Non-pay bidder/feedback question

[Oobgarm]

I recently put up three large lots of Nintendo Power magazine.

Two sold almost right away with BIN to a zero-feedback winner, while the other ran the course.

The buyer for the two BIN auctions made absolutely no effort to contact me, even after I sent messages outlining my paypal address and my mailing address for money orders. I clearly stated that all payments were expected within a week, so I opened 2 disputes against the bidder a week later after no contact from them. One was ignored, but one did get responded to, most likely due to eBay's reminder message. He says:

"After the bid was entered, a confusing message was displayed. It did not confirm that the bid was accepted nor that payment had been received. I don't purchase items on the net unless the path of payment is absolutely clear."

I further explained that my messages to them would have allowed them would have detailed the path of payment and would have avoided any problems. I waited, and no contact. I check the bidder's user ID and noticed that they'd been a registered user since 2001. For six years they'd been a member, and had no idea how eBay works.

The day before I was going to close the dispute and get my fees back, the bidder pops in and says this:

"We were responding to an item that we believed to be an immediate purchase. It didn't provide a means for immediate purchase. We purchased another item that was an immediate purchase, not a bid.

Please end all of your complaints against me. It was an honest misunderstanding. I would consider bidding on your items in the future. I would expect that you would act in a business-like fashion."

I check their bidding history, and they've won another auction, for an individual Nintendo Power magazine, at a fraction of the price they were supposed to pay for the two lots. I even contacted that seller and found that the buyer paid with paypal, no problems at all. It was even a BIN purchase, just like my two auctions.

So, I want to give this guy negative feedback. It's completely obvious that they had buyer's remorse, and yet made no effort to contact me on their own and be up front about the matter. But if I do give a neg, I'm most likely to receive a neg as retaliation since I'm not acting under their definition of a 'business-like manner'. I don't want to chance my perfect record, but this guy has really aggravated me and I think others should know what happened.

What do you all recommend I do?

[Cornelius]

This is why the feedback system is just plain broken. Clearly this buyer is in the wrong, and you have the choice of doing nothing or getting a retaliatory neg. You've summed it up just fine, and it just comes down to your choice. My only advice would be to wait and see if they leave you feedback first (perhaps accidentally), or maybe once the dispute is over, ask them to leave some positive feedback for you? I dunno.

Oh, and in the future I think there is an option to require immediate payment for Buy it Now. I couldn't find the option last time I used a BIN, but I know I've seen it before as a buyer.

Sort of an aside:
eBay is funny about feedback, only thing they really say is that it is for the buyer and seller to work out who should leave it first. Since I've gotten up to well over 100 with 100% positive, there really is no more incentive for me as a seller to leave feedback first, so I don't. I leave first as a buyer now that I've seen the seller's perspective, though I used to think they should leave feedback as soon as they got paid, that was just naive.