Honesty in giving feedback

[Steve K]

A positive response to a problem will result inOne reason eBay uses feedback is to generate and engender trust among its users. A seller with more than a few negatives will be frowned upon. As will anyone with a feedback score of under around 99%, though there are legitimate reasons why some scores can be a lot lower.

The idea that anyone on Ebay with a rating of less than 99% is considered untrustworthy shows just how far the problem of "grade inflation" has got into the rating system. In real life, you'd be quite happy dealing with a shop which had a customer approval rating of 95% or even 90% - the "face to face" nature of High Street shopping helps you make a decision when buying. Sadly, the tit-for-tat nature of the Ebay feedback system mean that sellers and buyers can be pressured into giving good feedback, even when it is not called for, to the extent that anything other than 100% is viewed with suspicion.

[Gwiwer]

If the member has recently joined and has only a few transactions on record then the feedback percentage might appear low as well. One negative from five sales gives 80% which is seen as dubious by many users. But if the history is looked into it will be seen that the user is new and has not had time to build a better reputation. A check on the user name can also be made to establish if they have traded before under a previous name. That can also reveal the occasional surprise such as users with poor track records constantly re-registering under new names hoping to erase their pasts.

 

There is an element of healthy suspicion around the eBay feedback system. I used the figure of 99% after some thought and because most of the established users will already be at or above that level with no problem. Those who are not will always have recent transaction history on full view and older deals with feedback left visible. It is quite possible for someone to have had a rough patch and improved but still have a lower score. Inspection of the feedback will show that there might be no negatives in the past year and any issues were all a long time ago. That is another benefit of the feedback system - it can be used for a little historical research and shows a track record over a length of time.

 

The idea that anyone on Ebay with a rating of less than 99% is considered untrustworthy

To be fair I did not use the word "Untrustworthy"