What Ebay's New Feedback Policy Will Mean to You
If you're an Ebay seller, Ebay's new feedback policy probably has you upset - and with good reason. While this new feedback system won't be the downfall of all sellers out there, but it goes to show once again that Ebay seems to favor their buyers more than the sellers (who are actually Ebay's bread and butter). If you haven't yet heard the news, there are some things you need to know...

If It's Not Broke, Let's Break It
Ebay's feedback system was never ideal. Some of that may have been due to the fact that eBay just doesn't police its feedback system enough. However, instead of fixing the real issue, they decided to take something that really wasn't broken and smash it to bits.

In the old feedback system (that has been with Ebay from the beginning) a buyer could leave positive, neutral or negative feedback for a seller and a seller could do the same for a buyer. This prevented many "deadbeat" buyers from taking advantage of sellers with feedback "extortion" and the system, while not perfect, did work. Not anymore.

Sellers Are At a Real Disadvantage
Ebay sellers will no longer be able to leave negative feedback for buyers. This means a buyer can win your auction, demand you charge only half the winning bid amount and ship the item for free. If you don't want to play by those rules that buyer can then threaten to leave you negative feedback, and you'd have no recourse. You wouldn't be able to leave them negative feedback in return and if Ebay's track record of policing these types of buyers is indication of anything, the site won't do anything about it either.

What Can You Do?
Here's the hard part - you really can't do anything. If you want to sell on Ebay you have to play by their rules. However, there is a "no sale" effort going on. Starting February 18th and ending on the 25th those who are against this new feedback system are urged not to list any items. That's eight days to show Ebay that the sellers (the ones who pay the bills) are not happy and that something needs to be done about it.