Does the Beer Trading Feedback System work? Improvements?

Much shorter post than others, but I don't think the majority of traders should have to answer 4-5 questions on a 1-5 scale because a very small minority don't give appropriate feedback.

 

I like a binary scale for simplicity, the problem is that right now it isn't used properly. If you have a bad trader thread set up, you should get a bad score no matter what. I don't care if it's shelf beers for shelf beers and after I call you out you send me all the whalez in the world, that should be a bad trade.

Any rating system with a number of components gets complicated and will likely exacerbate the problems of 1. people not rating their trade partners and 2. people just selecting the same rating across the board to get it over with. What's the difference between timeliness and lives up to deal? Is the latter just if the agreed-upon beers are included? Anything less than yes or no with a damn good excuse should get a negative review. Packaging, to me, is irrelevant. If you want to ship with no padding that's your prerogative, but if something breaks and you don't replace it that's a bad trade.

 

I remember a thread recently that came up that was similar to this post. People were complaining like crazy that they have to either click "I am 21 or older" or enter an 8 key-stroke date of birth and I didn't get that complaint either. It's your opinion and you're totally in your right to have it, I just don't get it.

I guess I just don't get how someone can take the time to post an ISO:FT or browse the site to find what they want, then send a message to the other trader and work out all of the details of a trade, then go out and buy the bottles necessary or pluck them from your cellar, then bubble wrap and box up all of the bottles, then create a label on fedex/ups and tape it on the box, then drive to the drop off location, then unwrap all of the bottles when you receive your box...but then taking 10 seconds to click a 1-5 rating on 4-5 different criteria is somehow too much of a burden.

 

Here is why: currently people will not enter anything besides positive feedback even when they have to create a bad trader thread, get assistance from other traders and don't hear from their trade partner for weeks at a time. Why will requiring them to enter even more information help? You think with more questions they will all of a sudden provide accurate feedback? It'll just require more work for the people properly using the system as it is already designed.

FWIW I enter the quickest information on age requirements on beer websites so maybe I am the scourge.

 

Yep I agree it could be refined! I think it is also important to note a system like this takes into account how well you resolve problems like a damaged bottle or leak - the intent isn't for everyone to have a perfect 5.0 score on every trade.

So say there was a broken bottle and you quickly fixed the issue and replaced it. Your score would work out like:



So you still end up with an overall score of a 4 out of 5. That is still a good rating and an acceptable trade, and when you mix in some more perfect trades (say you have 4 other perfect 5's) with the rating you end up with a 4.8.

A system like this requires everyone accepting that not all trades are 'perfect' and someone is still a great trader and can have the odd thing go wrong.

Perhaps it is too big a shift for people, but it moves the trading system toward using a range of scores. If someone has 30 trades, an average of 4.9, and no 'disaster' trades I am going to feel pretty comfortable trading with them. On the flip side if someone has 10 trades and an average score of 3.8 I am going to be a lot more careful.

Not sure if that is even viable, but the idea would be to have a scale of trader reputations where you can see clearly who will be easy to work with, and who might be a bit less reliable. Right now all we have is 'perfect' or 'terrible'...

 

I think it works fine.

I personally would vote against adding any more subjectivity/complexities.

 

I'm not sure it's a small minority not giving appropriate feedback. It's hard to have any real data to quantify it, but I suspect many people are leaving feedback inappropriately, but that it's only becoming obvious when we run across a situation like one of the current bad trader threads, where it turns out people have been giving a consistently flaky/bad trader good feedback in the interest of motivating said bad trader to send the owed box.

I get that there is a balance to be struck between making the system overbearing/unwieldy and better at capturing accurate feedback, but right now, the system encourages people to give good feedback for everyone except the very worst traders.

I agree with this sentiment, but we're talking about the stuff in between. People who have bad trader threads created about them are usually the extreme end of the spectrum. We need a way to properly evaluate trader behavior that doesn't lump everyone into "bad trader/stole beer" and "everything else"

If you have a bad trader thread set up about you, you absolutely deserve negative feedback. But I want to make sure people who trade like jerks but don't rise to the level of a bad trader thread are getting appropriately evaluated *and* encourage people to leave less-than-100% feedback out of fear of lumping in someone who was a little flaky on their communication in with the assholes who steal beer and intentionally scam people.

Bad trading is a spectrum. Evaluating it should be as well.

Even with the current "simple" system, we have these very problems. People not rating trade partners and people taking the easy way out and selecting "Good" as long as they get their beer.

