To be fair the buyer sounded like a big douche. Med Express immediately offered to reimburse the buyer for the $1.44 postage fee they were charged, it's a minor mistake that the buyer overreacted about. I find it kind of silly Med Express thinks they have a case here though, they probably have more money and will end up settling because the buyer won't be able to afford to fight.
Trouble is - you have to stand up to the bullies - even for those with whom you are less than sympathetic. Bullies must be stopped as if they succeed it will be you who they will come after next.
Let's put things in perspective. The post was short under 2 bucks and the seller was more than happy to cover it. So at what point does one think to themselves, hey let's go ahead and leave a negative feedback because there was a kink with the transaction? Hell, if every transaction had to work without a hitch, the majority of us wouldn't even be able to ship a product not to mention release an MVP...
> hey let's go ahead and leave a negative feedback because there was a kink with the transaction?
That's exactly what feedback on a per-transaction basis is for, isn't it? If a seller has a habit of sending things with underpaid postage, then a potential buyer will be able to see the pattern in the feedback history and choose not to buy. If it's a one-off, then a potential buyer will see that. The feedback history just represents fact.
If, on the other hand, buyers do not post negative feedback for such incidents, then a a seller habitually sending items with underpaid postage will appear the same as a more reliable seller. This renders the feedback system useless in this kind of case. It also makes it hard to find reliable sellers, and encourages less reliable sellers to remain in the system.
I personally think the negative feedback was silly to leave (because it was trivial, not false). However, suing the person who left feedback has far reaching implications. What else could we start suing customers for using their freedom of speech to talk about? Sue them if they talk about long delivery times? Sue them if they talk about damaged products in shipping? Sue them if they talk about bad products?
You have probably focused on the true problem. It looks like any negative element to the rather simplistic feedback model represents an issue for the seller. Why is that? - an issue ultimately fixed should be viewed as neutral - unless it is repeated too often.
which is why in my opinion the buyer should have probably left neutral feedback with an explanation of what happened. This way other buyers can read the neutral feedback and see if there is a trend with a seller. That is really what neutral feedback is for, it's a way to say hey everything did not go smoothly but I don't think the seller did it with malice, you as another future buyer should know about this, and if it seems to be a trend then you should leave negative feedback.
