Seller used my details to remove negative feedback

[vongy10]

hi all,

So i made a purchase then a week later I see it still hasn't been posted so I contacted the seller to see what's up. Seller says they ran out of stock and were expecting more soon. I waited. A month goes by and I contact the seller for an eta and was ignored so I left negative feedback and opened a item not received case. 

Got my refund then later in the evening I get messages about chats. I look into the transcripts and find the seller opened a chat 3 times under different accounts and successfully convinced a support member to remove the feedback. Has this happened to anyone else?

[vongy10]

hi all,

So i made a purchase then a week later I see it still hasn't been posted so I contacted the seller to see what's up. Seller says they ran out of stock and were expecting more soon. I waited. A month goes by and I contact the seller for an eta and was ignored so I left negative feedback and opened a item not received case. 

Got my refund then later in the evening I get messages about chats. I look into the transcripts and find the seller opened a chat 3 times under different accounts and successfully convinced a support member to remove the feedback. Has this happened to anyone else?

[padi*0409]

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@danieh_6 wrote:

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Not disputes, it would specifically say disputes or item not recieved requests.

However we also don't know what was said in OPs feedback.

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If an eBay or Paypal dispute process doesn't involve an investigation by them then I must be missing something.

It is also well known by experienced members here that negs are removed for mentioning disputes.

But I do agree we don't know what was said in the feedback, and there are other grounds for removal anyway.

[vongy10]

I know they opened 3 different chats because I got messages in my personal and ebay inboxes. You know when you had a chat with support online and they send you a copy of the chat afterwards?

They used one I guess personal accounts and a guest account twice and gave my personal details to make it look like it was me talking to support.

Item number 283744105613

No dispute or anything, I just opened a "I didn't recieve" case and chose to get a refund, left the negative feedback and the seller refunded after about an hour.

[vongy10]

As for the feeback. I don't recall for the exact words but I basically said "paid on x/x, no postage after a week, contact seller, no stock"

[tazzieterror]

You left the negative feedback after opening the return request?

I don't understand how you could bee seeing transcripts from another account - that doesn't make sense. Is the transcript showing that — pretending to be you — the seller has requested to have the feedback removed, making eBay think it was the buyer's request?

[vongy10]

Yes, I believe I left the feedback after opening the case.

Yeah, I don't know either. They must've sent them to me because they gave my user account name. I would share the transcripts but they have my personal details. The seller basically gave my details, item number and told them to remove the feedback because 'we' came to an agreement.

I don't care if I got my refund back, that feedback is accurate and shouldn't be removed.

[vongy10]

The weird thing though is that one of the support operators said they sent a remove feedback confirmation email to which I responded and said I asked for no such thing and I never opened a chat about it. I told them what had happened and they said they were going to crack down on the seller but the feedback is gone.

[danieh_6]

I disagree same seller OP has mentioned literally has negs with disputes being mentioned.

Are you sure you aren't confusing high rated sellers with account managers? Because that would classified as issue resolved neg removed.

[countessalmirena]

@vongy10,

What you describe is bizarre and alarming. If I were in that situation - of receiving transcripts to chats which I'd never had - I might just feel as though I were in the Twilight Zone.

In a sense this can be regarded as your account security being compromised. That being the case, you may want to report this on that basis.

While eBay's CS are still only able to be contacted via chat in most circumstances (due to COVID-19 health and safety restrictions), there is still (apparently!) phone support if the problem is to do with account security.

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If eBay CS chat staff are allowing eBay sellers to persuade them of a false identity, and under that false identity having steps taken in relation to transactions, it does not bode well for account security. At the very least, the staff member concerned should be given additional training.

[vongy10]

Yeah, it was super weird. I thought they were just spam mail at first until I saw the remove feedback confirmation email. It was late at night too (after 9pm) when those emails arrived and I was at work.

Well, I've responded to the email and told them it wasn't me and looks like I may have to call to see if they are actually doing something about it.

[countessalmirena]

@danieh,

In addition to the Member-to-member contact policy (which I interpret as padi has, in that an "investigation" by eBay or PayPal refers to action taken by either ebay or PayPal upon a dispute being opened (or - to make it clearer - the automatic bot-driven dispute process), I have only anecdotal information on which to go.

Some of the anecdotal information has been posted by various eBay buyers, some of whom had not previously posted on these boards, and all of whom were upset to various degrees (ranging from mild annoyance to sheer Vesuvius-like outrage) by removal of their feedback. In some of those cases, the buyers stated that they had mentioned something about a dispute in their feedback.

Other anecdotal information goes back further in time. I'm not certain, but I think there may have been clearer wording in one of the eBay policies at that (unspecified) time which made it clear that referencing an eBay dispute or PayPal dispute in feedback would be grounds for removal of that feedback. Can anyone else recall that?

There is certainly a core of experience/belief in the community on these boards which is predicated on this anecdotal and policy evidence, in that it's best not to reference a dispute directly.

(That's not to say that some feedback still standing doesn't reference eBay or PayPal disputes directly. Those feedback comments probably stand - in my view - because the relevant sellers haven't reported them for removal. I may be wrong.)