several with a delivery date a month or more out from purchase as a delivery date yet when that date arrives the tracking shows a tracking number is provided however they haven't even turned the items over to the shipping company.
That's an Item Not Received dispute on last estimated delivery date plus one second.
gotten ebay to refund from a couple because the seller wouldn't respond to me
It would be polite to notify the seller that the item is late. No discussion is needed after that. If they respond, take it from there. No response? Dispute under the Money Back Guarantee. .
feedback scores the seller has a rating in the 98% or higher,
That's not an A+, 98% is quite poor.
If the seller has a lot of sales, they could also have a lot of negs without dropping below 100% FB rating.
Because: ratios.
With 100 sales , 5 negs is 95%.
With 100,000 sales, 500 negs is 100%. Because there are 99,500 happy customers.
Stick with 99% or higher. And if you are not sure read the negative and neutral FB for patterns like slow delivery or poor quality.
Some buyers cannot be satisfied, so there is that.
when ebay steps in on these issues as a buyer your blocked from leaving any feedback
Yes.
You can leave feedback or Dispute the transaction.
Not both.
Especially if you are using mail order for your business, it is vitally important that you take time to read the feedback and pay attention to estimated arrival dates. It is also probably worthwhile to upgrade to a faster shipping service if the seller offers one, and to ask about purchasing an upgraded service if they don't.
