Disappointed After 21 Years of Loyalty

[kimwilde80]

After over two decades as a loyal eBay customer—with more than 500 positive feedback ratings and a flawless record—they’ve shown me that seller integrity means nothing when a buyer cries foul. I recently had a buyer claim an item was "not as described," despite no evidence, no photos, just a baseless complaint. eBay sided with them instantly, accepting the return and leaving me to absorb the loss.

This wasn’t just a minor oversight—it was a complete disregard for my history, my reputation, and the truth. It feels like sellers are treated as disposable, while dishonest buyers get a free pass. If this is how eBay treats its most reliable users, I can’t imagine what newer sellers are up against.

eBay used to be a place where trust and accountability mattered. Not anymore.

[femmefan1946]

Did you respond to the Claim immediately?

Did you send return shipping?

You are not required to refund until the item is returned - albeit at your expense.

[inu-liger]

Yeah I feel eBay has been very biased against the sellers. I've had some issues with blatantly dishonest buyers that eBay still mind bogglingly sided with!

[mrdutch1001]

"It feels like sellers are treated as disposable,">>>And that is the way it is on any selling site!...NOT unique to eBay....has not been " a place where trust and accountability mattered." for at least 15 years... it is what it is...

[femmefan1946]

@inu-liger 

Did you respond to the Claim immediately?

Did you send return shipping?

You are not required to refund until the item is returned - albeit at your expense.

If you trust eBay to do it for you, you will be disappointed.

They want to be sure you are engaged in the failed transaction.

Not every transaction will go perfectly.

That is why experienced sellers use Cookie Jar Insurance, which is setting aside a few virtual pennies in a virtual cookie jar for problems, whether that is a bogus demand for an NAD refund or underestimating the cost of shipping or shipping the red sweater instead of the blue one that was ordered.

[ricarmic]

You've done well to last this long without a problem like this. Not sure what you sell, of course different stuff has higher/lower risk of problem buyers, but the more stuff one sells, the higher risk of problems like this.

As femme says, one has to build "problem transaction" costs into the cost of goods sold, same as the case for "INRs" whether the INR is honest or not too.

I'm not ebay cheering here, but there's no way for the system (aka BOTS, people are very rarely involved in this unless it gets escalated) to know if you've made a mistake, if you're a problem seller (moreso the case for a "new" seller) etc. The bots don't know any of us aside from our stats and even the stats can be misleading (recall posts with "top rated" sellers with extraordinarily "high" numbers of negatives disguised under an extremely high volume of positives).

With your tenure, a call (use facebook etc which appears to have better equipped support staff) might help more than for a new soul, but my suggestion is to build a small rate into your cost model to handle the fortunately rare for you problem situation like this.