In a major development, eBay will finally make feedback more transparent - starting in late April, the detailed rating system will no longer be anonymous, the company announced today. However, it appears eBay sellers may have to do a little work in order to analyze their feedback.



eBay's Michael Jones wrote about the feedback changes on the announcement board today:



"I'm pleased to announce you'll soon be able to run weekly detailed reports on your transactions to help you prepare for the new approach to seller standards coming with the August 20 seller evaluation. These reports will show which of your transactions have defects, and the specific defects associated with each transaction.



"Starting the week of April 16, you'll be able to see which transactions have:

- Returns initiated for a reason that the item was not as described

- eBay Money Back Guarantee cases opened for item not as described or item not received

- Seller-cancelled transactions, and negative or neutral feedback



"Starting in late April, the detailed rating system will no longer be anonymous, and you'll also be able to see which transactions have low detailed seller ratings for item description and ship time."



When eBay launched DSRs in 2007, it allowed buyers to leave them anonymously, saying buyers would be more truthful if they knew sellers could not leave them retaliatory feedback. But in 2008, eBay took away the ability of sellers to leave negative ratings for buyers - yet the anonymity of DSRs remained.



It took eBay 6 years to acknowledge the validity of sellers' argument in favor of making DSR feedback transparent. Jones wrote in the March 2014 announcement, "We've heard from many of you about the need for more insight at the transaction level into how you're doing toward eBay's performance standards - and we listened."



In the company's UK announcement today, it went further, writing:



"While the current system of anonymous ratings provides sellers a general indication about their service, they need details to address any issues effectively. For example, if a seller's ratings indicate their items take too long to arrive, it will help them take the right action if they know the issue is with posting to a specific geographical region.



"Sellers will soon be able to get reports that provide this kind of detailed information. Starting in late April, detailed seller ratings will no longer be anonymous. Sellers will be able to run reports telling them which of their transactions received low detailed seller ratings.



"With this change, sellers will be able to make much better use of the ratings to continually refine their selling practices - and deliver the great service you expect. So please continue to leave ratings and feedback that honestly and fairly reflect your buying experience."



Sellers have been telling eBay just that for years - with more information about DSRs, they could improve their business practices. So why did it take eBay 6 years to make DSRs more transparent? What do you think of today's announcement from eBay?

