eBay

eBay’s Global Community

As I read through some of the discussion threads of eBay sellers, I realized how technology has allowed us to form international community of consumers with established rules and regulations. Doing business through eBay still seems a little risky but the fact that the majority of people still live ethically has allowed e-bay to succeed. Like in every society there are people that still try to circumvent the system and will try to get away with unethical activities. Through the discussion forum, eBay sellers have established an environment in which anyone can communicate the problems they have encountered and ask for advice for handling those situations. Sellers also have the option to offer suggestions on how to make the selling process better. Some of the issues that I found interesting in nature were how e-bay sellers handle non-paying bidders, feedback concerns, and international selling.

The hot topic that I found in many discussion threads was the issue with non-paying bidders. This problem makes it difficult for sellers to continue selling with confidence and it also makes it hard for new sellers to start selling. Non-paying bidders also prevent honest bidders from actually purchasing the item. This also forces the seller to place the item on auction again, incur a re-listing fee, and they may not also get the high bid that they had the first time. It also causes retaliatory negative feedback from the non-buyer to the seller. The sellers have addressed this issue by providing suggestions and answering each other questions. Some of the ways the seller community is handling the issue of non-paying bidders is by filing non-paying bidder alerts and FVFC(Final Value Free Credits). Consensus from the seller community is that filing negative feedback is not sufficient because eBay does not suspend a non-paying bidder until their feedback number reaches about a negative three. However, if the seller files the FVFC, E-bay will suspend the bidder if three sellers have filed on the same bidder. eBay also addressed this situation by conducting a workshop titled “Reducing Unpaid Items”. The workshop was conducted by the eBay staff and was opened to the entire seller community. I think that this type of format is very useful to eBay sellers, because it gives them the chance to voice their concerns directly to eBay and get immediate feedback as to what is being done to address those concerns.