There are a couple of changes popped up on eBay feedback – a new opportunity to ‘Rate this item’ and auto feedback for sellers if a buyer hasn’t left feedback within 7 days.
Rate this item
We’re guessing that this ties in with eBay’s push to get ratings for products which can be used to promote listing on Google. It’s similar to adding photos of the product when leaving feedback.
The chances are that many will miss the fact that this is a product rating, not a seller rating. Although eBay has a pop up informing buyers that it’s a new feature, that disappears once you’ve seen it a couple of times. There is a danger – if a buyer rushes to eBay to leave feedback the instant a product arrives, it’s not really a fair assessment of the actual product as they’ll really be leaving feedback about the service and condition it arrived in.
If rate this item in feedback helps get eBay listings appearing in search engines with product 1-5 star rankings, long term this should be a positive.
eBay Automated Feedback
A few people have had a surprise when browsing feedback… they’ve found comments saying ‘This seller successfully completed an order’ tagged as ‘eBay Automated Feedback’.
eBay say that auto generated feedback will be added to successfully completed transactions if the following conditions are met:
- Buyer doesn’t leave feedback within 7 days of the estimated delivery date
- The buyer hasn’t reported an issue with their transaction
- Seller has received 10 feedback or less.
It’s the third which is most interesting – this is a feature designed to give new sellers a bit of back up in getting started. eBay automated feedback won’t be left if there’s a possible issue with the transaction such as opening a return, item wasn’t received, or an order cancellation. Additionally, it doesn’t stop the buyer from leaving genuine feedback in which case it will replace the automated comment.