I'm just throwing stuff out there, but timeliness would be shipping on time and lives up to deal would be including the agreed upon bottles. Obviously there is some overlap that would have to be refined--case in point: timeliness could also apply to communication. So maybe cut that one out and just have:

Communication
Packaging
Completes Terms

I'm sorry but packaging is not irrelevant--at least not to me. I would prefer to trade with people who put care and attention into their packaging so that the likelihood of a bottle breaking is low. I don't want either of us to have to go through the hassle and cost of replacing/sending back/etc bottles, even though sometimes it is necessary even with good packaging. I will say this: if you took the time/care to package your bottles well in the first place, I suspect you are also the type of person who is more likely to make good on a broken bottle, should it occur.

This is also a good example of the fact that trading behavior is a spectrum. If you send something and your bottle breaks because you paid no attention to carefully packaging the bottle, that is absolutely something I want to know. Now if you replace the bottle, then you're not a Bad Trader, but there is certainly an area in which your trading could be improved. I just want a feedback system that reflects this.

 

Exactly. The current problem in a nutshell.

 

Because the way it's set up now it might as well be labeled "This guy stole my beer" and "I received my beer" because that's how people leave feedback. There is currently nowhere to give anything but a perfect score. leaving Neutral feedback is pointless since it doesn't effect the overall score. i know I personally rarely bother clicking on a persons feedback score to see if any neutral feedback had been left because 99.9% of the time, it's not there anyway. I'm sure some people would continue to simply click 5 for everything and that's to be expected. Homers of local breweries or traders trying to pump up value leave 5's across the board for beers but obviously beer ratings, and trading feedback scores, have to be taken with a grain of salt. I'm not going to say "A lot of people just give every beer a 5 score so why not just change the rating system for beer to bad, decent, or good?"

You say that if everyone leaves feedback appropriately that this is not necessary, but let me ask you this...have you ever had a partner that agreed to ship on Monday but didn't ship until Wednesday or Thursday and caused your package to sit in a hot warehouse all weekend? Have you ever had a partner that you messaged a few times trying to expand or work out the details of a trade and he took a day or two to respond, or you even had to send a follow up message? I'm sure you have, we all have, but I'm also sure you left that guy positive feedback and none of his future trade partners will ever have a clue that things might not go perfectly as planned and he will go on thinking he's the perfect trader. If everyone leaves feedback the correct way in a 1-5 system (like you said they should in the current system) across 4 categories, that information will be even more valuable. The guy will still have a good feedback score but maybe a 3 in communication will cause him to respond to future trades quicker. I just personally don't see how adding 3 clicks is going to cause any problems.

 

While it provides more information, splitting into that many categories can create a lot more conflicts. Not only it is more work for the programmers to add that to the site but I can see the mods getting tons and tons of PMs of people arguing about the different categories. While it gives a better picture of the overall experience of previous users with X user it also provides X user with more ammo to whine about (e.g. "Why did I get a 4 in packaging, I've always used the same packaging and never had a bottle break").

In my previous posts I wasn't implying that a few days late or a few days without responding should be directly going into a penalty. Shit sometimes DO happens, and delays can be normal. I was referring more to the point of Bad Trader consideration when things really get past the line. At the end many people receive their beer and give positive feedback regardless of all the problems. That's the huge source of the problem.

I'm just trying to think of the easier possible suggestions based on the system as it is right now. The whole ebay thing sounds like it'll be way too much work to add (but I'm not a web designer so I might be wrong) and I can see a lot of people still not taking the time to rate all categories one by one appropriately.

In summary: I don't think the system needs a complete ovehaul. I think that finding a way to have the okay/neutral feedback reflected in the percentage score and campaigning for people to use the system they way it is supposed to be (e.g. don't forgive the bad trader because he sent you your all time great want) should be a good starting point.

 

I would weight packaging lower and use the 3 point scale like @LambicPentameter suggested (good, okay, bad) reserving bad for breaks. Personally, I find communication to be the most important (as comes up in almost every bad trader thread) followed by shipping time, and packing. I would see weighting it like communication (.3), shipping time (.2), overall (.3), packing (.2). Either way, I know someone suggested it (perhaps above, sorry if it has been mentioned) altering the feedback system so that you cannot see the other person's feedback until you have left their feedback. Then it is not editable unless sending a request with a reason.

 

I disagree and you really never know until you try it. In my opinion, people leave positive feedback because it's basically positive or negative since neutral doesn't contribute to the rating. I'd be much more likely to rate someone a 4 out of 5 than I would be to rate them neutral. The fact that pretty much everyone unanimously says that they wouldn't consider trading with someone with a 95% feedback score basically says the feedback here just doesn't work. It's basically 100% or you're blackballed. If I saw someone with a 4.5 rating because a few people said his communication was slow, I'd definitely still trade with him.

