In This Chapter
Making the My eBay page a space to call your own
Keeping tabs on all you're buying and selling
Organizing your data
Rolling with your feedback
I know eBay is a sensitive, touchie-feelie kind of company because it gives all users plenty of personal space. Long preceding Facebook.com, eBay's My eBay page is your private space for all your activities on eBay — sort of a "This is your eBay life." I think it's the greatest organizational tool around, and I want to talk to somebody about getting one for organizing my life outside eBay.
In this chapter, you find out how you can use the My eBay page to keep tabs on what you're buying and selling, find out how much money you've spent, and add categories to your personalized list so that you can get to any favorite eBay place with just a click of your mouse. You gain knowledge of the ins and outs of feedback — what it is, why it can give you that warm, fuzzy feeling, and how to manage it so all that cyber-positive reinforcement doesn't go to your head.
Tip
I do want to preface this chapter by warning you that the My eBay page has become the hub for the zillions of features that eBay offers. As a beginner on the site, you'll be doing yourself a favor if you stick to the basics of the buying, selling, feedback, and account settings. eBay's offerings are fun, but they do a heck of a job confusing you when you're just starting out. Ease into the extras slowly.
Using your My eBay page makes keeping track of your eBay life a whole lot easier. And getting there is easy enough. After you enter eBay, sign in through the Sign In link (described in Chapter 3). After you sign in to eBay, you can access your My eBay page by clicking the My eBay link in the navigation bar (see Figure 4-1) at the top of almost every eBay page.
Tip
If you've forgotten your eBay user ID or password, click the Forgot Your User ID or Forgot Your Password link. For your user ID, you can then type your e-mail address, and eBay will send you an e-mail with your user ID. Your user ID appears in any search results, posts, or pages. For the password, you have to answer your secret question (the one you filled in when you registered). If you don't remember that, eBay will send you a password-reset e-mail if you input your correct contact information with telephone number.
After you click the My eBay link, you arrive at your My eBay Summary page. As you can see by my absolutely busy Summary page in Figure 4-2, you can access just about anything you need right here. You find some handy reminders on the center of this page. Useful buying and selling reminders also show up here, although when you're involved in a large number of eBay transactions, they may seem like the whining of a nagging spouse. Bottom line? These reminders help keep your business under control.
The My eBay drop-down menu in the navigation bar takes you to the main areas of My eBay. Also, look at the left side of the main My eBay page in Figure 4-2. Under the Summary heading are many handy links that take you to different areas of your eBay business. Table 4-1 gives you the scoop on the major links on the page.
Table 4.1. The Major Links on Your My eBay Page
Note
Tip
At the bottom of left side section, under the Shortcuts heading, are important links to activities and information.
Note
Don't confuse the My eBay page with the About Me page. The About Me page is a personal Web page that you can create to let the world know about you and your eBay dealings. (You don't have to have an About Me page if you don't want to — but they are free for the taking and are fun to share.) I tell you how to get your own About Me page in Chapter 14.
Your My eBay page has three tabs: Activity, Messages, and Account. They're on the top side of the page below the My eBay heading. If you mouse over the Account tab, you see a drop-down menu like the one in Figure 4-3. Clicking Account brings you to a summary page that has snippets of each topic in the My Account section. It's really better to click the individual menu options so that you can go directly to the place you want to explore.
The Account drop-down menu has options to take you to two very important areas of My eBay: Personal Information and Addresses. This is where you update your contact information. Initially, all this data comes from your registration. But it's policy on eBay that every user files his or her current contact information — so if you move or change phone numbers, e-mail addresses, or banks, you need to input that information here.
It's also where you can change your user ID (if you ever decide that Charlie18907 doesn't properly reflect your personality). Also, your instant messenger name can be inserted here so that you can get IM alerts at Yahoo! Messenger, AIM, or whatever messenger program you use; add wireless numbers for auctions about which you want to be notified. You can also change your password and all your other registered information here.
Note
On eBay you can change your user ID at any time (every 30 days), and your feedback rating will follow.
Because we live in a world where everyone has his or her own way of doing things, eBay allows you to set all kinds of preferences for your eBay account. One of the links leads to the Preferences page. The Preferences settings are all important to your eBay tasks. You have to decide which activities you want activated for your eBay account (you can always change these later). The most convenient thing is to select all the options that make sense to you. You can set many Notification preferences:
Notification Delivery: This is where you let eBay know which method of notification works best for you. You can also indicate whether you want HTML or text-based e-mails.
