Is there an appropriate forum to vent about this? I was given retaliatory negs for a neutral feedback even when i paid promptly and spent weeks trying to resolve the matter before having to whine to 'mommy' (ebay) and 'daddy' (paypal).

I felt like the guy was a jerk, and I want to publicize his behavior.

I'd suggest general, but the higher-ups might be ok with it being elsewhere.

I got one retaliatory neg for giving a bidder a negative when they went NPB. Unfortunately with feeBay at that point there is not a lot you can do. Curiously because they got a NPB report from me and a couple of others at the same time, their account was suspended and then the retaliatory neg guy emailed me and want to complete the sale and for me to report that he had paid so he could get his account back. But after the neg no way. There is justice.

Ebay protects the sellers in several ways. First is their ridiculously convoluted dispute process and their outrageous levying of a fee for their "buyer protection gurantee".

I was ripped off by one of their power sellers who has remained a member even with 9 recent claims like mine. The seller violated federal law by misrepresenting a base metal chain as "antique sterling". I'm filing federal charges with the US attorney here and including ebay as complicit in the fraud since they have not disciplined the seller.

Ebay also pretends to cooperate with authorites by posting a link to the FTC which is utterly useless. They protect their power sellers because sellers are the source of all their profits. Buyers don't pay ebay anything, the sellers do. Look up the relevant federal law on wire fraud and file a complaint with your US attorney. Include ebay in the complaint. That's what I'm doing.

You could be one of those people to win a multi-million dollar lawsuit.

And if he is I'll be his best friend for life. . . . unless he goes broke before he dies. . . .

Together with dozen others I was defrauded (for 60 silver eagles )

Local police got the grouped complaints by way of IFCC and more then a dozen had complained that way
Only people that had more then 500 dollar involved and lived in the US were repaid
As far as I can see the local police did nothing whatsever as to ask me by email if I was still defrauded

After the first conviction in small claims court by default the defrauders realised that they better pay back anybody over 500 dollars and just keep the money from the out of US and smaller buys

I'm not suing, I'm filing a federal criminal complaint.

And what did ebay do? I'd be surprised to hear that the seller has even been banned.

The seller was banned for the second time and a little later for the third time and then I lost intrest
It is very simple never ever buy outside your legal jurisdiction which for me is all of the European Community ( and UK is excluded because they are not a euro country and not mainland so I cannot drive there to go to the police )
Since that single US buy and defrauded on the first buy I never ever went outside the EEC again

My solution has been to restrict my buying on ebay to the few sellers I have found trustworthy. Ebay is simply too open to frauds and scam artists. The venue is a great form of public market, but without any controls by the market operator, it isn't a safe venue for buying.

Feedback being limited to 80 characters (spaces included) is ridiculous, and the dispute console should be publicly accessible. If prospective buyers could see the actions of sellers on the dispute console, dishonest sellers wouldn't have a prayer of keeping up their ripoffs fro very long.

28Plain: that stinks.

Regarding my initial conundrum...

I noticed that some other Coinpeople folks are buying from this seller. I don't really feel the need to be a big person about this. I won't get any satisfaction out of pointing out this liar's lies to him, as he clearly doesn't care.

I won't post the story here, rather I'll let the feedback speak for itself. I left it on Jan 7. Seller retaliated with negs and lies on the same day. My ebay id is Fjordreject.

The dishonesty should be easy to spot. Proof available if anyone wants it.

best regards,

I read his comments to you.

I don't care if a seller has an almost perfect feedback, if they use insults when dealing with feedback and feedback replies, I know I don't need to do business with them.