Ebay seller ordered to pay $19,250 after suing two customers over negative feedback

[Jim K Global Moderator]

An eBay seller who sued two customers over their negative feedback online has been ordered to pay $19,250 to cover their legal fees.

This week, a judge ordered Med Express Inc., a refurbished medical equipment seller who sued back in 2013, to pay for the two Ohio lawyers who defended the case pro bono.

Med Express filed a lawsuit for libel in Medina County's Court of Common Pleas in Ohio in 2013, claiming that their feedback on eBay hurt the company's reputation and a lower overall rating increased seller costs to eBay.

One of those customers was Amy Nicholls, an office administrator for a manufacturer in Greenville, South Carolina. She bought a microscope light for her employer in February 2013 from Med Express. After paying $175 plus $12 in shipping for the item, Med Express said in the court filing that it "took the equipment to the Valley City post office, where it was weighed and shipped to Nicholls."

Though Med Express claimed that it paid the full shipping cost, "for some reason unknown to Med Express, the equipment was received by Nicholls with $1.44 postage due," according to the court record. Med Express apologized immediately and offered to reimburse Nicholls for the postage due, but she went ahead and posted a "negative" comment about the charge on eBay's website: "Order arrived with postage due with no communication from seller beforehand," she wrote.

Med Express filed a nearly identical suit on the same day against another customer, Dennis Rogan. He left a "neutral" review.

After receiving negative publicity over their suit, Med Express apologized and said it was withdrawing the lawsuit.

"Please understand that our customer was never the target of this lawsuit. We had instructed our attorneys to ask for $1 in damages. Her feedback was also never an issue. We fully support her right and all of our customers' right to leave any feedback they desire -- true or otherwise!" Med Express President Richard Radey wrote in a statement back in 2013. "The issue involved Detailed Seller Ratings or DSRs. The low ratings caused us to lose our Top Rated Seller Plus standing."

But in April 2013, Nicholls, with the help of Jeffrey Nye and Thomas Haren, two lawyers in Ohio who offered to take the case for free, filed a counterclaim against Med Express and its attorney, claiming frivolous conduct and "malice or aggravated or egregious fraud." They cited seven different times Med Express sued out-of-state eBay customers who would have difficulty defending themselves in court. Nicholls' attorneys said they had seen Radey's comments and were aware he had dropped the lawsuit against Nicholls, but they continued with their countersuit all the same.

 

More at ABC News

Per the lawsuit Med Express was even wanting to receive damages to compensate for the "losses it has and will suffer as a result of Nicholl's conduct" and to be awarded reasonable attorney fees and punitive damages. (Source)

Hopefully this is a sign of things to come ... frivolous lawsuits getting tossed and the parties making them having to cover the costs.  

Apparently Med Express has sued other customers for leaving negative/neutral feedback.

[Torolol]

Probably want to emulate the example of certain video game publisher who issues DMCAs over negatives reviews on YouTube.

[Yusuf M. Veteran]

"We had instructed our attorneys to ask for $1 in damages."

Hahaha! I could find a dollar outside without even trying. I'm glad their bully tactic backfired.

[DocM]

The very definition of a tool.

[vcfan]

Though Med Express claimed that it paid the full shipping cost, "for some reason unknown to Med Express, the equipment was received by Nicholls with $1.44 postage due," according to the court record. Med Express apologized immediately and offered to reimburse Nicholls for the postage due, but she went ahead and posted a "negative" comment about the charge on eBay's website: "Order arrived with postage due with no communication from seller beforehand," she wrote.

pathetic

 

[ThisSiteHasLostItsCharm]

case of bad buyer and dumb seller, you don't sue over neg feedback....

[MikeChipshop Member]

As far as i can make out, they were both as bad as each other.

[technord]

ebay is a haven for idiots and scammers

[+InsaneNutter MVC]

ebay is a haven for idiots and scammers

So true, where I work we have our own e-commerce website along with an Ebay and Amazon outlet.

99% of any customer problems come from Ebay, customers on there just take advantage as they know Ebay will side with them.

We've had negative feedback for items that have come direct from the manufacturer stating "not genuine part", then when you look at the feedback that person has left for other seller its basically the same "not genuine part" "part not suitable" - essentially abusing the eBay feedback system.

We've have had customer kicking off because the part has been sent to the address on their Ebay account, and they have since moved house and only updated their address on Paypal... well great update your address on Ebay then, that's what Ebay gives sellers as the place to send the item, not the billing address!

A recent one was a woman ordered an item to Argos in the UK, then left us negative feedback she had to spend 30 mins on the phone to Argos to find out if the item had arrived yet, again great what's that to do with the company who sold you the item? you the customer chose it to be sent to Argos.

[HawkMan]

 

99% of any customer problems come from Ebay, customers on there just take advantage as they know Ebay will side with them.

And how many % of your sales are from ebay. I'm guessing the numbers is pretty similar since otherwise the ebay store would have been closed meaning it's definitely making bank and then some. 

[+InsaneNutter MVC]

 

And how many % of your sales are from ebay. I'm guessing the numbers is pretty similar since otherwise the ebay store would have been closed meaning it's definitely making bank and then some. 

 

Oh yes it more than worth keeping Ebay going. I'm simply saying if you compare the different sales channels Ebay customers by far waste the most time and cause the most issues.

That aside its a good additional revenue stream and a good way of gaining additional customers that buy directly from the main website.

[HawkMan]

The thing is of course, ebay is made to cater to private sellers, small sellers and other far away sellers that the buyer don't know anythign about and would be dubious to trust, in addition here in europe we have such strong consumer protection that you generally won't get when you buy on ebay.

because of this ebay needs to generally side with the buyer to keep people buying and because there's a lot of shady sellers. For larger well renowned compnaies selling mostly in their own country, ebay really doesn't make much sense as buyer actually have better protection buying directly from the company. 

Also sellers usually have options to block buywer trying to scam them, like requiring items to be shipper back, that usually stops most. and breaks the "no communication" clause that automatically sides with the buyer. if the buyer didn't get the item or claims so. then the solution is of course tracking, which most asian sellers avoid because the use the free state funded shipping options, and it's cheaper for them to lose some stuff to the occasional dishonest buyer than to not offer free shipping and get it covered. Serial abusers get busted anyway. In europe the only untracked mail is usually in country packages sent as mail, and the difference in shipping as tracked mail is usually insignificant. still if it's an option and I buy from the UK or Germany I usually go for untracked as I haven't really not gotten items from here.