Buying Notifications: Be careful here. If you indicate that you want all this e-mail and you plan to be active on the site, prepare to be deluged. Select wisely! But remember, you can always make changes. You can get real-time notifications on your shopping for the following:
Watched Item (also daily, weekly or monthly) e-mail
Watched Items that were relisted by the seller
Confirmations for your bids
E-mails when you're outbid in an auction
Winning buyer e-mails
Losing bidder e-mails
As you can see, this is way too many e-mails, especially if you do a lot of buying and selling. They will send you e-mails for even more than I mention here. For sanity's sake, narrow your selections to the minimum.
Selling Notifications: If you're selling on the site, most of these notifications will be useful. You can indicate you want to receive the following e-mails:
Notification that you've saved a draft on the Sell Your Item Form
E-mail confirmation each time you list an item for sale
Yay! The end-of-listing e-mail when your item has sold
Boo. The e-mail you get when your item doesn't sell
Notification when your buyer performs Checkout
These are all important, especially when you're a new seller. When you become more active as a seller, you might want to whittle these down a bit — but not too much! Information is power.
Other Transactions and Notices: Again, up to you. These can be overwhelming. eBay gives you the option to receive e-mails in the following areas:
Member-to-member communications
Indicate whether you choose to receive Second Chance Offers
Reminders to leave feedback
Account preference changes
Without enumerating everything else (I can see you're about to doze off), you can also opt in (or opt out) of eBay surveys, promotions, telephone update, and direct USPS mail from eBay.
Next on the Preferences hit parade are your actual site preferences — how you'd like to conduct business on the site. These are settings for the more advanced seller. You can make most of these decisions on the Sell Item Page. If you have time, though, click through each of the individual links to show the options and be sure the default settings work for you.
Tip
When you finally get your My eBay page set up the way you like it, save yourself a lot of work and time by using your browser to bookmark your My eBay page as a favorite. Doing so saves you a lot of keystrokes later. If you want to send a shortcut to your desktop, in Internet Explorer choose File
Next (after the Seller Dashboard which I explain further on) comes the Feedback option. In the Feedback area, you see all the items that need your feedback attention, and you can see the recent feedback that has been left for you. Save yourself a trip; you can more conveniently leave feedback from the item page, your Sell page, or your Buy page.
Not surprisingly, the My Account option leads you to more links for your PayPal and eBay Seller accounts. After you start selling, your Accounts pages become powerful. Figure 4-4 shows you the Seller Accounts summary section of my My eBay page. There's also a drop-down menu so that you can view past or current invoices. You can look up every detail of your account history, as well as make changes to your personal preferences (such as how and when you want to pay fees).
Before you jump into the money game, you may want to review the links that eBay gives you to manage your money:
View Account Status: Click here to get a complete explanation of your eBay account — charges, credits, and your current balance since your last invoice.
View Invoices: Click the drop-down menu to see your most recent invoice and details of the transactions.
PayPal: A quick click here, and you're taken to the PayPal home page. Check out Chapter 6 for more on the PayPal payment service.
Note
When you give eBay your credit card information, eBay attempts to authorize your card immediately. Your credit card company's response, either Declined or Approved, appears on your View Account Status page.
Payment Terms: Although you need to post a credit card for ID purposes to sell on eBay, you can pay your eBay bill in one of three ways. They like to deduct it directly from your registered checking account, but I prefer the ways listed next. You can change your method of payment at any time. See Table 4-2 to find out when the different payments are charged to your account.
Credit Card on File: You can place your credit card on file with eBay so that each month eBay can place your selling charges on your credit card. I've been using this format since I became an eBay user and find that it works out very well.
PayPal: You can make single payments directly through your PayPal account. If you have a cash balance in your account, you can have it applied to your eBay bill; if not, you can pay the amount through the credit card you've registered on PayPal.
If you look at the links in the box on the left of your Account Summary page, you see a group of links to quickly zip to specific areas as well as navigating by using the tab with its drop-down menu. One of the most important is the link to the Seller Dashboard, which is the place where eBay calculates your ratings on the site. An explanation of the Detailed Seller Ratings (DSRs) is in Chapter 8. Figure 4-5 shows you a shot of my Seller Dashboard.
