When buying items on eBay, you are giving your money to the seller with the hopes that you will be getting something in return. However, no matter how many guarantees of safety eBay may make, there are no certainties. So why not take a little extra time to do a few checks that may increase your chances of having a pleasant transaction on eBay.

One of those checks is to take a look at the sellers reputation, or feedback rating on eBay. This is a quick and easy-to-read summary of each eBay seller’s eBay transaction history. It can give you some idea of whether or not to trust the seller with your money. When buying anything there is always a little risk, you want to minimize that risk when possible.

How Do I Check Feedback Ratings?

When you get to the item description page, there is a box in the top right corner with information about the seller. The box has the title ‘Seller Information’, and contains the seller’s name, their feedback rating, and their positive feedback percentage, as well as any stars they have earned.

There are different colored stars given to the eBay sellers based on their rating. Stars are given in this sequence – yellow, blue, turquoise, red, green, shooting yellow, shooting purple, shooting red. Anyone who has attained a shooting star is an experienced eBay member and you should be able to trust them.

Click on the seller’s name to get a more detailed view of their reputation on their member profile page. This page shows the total number of positive and negative feedback ratings that have been given to the seller, as well as a breakdown of those ratings over time. Also available on this page is a complete history of all feedback comments left for that seller, with the most recent listed first.

What Am I Looking For?

Lots of people assume that anyone with a very high number can be trusted, but that isn’t always true. It is more important to take a look at the seller’s feedback percentage. You should consider anything below a 99% a red flag and investigate further.

Look through the first page of comments for the most recent transactions: are there any negative comments? What do they say? Take the other buyers experiences into account, as a similar experience could happen to you if you decide to deal with the same seller. However, be careful to not penalize sellers unfairly, if they have had trouble in their past on eBay but have since improved. You should consider the breakdown of feedback over time and dismiss any negative feedback left a long time ago. You should also pay particular attention if a seller seems to have been left an out-of-character amount of negative feedback in the recent history,

The next time you go to buy on eBay be sure to take a look at the sellers reputation and feedback, and as a seller keep in mind that others are looking at yours.