Private (hidden) feedback ... what are they trying to hide?

Ebay allows it's members to hide feedback comments while only displaying their feedback scores. The reason is that not all Ebay members are sensible. Rude Ebayers can leave comments that shatter a responisble Ebayer's reputation. So it's understandable why some people will choose to hide their feedback comments.

Then there are also those not-so-honest people who use this feature to hide feedback that can help buyers make informed purchasing decisions.

Ebayers can determine the following just by looking at past feedback comments:

• Can this seller be trusted?
• How has their service been in the past?
• Do they respect their customers?
• Have past issues been professionally resolved?
• And more.

My boyfriend has avoided purchasing from a seller because his replies to feedback comments, and feedback left for others were very rude and disrespectful.

Anyway, no one is perfect, so there are some really good sellers and buyers who may have one or two neutral or negative feedback comments. Ebayers can generally be trusted as long as their overall score is high and there aren't any accusations of fake stock being sold.

Here's a link to Ebay's help file on using private feedback.

My Story

I bought some items off an Ebay seller who hid their feedback comments. I was too trusting and didn't look into why the seller may have hid their comments.

Guess what happened? I purchased and paid for 4 items off this seller, and after all that the seller unregistered themselves from Ebay! I waited a week after I paid for the items to see if they had delivered the items. Nothing came.

Boy was I fuming! There was no explanation from them about why they were unregistered from Ebay.

I then took some time to find out how many items this seller had sold in the past 2 months and found out that they had sold 53 items in the last month, but had only 13 feedback comments to their name.

That did not match at all!

After some asking around, I found out that this seller didn't deliver items won by a majority of other buyers! Buyers who have paid by net bank transfer or direct deposit are finding it impossible to get a refund, and some have given up.

I'm in the process of trying to get a refund from this buyer and hope I do not have to wait too much longer.