This is an important place to go on a regular basis because eBay evaluates your status on the site daily. Your status affects your placement in searches and whether you get a discount on your fees (based on your customer satisfaction ratings) if you're a PowerSeller.
If you sell an item and the buyer backs out (a rare but disheartening situation), you can at least get a refund on some of the fees that eBay charges you as a seller. These are the final value fees, and they're based on the selling price of the item. In the Resolution Center you can keep track of the disputes in progress and send or receive messages from the other party regarding payment.
Before you can collect a final value fee refund, the following conditions must apply:
After your listing is over, you have to allow buyers at least three business days to respond to you. If they don't respond, you can send them an e-mail politely reminding them of their commitment to buy.
If at least seven days have elapsed since the end of the transaction and you have the feeling that you're not going to see your money, you must open an Unpaid Item Alert. After you file this notice, eBay sends you a copy and the bidder gets an ominous e-mail with a reminder to complete the transaction or to respond with a reason.
Warning
You have up to 45 days from the end of the auction to file an Unpaid Item Alert — and you can't get a final value fee credit without filing this alert.
The next ten days after you file the Unpaid Item Alert are your "work out" days — the period where you and the bidder hopefully complete your transaction. You may try to give the bidder a call or send an e-mail through the Dispute Console to resolve the situation during this time.
After the ten days have passed but no more than 60 days have elapsed since the end of the auction, you may file for a final value fee credit.
Tip
If you have begin the process and file for a final value fee credit but then manage to work things out with the buyer, eBay removes the complaint from the buyer's account after the buyer pays through PayPal. Buyers with too many of these warnings can be suspended from using the eBay site. You can automatically file to have this alert removed through the Dispute Console.
Part of the fun of eBay is searching for stuff that you'd never in a million years think of looking for. Wacky stuff aside, most eBay users spend their time hunting for specific items — say, Barbie dolls, designer dresses, plumbing supplies, or U.S. stamps. That's why eBay came up with the Organize area of your My eBay page. Whenever you view your My eBay Organize links, you see a list of your favorite searches and sellers. But because eBay isn't psychic, you have to tell it what you want listed.
If you shop eBay at all like I do, you'll be looking for similar things and sellers over and over. The My eBay Organize area allows you to make note of your favorite searches and sellers. You can perform these searches and visit these stores with a click of your mouse.
You have the opportunity to list a maximum of 100 searches here. When you want to repeat one of these searches, just click the Search name to search for the item. eBay will even e-mail you up to 20 of your searches when new items are listed. (For more on that advanced function, check out Chapter 18.)
To add a search to your favorites, first perform the search. (For details on how to perform a search, see Chapter 5.) When the search appears on your screen, click the Save This Search link, shown at the top of the search results in Figure 4-6.
Figure 4.6. Click the Add to Favorite Searches link to send a search to your My eBay Favorites page.
The search is now transported to your My eBay Favorite Searches area for that particular search, as shown in Figure 4-7. If you want to be notified by e-mail when new items are listed, select the check box and the time frame in the drop-down menu.
When you find a seller whose merchandise and prices are right up your alley and you'd like to occasionally check out the seller's auctions, you can list the seller in the Favorite Sellers area:
When you've shopped eBay and found a seller that you're happy with, click the link on the listing page to view the seller's other items.
You see a search page listing all the items for sale by that seller.
Scroll down the page, and on the left side, click the Add to saved sellers link.
The seller is saved to your Saved sellers (favorites) page.
Tip
If you find seller that you'd like to make favorites while you're browsing or buying in their eBay stores, click the Add to Saved Sellers link at the top of the store's home page.
Tip
Got the time? eBay does. Click the eBay Official Time link, which is at the bottom of virtually every eBay page. The eBay clock is so accurate that you can set your watch by it. And you may want to, especially if you want to place a last-second bid before an auction closes. After all, eBay's official time is, um, official.
I have the most fun on eBay when I'm shopping. Shopping on eBay is exciting, and I can find a zillion great bargains. Fortunately, eBay gives us a place to keep all our shopping information together: the Buying area.
When you bid on an item, eBay automatically lists the item in the Buying area of your My eBay Page. If you're winning an auction, the price appears in green; if you're losing, it appears in red. After the auction's over, the listing moves to Won (yea!) or Didn't Win (boo!). You can watch the progress of the auction from here and see the number of bids on the item, the high bid, and how much time is left until the end of the auction. All this information can help you decide whether you want to jump back in and make a bid.
eBay also keeps a total of all your active bids and buys to the left your data in the Totals: Buying Total box — which I hope helps you stay within your spending limits.
