Back in August I related that I'd bought a couple of of 1A filters from OAI,
and that they hadn't been Olympus filters - they were no-names and were
loose in their mounts. The auction titles were both
"OLYMPUS 49MM 1A Skylight Filter OM Camera"
Seems to me they should have been Olympus filters, no?
As well, I bought a C-POL which had "Olympus America Inc" printed on it, but
didn't appear to have come from Olympus Japan. Well, I wrote OAI and told
them this, but that I was going on a long canoe trip and wouldn't be able to
do anything about this for a while. They said I could return the items
whenever.
When I came back I tested the C-POL and decided that although it gave some
blue-yellow effects I would keep it. I was pretty busy at work, but it got
to be October, so I figured I'd better pull my finger out and return the 1A
filters, so I mailed them back. Then, figuring that it would be dishonest to
post positive feedback for such a substitution of goods, left the following
feedback for both:
"Neutral: Not an Olympus filter, but return accepted graciously."
This seemed fair and logical to me given what they'd done, but I was a bit
concerned that with feedback "inflation" anything except glowing, effusive
praise for the seller might be taken amiss. This is what I got back:
... I have a little bad news. I just
noticed you left us 2 neutral feedbacks. Our policy states that any
user who leaves neutrals or negatives is put on a blocked bidder list.
I'm sorry but I can no longer accept your bids on our account. I also
gave a considerable return time frame well past the 30 days so I feel
no feedback at all would be best. We did leave positives for all. In
any case you are welcome to purchase on our online store at
www.olympusamerica.com/store but as of now I am required to block you.
Not my choice.
Thank you,
Olympus America Inc.
I'd be interested in people's opinions on whether it is reasonable to leave
a neutral in a case like this (i.e. shipping no-name goods apparently
inferior and different to what would reasonably be expected), and in whether
this policy is allowable under eBay rules. While sellers should be able to
block unreasonable and obnoxious buyers, their policy seems to amount to
bullying people into leaving only positive feedback (though it'd work better
if they told people about it :-( ).
Andrew
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