Ebay feedback was originally put in place to view buyer and seller reputations. It is based on member to member comments to share trading experiences with others in the online community.

Ebay feedback is set up so that for each sale, the seller and buyer get to rate each other. Every ebay feedback consists of positive, negative, or neutral. Then there is a place for a short comment. Now for every positive you get one point, negative you get -1 point and neutral you get no points. For every 10 comments or ratings you receive a star.

Ebay feedback is then broken down on a member's profile into subsections. Feedback score is how many members were satisfied with their business transaction with you. It is usually the difference between the number of buyers who left a positive score and those who left a negative score. You then have positive feedback which is the positive feedback left displayed as a percentage. If one person had multiple dealings with one person the feedback is considered as only one. Negative feedback would then be the number of negative feedback that members have left. As in the positive feedback above if there has been more than one dealing with an individual all that feedback is still considered one. All positive feedback is all the positive feedback the member received. Recent rating is a tool used to show all ratings left for this individual in a certain customizable time frame such as 30, 60 or 90 days. Ebay feedback can be left up to 90 days after a sale is complete.

Ebay feedback does have its opponents. Some point out the ratings for ebay feedback is overly positive. They view this as the fear of retaliatory negative feedback. You gave me a negative ebay feedback (even if it was deserved) and now I am going to give negative feedback. (even if not deserved) one of the proposed remedies for the ebay feedback is to not show feedback until after both the buyer and seller submitted their ratings. The other concern of some is that the only way you can submit feedback is if you purchased the item. For example, if you saw what was a fake or misleading auction you can not leave any type of feedback to alert others.

There have also been reports of Ebay doing nothing on a complaint and leaving the only option of the ebay feedback. The fear then of negative feedback in return means that nothing is done. The idea of seller being treated better than the buyer has also been explored. It seems that for a buyer to have an account canceled it takes only 4 uncompleted transactions. However, a buyer has to make a complaint to ebay and the seller's ebay feedback is looked at to decide if something should be done. This as stated above is questioned since they feel the feedback may not be accurate.

Ebay feedback is a possible indicator of the type of buyer or seller your dealing with. You should use other avenues to protect yourself. As a buyer ask questions of the seller and note how they react. If they answer in a timely manner and offering you a straight forward answer goes a long way to helping you make a decision on if you want to do business with the individual. Ebay feedback can help but is not the only answer to the question of an individual seller or buyer's integrity in business matters.