When you've won an auction or purchased an item in a store, it appears in the Won area. From this area, you can visit the auction to print the auction page or double-check it. From the links in the Action column, you can also pay for your item through PayPal; if you've already paid, you can view the PayPal payment details. You can also click a Leave Feedback link here from the drop-down menu — after you've received the item and are satisfied with your purchase — to leave feedback.
Items I'm Watching is the most active area of my My eBay page (see Figure 4-8). This is the place for you to work on your strategy for getting bargains without showing your hand by bidding. In this area, you can watch the auction evolve and decide if you want to bid on it. You can list several auctions for the same item and watch them develop and then bid on the one that can give you the best deal. You can track the progress of up to 100 auctions in your Items I'm Watching area.
Moving auctions into the Item's I'm Watching area is easy. When you've found an item that you want to keep track of, look for the Watch This Item (Track It in My eBay) link, which is located just below the price on the listing page. Just click this link to transport the item to your Items I'm Watching area.
Your My eBay page supplies you with the tools to keep track of items you're selling on eBay. The My eBay Selling page works much the same as the Bidding page, but this time you're making the money — not spending it! Your current auction sales are listed in the Items I'm Selling area. The items with bids on them appear in green, and the ones without bids (or where the reserve hasn't been met) are in red. At the bottom, you have a dollar total of the current bids on your auctions.
Similar to the Buy section of the All Buying section, the Sell area keeps track of your ongoing listings on eBay. You can observe the auction action in real time (or at least every time you refresh the page). You can see how many bids have been placed, when the auction closes, and the time left in the auction. If you want more information about what's going on, click the handy All Item Details link, which gives you a miniversion of each auction (without the description).
When the sale is final, the items go into the Sold area (shown in Figure 4-9). Here's where you can keep track of the sale. You can check whether the buyer has paid with PayPal as well as the transaction status. If the buyer has completed checkout, you can get his or her information by clicking the Next Steps/Status link. If the buyer hasn't completed checkout, you can click the Send Invoice button to send the buyer an invoice. Very handy!
If you haven't heard from the buyer after three days (the prescribed eBay deadline for contact), you may need to resend your invoice or send another e-mail. See Chapter 12 for more information on post-sale correspondence.
After the transaction is complete (which means the item has arrived and the buyer is happy with his or her purchase), you can click the handy Leave Feedback link to leave feedback about the buyer.
You can also relist the item from a quick link or place a Second Chance offer to an underbidder if you have more than one of the item. See the nearby sidebar for more on the Second Chance feature.
Tip
If you're at the point where you're selling bunches of items on the site, you may want to subscribe to one of eBay's Selling Manager tools. These tools make your Selling area look completely different and give you the opportunity to handle more sales in a compact and convenient design. See Chapter 20 for detailed information.
Yes, I bug you about printing stuff at the outset of your selling career — not because I'm in cahoots with the paper industry but because I care. The eBay transaction process can be daunting, and beginners can easily lose track. The best way to protect yourself is to keep good records on your own. Don't depend on eBay to cover you — not that eBay doesn't care. But this is your money, so keep a close eye on it.
Now don't become a pack rat and overdo it. To help point you in the right direction, here's a list of important documents I think you should print and file whether you're a buyer or a seller:
Auction pages as they appear when they close
PayPal statements indicating any payment you receive that doesn't clear
Insurance or escrow forms
Refund and credit requests
Receipts from purchases you make for items to sell on eBay
Tip
Always, always, always save every e-mail message you receive about a transaction, whether you buy or sell until the transaction is over and feedback is left. Also save your EOAs (End of Auction e-mails) that eBay sends. For more information about EOAs and correspondence etiquette after the auction is over, see Chapters 8 and 12.
Why should you save all this stuff? Here are some reasons:
Even if you're buying and selling just a few items a month on eBay, you need to keep track of who you owe and who owes you money.
Good e-mail correspondence is a learned art, but if you reference item numbers, your e-mail is an instant record. If you put your dates in writing — and follow up — you have a nice, neat paper trail.
Documenting the transaction through e-mail will come in handy if you ever end up in a dispute over the terms of the sale.
If you sell specialized items, you can keep track of trends and your frequent buyers.
