now the stars have some sort of meaning to what exactly an amount of stars means.

    Obviously nobody at eBay knows anything about UI design though – you want to give the users the minimum amount of options to do what they need to do. Pictures of stars were fine for this. If they needed to add text, they could have put it in a tooltip or something.

  11. Surely a simple “Would you buy from this seller again” tick box should be enough for feedback these days?

  12. Chris, do you also get the “did this arrive on time” tick box too?

  13. Just part of the script for the new Carry On Ebay movie. Give it time and it will be another ebay backtrack/u-turn. I’m sure ebay throw these things out there knowing tamebay will pick up on it and then ebay wait for the comments. Let’s Carry On regardless..

  14. I wonder if E-Bay have ever heard of the phrase ‘polishing the turd’ ???

  15. The problem is that for years now on certain cell phones, when the Buyer went to leave feedback, the stars were REVERSED.

    This is because certain cell phone companies were not willing to share proprietary information with eBay, so eBay could program the feedback system to work on those cell phones.

    I was the recipient of FOUR of these cell phone Positives + all low scores in a four month period in 2012.

    In 2012-2015, when eBay were using these BUYER OPINIONS to suspend Sellers from the site, this was a lawsuit just waiting to happen.

    Perhaps eBay is finally getting around to trying to solve this problem.

    But the fact is that the world is changed and every company is soliciting Feedback these days. Consumers are weary of it.

    Ebay just needs to scrap the antiquated and invalid DSR system, and collect their data in such a way that mistakes and opinions by lazy Buyers don’t negatively affect Sellers under the Cassini search engine.

  16. eBay had just been making some sensible progress of late, and now it wants to take two steps backwards. Just crazy!

  17. Until I became an online seller I usually went for the middle option on surveys – one higher if I was particularly happy. I always left the highest option for perfection (which I never found).

  18. what a waste of time ebay! the feedback is fine and does the job.

    Making this type of change is not time well spent for ebay its not going to increase sales for them overall.

    One simple thing they need to do. Put more emphasis on the location of the item being sold when the results show. UK BUYERS don’t want to wait 3 weeks for something to come from china direct. So putting china search results first all the time is not giving the customers what they want!?

  19. Everytime I search for something on ebay I type in the search term, see the results, then apply the UK filter so get rid of the china rubbish and long shipping times. Its a habit I have got myself into because the first 20 results for everything is always seller location china from Mid-popular items.

    The number of customers who must place orders and not realise the seller is based in china. Then wonder where there item is and be annoyed that they didn’t buy from a UK seller.

    This can only drive customers away! bad satisfaction.

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