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Uber vs. Laws
- DrScump 11y agoIn giving only a partial account of eBay's rating system, this author learned exactly the wrong lesson. The original two-way eBay rating system did work well. However, ratings became meaningless (except to see in aggregate a long history of transactions by a party, which gives a veneer of stability). The modern failure is twofold: 1) several years back, eBay made it impossible to leave negative or even neutral feedback for any buyer under any circumstances. Never paid? Try to extort a lower price? Phony claim of non-receipt? Damaged the item and then blamed it on the seller? NO PROBLEM, says eBay, and future sellers are none the wiser and cannot protect themselves. 2) A dishonest eBay seller can void any transaction simply by refunding the payment. So, if she didn't like the winning price on an auction, she gets a do-over, and the buyer gets hosed. Or, the seller can try to change terms (I experienced this just last week, where the seller tried to extort 250% of the winning bid price, then cancelled when I balked). Policies like these have made eBay no longer a safe place to sell, and their squeezing of sellers for every possible fee became relentless, to the point that you cannot even say the word "cash" in a listing any more. So, modern eBay is a joke, and much of that commerce has moved to Amazon and elsewhere.