Some day the IRS may come knocking on your door, especially if you buy stuff for the purpose of selling it on eBay. Scary, but true. For more on where you can get tax information, take a look at Chapter 9.
Tip
When it comes to keeping records via e-mail and documents about transactions, I say that after you've received your feedback (positive, of course), you can dump it. If you get negative feedback (how could you?), hang on to your paperwork for a little longer. Use your discretion, but generally you can toss the paperwork from a bad transaction after it has reached some sort of resolution. (You can find out more about feedback in the next section.)
Tip
Once a month, do a seller search on yourself and print your latest eBay history. Chapter 5 tells you more about doing seller searches, organizing your searches, and starting files on items you want to track.
You know how they say you are what you eat? On eBay, you are only as good as your feedback says you are. Your feedback is made up of comments — good, bad, or neutral — that people leave about you (and you leave about others). In effect, people are commenting on your overall professionalism. (Even if you're an eBay hobbyist with no thought of using it professionally, a little businesslike courtesy can ease your transactions with everyone.) These comments are the basis for your eBay reputation.
Warning
Because feedback is so important to your reputation on eBay, you don't want others leaving feedback or making bad transactions under your name. The only way to ensure this doesn't happen is to always keep your password a secret. If you suspect somebody may know your password, change it before that person has a chance to sign in as you and ruin your reputation. (For more on selecting and protecting your level of privacy, see Chapters 1 and 15.)
When you get your first feedback, the number that appears next to your user ID is your feedback rating, which follows you everywhere you go on eBay, even if you change your user ID or e-mail address. It sticks to you like glue. Click the number next to any user ID and get a complete look at the user's feedback profile. The thinking behind the feedback concept is that you wouldn't be caught dead in a store that has a lousy reputation, so why on earth would you want to do business on the Internet with someone who has a lousy reputation?
Note
You're not required to leave feedback, but because it's the benchmark by which all eBay users are judged, whether you're buying or selling, you should always leave feedback comments. Get in the frame of mind that every time you complete a transaction — the minute the package arrives safely if you're a seller or an item you've bid on and won arrives — you should go to eBay and post your feedback.
Every time you get a positive comment from a user who hasn't commented on you before within the past week, you get a point. Every time you get a negative rating, this negative cancels out one of your positives. Neutral comments rate a 0 — they have no impact either way. eBay even has what it calls the Star Chart, shown in Figure 4-10, which rewards those with good-and-getting-higher feedback ratings.
Warning
The flip side (or Dark Side to you Star Wars fans) of the star system is negative numbers. Negative comments deduct from your total of positive comments, thereby lowering the number beside your user ID.eBay riddle: When is more than one still one? Gotcha, huh? The answer is, when you get more than one feedback message from the same person in the same week. Confused? This should help: You can sell one person 100 different items, but even if the buyer gives you a glowing review 100 times in the same week, your feedback rating doesn't increase by 100. In this case, the other 99 feedback comments appear in your feedback profile, but your rating increases only by 1.
Sellers are only allowed to leave positive feedback for buyers — I know this may not make sense, but that's the way it is. You can leave a "positive," but still be honest about your transaction in your words. eBay made this rule so sellers wouldn't leave retaliatory feedback to buyers who left them negative feedback.
Should a buyer who hasn't paid leave you a negative, eBay cooperates and removes the feedback, provided you've filed an Unpaid Item report.
Tip
If feedback is left individually and stretched out over several weeks (only one per week), the person on the other end of the transaction will get a single feedback point each time you leave a positive. I do this for my buyers who buy multiple items from me (it's easy from the My eBay page). But, grrrrrr, they don't seem to know this rule so I'll get several positives — one after another — netting me only one positive. *Sigh*
Note
Anyone with a −4 rating has his or her eBay membership terminated. Remember, just because a user may have a 750 feedback rating, it doesn't hurt to click the number after the name to double-check the person's eBay ID card. Even if someone has a total of 1,000 feedback messages, 250 of them could be negative.
Tip
You can get to your personal feedback profile page right from your My eBay page by clicking the number next to your user ID.
Feedback comes in three exciting flavors:
Positive feedback: Someone once said, "All you have is your reputation." Reputation is what makes eBay function. If the transaction works well, you get positive feedback; whenever it's warranted, you should give it right back.
Negative feedback: If there's a glitch (for instance, it takes six months to get your Charlie's Angels lunchbox or the seller substitutes a rusty thermos for the one you bid on or you never get the item), you have the right — some would say obligation — to leave negative feedback.
