eBay overhauls feedback system

The online auction website eBay plans to overhaul their feedback system later this year by removing the ability for sellers to leave feedback after an auction completes. This means that only buyers will be able to leave feedback about the transaction after it completes. Some might say that this gives the buyer an unfair advantage over the seller while others would say that the move makes perfect sense.

I'm not using eBay that often anymore since all that professional sellers turned it from a private to private auction site to one where professional sellers dominate. It never made that much sense to leave feedback for buyers anyway in my opinion and it was used by sellers to put pressure on the buyers. I more than once did not leave negative feedback because I knew that the seller would do the same not caring about the justification for the feedback.

Feedbacks are a way of finding out if a seller is honest and delivers the goods after payment, and also whether the sold goods are exactly what has been advertised in the auction description

If an auction goes wrong or an dispute comes up sellers (and buyers) still have the option to contact eBay directly to sort things out.

Good move, bad move ? What's your take on the change?

Update: The changes are now live on the site which means that sellers of items can't leave feedback anymore after their items have been purchased by an eBay member. It is still possible to look up a seller's feedback rating on eBay to check our the past transaction history which is an important tool to verify a seller before making a purchase on the shopping site.

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