Privacy Of Questions To Sellers

[HannaHolly]

I have a different view here.
As a seller I am happy to have customers questions displayed. On the rare occasion i get a spam question i blackball the questioner and delete the question.

As a buyer I find it useful to know if a seller responds to questions and sometimes the question responses to other peoples queries have either reassured me this is a seller i want to buy from, or warned me this is one to avoid.

Unfortunately there will always be a small minority of bad sellers who would be very happy to set their questions settings to 'invisible' and not respond to any of them - either because they've not visted the site for ages, or because they have something to hide. I feel much safer knowing there is a way to publicly see if a seller is responding to questions.

[lofty100e]

I agree that the seller , should have the choice of showing or not.....
on the other hand...it could stop the same question/s being asked several times....but again , sellers choice....papa.

That shouldn't happen really Papa, a seller with a professional attitude would alter the listing to include any details that had been neglected as soon as possible.

[madelaine]

I can see both sides of this argument, but I would like to be able to delete the question AND answer it (when it the answer just refers to the questioner). There is also the problem of people using the facility to leave adverts about their own listings/site

[ArtisanUK]

I'm not particularly comfortable with it. Also we have the problem of not being able to contact another member (unless they are active in the forums) without going through the auctions.
I wanted to email another member on the site last week to discuss something we had bought from the same seller, but the only way I could do it was to message her on one of her auctions! In the end she came onto the boards which was helpful, but otherwise I was a bit stuffed.

I can see that M&G wouldn't want people selling off site, but since we are all trying to build feedback at the minute ... and taking into consideration folk can still do it just by buying one item and making contact that way ...?

Also I think that most sellers, if they get generic questions about their auction, would be happy to let it be seen by other potential customers, it's just that they want the option NOT to do it if they so choose.

[bloss000]

I agree that there should be a choice - sometimes it is just not relevant and doesn't need to be on listing. I had to close and re-list an auction to get rid of q&a's because it wasn't relevant to listing but buyer needed to get hold of me. Good job it is free to do that!!
I see they want to be different to elsewhere, but they do need to consider privacy as there is no way to respond to a question other than on listings.

[lottie2005]

Hi,
I can see both sides of this.Though it can be open to abuse as i discovered.I ended up with fake written in the ask the seller a question box on a number of my items.This remained in situ for a few hours until i discovered it.
regards,
Michaela

[iwiw60]

In total agreement with the masses here on this one...Q&A should be private .

In my inbox this morning I got all excited because I had received a 'question' about one of my listings. Opened it up and it's an offer to sell ME something from their store!!! Hellooooooo???

Anyway, to say I'm a tad upset by this is an understatement, but there it is, in all its glory, sitting on my listing for all the world to see...AAAaaaack!

Okay, I'm off my soapbox.........

[kengillam]

That's a bit cheeky, trying to sell through Q&A on someone elses listings. Easy to end it and relist, but would be a different matter if you''d paid for some extra upgrades though.

[iwiw60]

That's a bit cheeky, trying to sell through Q&A on someone elses listings. Easy to end it and relist, but would be a different matter if you''d paid for some extra upgrades though.

Ken, is there a way I can delete that off my listing?

[kengillam]

Cancel the listing and relist it I'm assuming there are no bids on it though.