Neutral feedback: You can leave neutral feedback if you feel so-so about a specific transaction. It's the middle-of-the-road comment. Say you bought an item that had a little more wear and tear on it than the seller indicated, but you still like it and want to keep it.
If you're selling, here's how to get a good reputation:
Establish contact with the buyer (pronto!) after the listing ends (see Chapter 12).
After you've received payment, send the item quickly (see Chapter 12).
Make sure that your item is exactly the way you described it (see Chapter 10).
Package the item well and ship it with care (see Chapter 12).
React quickly and appropriately to problems — for example, the item's lost or damaged in the mail, or the buyer is slow in paying (see Chapter 12).
If you're buying, try these good-rep tips:
Send your payment fast (see Chapter 8).
Keep in touch through e-mail with the seller (see Chapter 8).
Work with the seller to resolve any problems in a courteous manner (see Chapters 8 and 12).
If you're selling, here's what to do to tarnish your name big-time:
Tell a major fib in the item description. (Defend truth, justice, and legitimate creative writing — see Chapter 10.)
Take the money but "forget" to ship the item. (Who did you say you are? See Chapter 16.)
Package the item poorly so that it ends up smashed, squashed, or vaporized during shipping. (To avoid this pathetic fate, see Chapter 12.)
If you're buying, you can't get official negative feedback, but the seller still has their "say." Here's how to make your feedback comment a serious mess:
Bid on an item, win the auction, and never respond to the seller. (Remember your manners and see Chapter 6.)
Send a personal check that bounces and never make good on the payment. (See Chapter 16 — and don't pass Go.)
Ask the seller for a refund because you just don't like the item. (Remember how to play fair and see Chapter 8.)
Note
When you click the Feedback number next to a member's user ID, you'll see all the tools you need to gauge the member. Think of your feedback profile as your eBay report card. Your goal is to get straight A s — in this case, all positive feedback. Unlike a real report card, you don't have to bring it home to be signed.
When someone clicks the feedback number next to your user ID, they see the following information (see Figure 4-11):
Your user ID: Your eBay nickname appears, followed by a number in parentheses — the net number of the positive feedback comments you've received, minus any negative feedback comments you may have (but that wouldn't happen to you).
Your membership information: Listed here is the date you first signed up as a member of the eBay community. Below that is the country from which you're registered, your star rating (refer to Figure 4-11), and any icons leading to more areas related to you on eBay, such as your About Me page (see Chapter 14). This area also notes whether you are a PowerSeller (see Chapter 20) and whether you have an eBay Store.
Detailed Seller Ratings: This area sums up the ratings, from one to five, that buyers have left for you.
Your Recent Feedback Ratings: This area is a scorecard of your feedback for the last 12 months. At the bottom of the feedback tote board is a summary of your bid retractions in the past six months — the times you have retracted bids during an auction.
Tip
Be careful when you retract a bid. All bids on eBay are binding, but under what eBay calls "exceptional circumstances," you may retract bids — very sparingly. Here are the circumstances in which it's okay to retract a bid:
If you've mistakenly put in the wrong bid amount — say, $100 instead of $10
If the seller adds to his or her description after you've placed your bid, and the change considerably affects the item
If you can't contact the seller (your e-mail continuously bounces back and the phone number doesn't work)
Note
You can't retract a bid just because you found the item elsewhere cheaper or you changed your mind or you decided that you really can't afford the item. If that's the case, e-mail the seller and ask them to please remove your bid. See Chapter 6 for more information on retracting bids.
Your eBay reputation is at the mercy of the one-liners that buyers and sellers leave for you in the form of feedback comments. Each feedback box contains these reputation-building (or reputation-trashing) ingredients:
The user ID of the person who sent the feedback. The number in parentheses next to the person's name is his or her own feedback rating.
The date and time the feedback was posted.
The item number of the transaction that the feedback refers to. If the item has closed in the past 30 days, you can click the transaction number to see what the buyer purchased.
Seller or Buyer — indicating whether you were the seller or the buyer in the transaction.
Feedback bullets in different colors: praise (in green with a plus mark), negative (in red with a minus mark), or neutral (in grey with a white dot).
The feedback the person left about you.
After reading feedback you've received from others, you may feel compelled to respond. If the feedback is negative, you may want to defend yourself. If it's positive, you may want to say thank you.
