
eBay is making a change to its feedback system that some sellers say slants the playing field even more in buyers' favor.
"Previously, sellers and buyers could only leave feedback of up to 80 characters," eBay announced on Friday. "We realize that's often not enough space to include important details, so we're increasing our feedback fields to allow a maximum of 500 characters."
If eBay was patting itself on the back, users quickly disabused it of the notion they would welcome the change.
"Feedback shouldn't be a novel," one seller replied on Facebook.
When a moderator said they appreciated the feedback and wrote, "We wanted to give buyers and sellers the opportunity to be able to express their feedback in a more detailed way," another seller pointed out the sticking point:
"Sellers aren't able to express their feedback if they have a negative opinion so your statement is false."
Another seller said the change would be fine if sellers could also leave negatives, "but since we can't this is nothing but bad bad news for sellers."
Another said, "It's bad enough when you see negatives saying "this is garbage and so is the seller" and eBay refuses to remove the feedback. Now we get a novel written about us when we have 0 recourse."
Here's the announcement on the
eBay Seller announcement board, let us know what you think. Will the extra space allow you to respond with more details when a buyer leaves an unfair rating?