Just want to let off a bit of steam regarding my recent experience with Amazon and an unreasonable buyer (one of many unfortunately). I list a few items on Amazon as they are free to list, and occasionally get a sale. Due to the high fees and predetermined shipping charge it is hard to be competitive with lower value items, hence the low sales. Now, the set shipping charge is around £4. So what I do is list items far lower than their value, hence the total is very reasonable. It would seem most people accept the item cost + shipping fee as a total amount, as is the case when I shop on eBay or similar for single items. However, one buyer decides that it is an outrage that they have been charged £4 shipping when it only cost me £0.69 for a second class large stamp. They do say they are happy with the item though. I reply to them saying that the delivery charge is set by Amazon and that I have lowered the item cost accordingly. The next day I receive a message from Amazon saying that a buyer has complained that the item was sent with "insufficient packaging". I reply to the buyer asking what they are wanting out of this, and that as I already explained, I have no control over the shipping charge. No response from the buyer, simply a feedback rating of 1 (equivalent to eBay negative) claiming the item was not as described, would not deal with seller again, etc etc. Now, the annoying thing is, as I only have ~10 feedback, a single negative puts a huge dent in my rating. Contacted Amazon and of course they have absolutely no interest in helping me out, they state the buyer can leave whatever feedback they like as long as it isn't solely an item review. I asked what am I supposed to do to avoid these kind of complaints when I cannot set the shipping charge, and as of yet, they have avoided the question and not provided any kind of response. Not surprised really as from what I can tell, there is nothing I can do. These kinds of buyers really annoy me, it seems as if they only purchase things to be complete and utter c*nts to the seller. They know full well before they pay for the item what the shipping charge is, what the actual cost is likely to be, and that the advertised item cost is very low to compensate.
Lets face it as a seller on Amazon, Ebay those are the risks you take. If your feedback is that low just start again?
I know that. But this is a rant, sellers should not have to deal with such c*nts, I mean they can choose if they want to buy something or not, so unless there is some major issue with service or the product, just be happy as you knew exactly what you were doing when you made the order. I have considered starting another account, but I have no idea how much of an impact the feedback rating actually has. With eBay your listings get put at the bottom and so less sales, but I don't think it really works like that on Amazon. The items I sell have little competition, so I think if people are going to buy them, they still will. The other thing is that unlike eBay, you can actually use more than 10 characters to respond to the negative feedback, which I have done to explain my side. You are forced to charge the default rate of ~£4 (which does not even combine for multiples of the same item) unless you pay their ~£28 a month subscription fee. As I only sell a few items a month, I would be losing money if I paid that.
I agree with that, also you could go sell on ebay and not worry again about the shipping fees since you'll be the one to decide what they are.
I do sell on eBay and that is where 95% of my sales are through. I only list on Amazon because the listings are free and despite me charging more due to the higher fees, some people prefer to use Amazon. I think eBay is very toxic though, it's far too easy to abuse the "money back guarantee", and believe me, many people do so. But again, I don't really want to get into an eBay/Amazon debate, this was merely a rant about this particular buyer, and what appears to be common for all of these market places - buyer is king, seller means nothing. Thankfully this isn't a full time job for me, and as soon as I get employed I'll give it up. But as a typical student, every extra penny counts
A lot of these problems seem inherent to selling without any face to face transaction between two small parties via a large intermediary. Broadly speaking human nature (sadly) seems to dictate that if you protect the buyer the buyer will take advantage of that and abuse it, and vice versa. It's difficult to protect both equally with out extra cost and administration (through arbitration) for the organiser of the sale (Ebay, Amazon etc) so they protect what they see as their most important revenue source, which is the buyer. Unlike the in the law, the private company has no compulsion to be as even handed as possible (maybe they should? greater regulation?) It's not fair, but baring taking each case up outside of the system you ultimately choose to use (small claims court?) I'm not sure what can be done about it.