To respond to feedback, follow these steps:
Click the Feedback link in the drop-down menu under the Account tab on your My eBay page, and then click the Go to Feedback Forum link at the top of the page.
You're transported to the Feedback Forum, where you can reply to feedback comments left for you.
Find the feedback you want to respond to and click the Reply link.
Type your response.
If you want to follow up to a feedback you've already left for someone, follow the preceding steps, but in Step 2, click the Follow Up to Feedback Left link on the Feedback Forum page.
Warning
Do not confuse replying to feedback with leaving feedback. Replying does not change the other user's feedback rating; it merely adds a line below the feedback with your response.
Writing feedback well takes some practice. It isn't a matter of saying things; it's a matter of saying only the appropriate things. Think carefully about what you want to say because once you submit feedback, it stays with the person for the duration of his or her eBay career. I think you should always leave feedback, especially at the end of a transaction, although doing so isn't mandatory. Think of leaving feedback as voting in an election: If you don't leave feedback, you can't complain about lousy service.
eBay says to make feedback "factual and emotionless." You won't go wrong if you comment on the details (either good or bad) of the transaction. If you have any questions about what eBay says about feedback, click the Feedback link on your My eBay page and then click the Go to Feedback Forum link.
In the Feedback Forum, you can perform six feedback-related tasks:
See feedback about an eBay user.
Leave feedback for many auctions at once. Here, you see all pending feedback for all transactions within the past 90 days. You are presented with a page of all your transactions for which you haven't left feedback. Fill them in, one at a time, and with one click you can leave as many as 25 feedback comments at once.
Review and respond to existing feedback about you.
Review the feedback you have left for others. Here, you may also leave follow-up feedback after the initial feedback, should situations change.
Make your feedback profile public or private. Remember, if you make your feedback profile private, you may hinder your future business on eBay. See the sidebar "Extra, extra, read all about it," elsewhere in this chapter.
Check the Feedback FAQ to review any changes in the feedback system.
Warning
In the real world (at least in the modern American version of it), anybody can sue anybody else for slander or libel; this fact holds true on the Internet, too. It's a good idea to be careful not to make any comments that could be libelous or slanderous. eBay is not responsible for your actions, so if you're sued because of negative feedback (or anything else you've written), you're on your own. The best way to keep yourself safe is to stick to the facts and to not get personal.
Tip
Tip
If you're angry, take a breather before you type your complaints and click the Leave Comment button. If you're convinced that negative feedback is necessary, try a cooling-off period before you send a comment. Wait an hour or a day and then see whether you feel the same. Nasty feedback based on emotion can make you look vindictive (even if what you're saying is true).
And speaking of safety features you should know about feedback, you may want to study up on these:
Remember that feedback, whether good or bad, is sticky. eBay won't remove your feedback comment if you change your mind later. Be sure of your facts and carefully consider what you want to say.
Before you leave feedback, see what other people had to say about that person. Is your thinking in line with the comments others have left?
Your feedback comment can be left as long as the transaction remains on the eBay server. This is usually within 90 days of the end of the listing. After 90 days have passed, you must have the transaction number to leave feedback.
Your comment can be a maximum of only 80 letters long, which is really short when you have a lot to say. Before you start typing, organize your thoughts and use common abbreviations to save precious space.
Before posting negative feedback, try to resolve the problem by e-mail or telephone. You may discover that your reaction to the transaction is based on a misunderstanding that can be easily resolved.
eBay users generally want to make each other happy, so use negative feedback only as a last resort. See Chapters 8 and 10 for more details on how to avoid negative feedback.
Note
If you do leave a negative comment that you later regret, you can't remove it. You can go back to follow up and leave an explanation or a more positive comment (but it won't change the initial feedback or rating), so think twice before you blast.
Several ways are available to leave feedback comments:
If you're on the user's Feedback page, click the Leave Feedback link; the Leave Feedback page appears.
In the Won area of your My eBay page, click the Leave Feedback link next to the listing.
Go to your auction and click the Leave Feedback icon.
In the Feedback Forum, click the Leave Feedback link to see a list of all your completed items from the last 90 days for which you haven't yet left feedback.
To leave feedback for a buyer, follow these steps:
Enter the required information.
Note that your item number is usually filled in, but if you're placing feedback from the user's Feedback page, you need to have the number at hand.
Type your comment.
Only positive feedback can be left for a buyer, so choose your words carefully.
Click the Leave Feedback button.