 

Well, right now we have the problem of people worrying about leaving neutral feedback because they don't want to tarnish the other person's reputations. If, when using a 5-point system, someone leaves a 4 for packing, they should be able to explain why to the other trader and the other trader should duly note the constructive criticism. For instance, I recently received a box that had cans bubble wrapped with mostly duct tape surrounding each entire can. They were wrapped tightly so I had to use scissors and, since I couldn't tell which was the top or bottom due to not being able to see through the tape, I cut the tape on top of one of the cans and the point of the scissors snagged the tab which caused the seal to release the pressure of the can. I was not happy because that meant I had to cool down and drink that beer before going to work since the package arrived in the morning and that beer certainly would have lost all its carb by the time I got back home. If I had the chance, I would've rated shipping a '4' and told that particular trader that he shouldn't use duct tape in future trades. Everything else was great as far as communication and promptness of shipping so I went ahead and left positive feedback with no mention of any issue. With a broken down score for each category of trade criteria, others (or at the very least, the trader) would see that there are things that he/she need to work on. And my main point is that, if we already are having the problem of being too polite with a binary system and not wanting to leave less than perfect feedback, people will obviously require a good reason to mark the other user down a point for the specific criteria they're grading.

 

Would you be happy if you got a 1 for packing an otherwise bomb-proof because a bottle cap leaked? I wouldn't. That's not in my control. Of course not all honest feedback will or should make people happy. But straight to 1 for a cap leak I offered/will replace?

If someone only used newspaper and packing peanuts, but nothing broke, I don't think they'd deserve a 5. Or taping the crap out of bubble wrap, that's not a 5. People need to be judicious with tape or move to better stuff (small saran wrap wand FTW). Also, if someone packed a bomb-proof box and a bottle broke, I wouldn't blame them before Fedex/UPS. If we resolve it fast and easy, and it was a fluke break, I'd still give a 3-5. They're doing things right, sometimes people get unlucky.

Lastly, communication should be weighted at least 0.3, if not a bit higher.

THIS x100

This would create a more informative system (people know what they're getting into), and if clear guidelines are given (@pagriley is halfway there in one day), hopefully complaints to mods would be minimal. Could be worth a shot.

If the partner bails on leaving feedback, you don't get credit anyway right? Because they never left any for you.
So if anything, it lets the party who bailed get credit, right?

 

I don't understand why people can't leave positive feedback and still mention the "issue" in the comments. Why is there a need to hide behind a numbering system for different categories. If it's less than stellar, mention why in the feedback, you can still give a positive if you feel it warrants it because you received your beer. However, it gives everyone else a "heads up" not to ship until they get a tracking number first (slow shipper).

Maybe if a numbering system is adopted you should be forced to give detail if you are leaving less than a 5 in any category. Give reasoning on why you are giving a "4" (or less) for any category - minimum amount of characters needed to submit. At least that would give a little context behind the persons reasoning and hold the person leaving the feedback accountable for the number they are giving.

 

I agree that people not wanting to give you a "poor" rating is a major issue. I believe that more emphasis should be placed on pointing out the great traders rather than focusing on the poor ones. This can be done with a few simple check boxes after the trade is completed such as "shipped on time" and "provided great extras" which can be tallied relative to your total amount of trades. These "stats" can be viewed on a members profile something along:

Good communication: 8/8
Timely shipping: 8/8
Good Extras: 2/8

Where 8 represents the members total trades, and the first number, how frequently each occured. This does not necessarily shed the trader in a bad light yet still informs other members as to what they can expect from a certain trader, both positive and negative. If extras are not important to you, this trader would still be appealing.

This gives the individual more information to truly decide if they want to trade with said person and these boxes can be checked off in a matter of seconds. It also allows you to get a small gripe in (by withholding a checkbox) and still give an overall "positive" review.

If all this does is make people step up their game to get all checked boxes, I think we are on the right track!

Just my 2 cents. I don't hate the way it is right now though.

 

I personally like the current "ebay style" system. I think the main problem with it is that people are afraid to leave neutral feedback. Personally, I leave green as long as we both get boxes at about the same time (within a day or two) with the bottles we expected and no breakage/loss/etc.

Neutral, to me, should be anytime that a box is late (or communication is really late) or box did not contain what was expected AND the other party fixed it by providing the bottle expected. Basically every trade that didn't go smoothly, but you got your expected box without excessive delay.

Red should be reserved for trades in which the expected result was never achieved or had to progress to forums to get resolved. I guess excessive delay should be here as well, but it should really be excessive and not just a week due to semi-understandable reasons.

 

I guess I just dont get it..Everyone coming out saying this will be better, that will be better and so on...Fact is there is nothing wrong with what we have now...The problem is "US" in this community having no balls to actually write down in feedback what problems they have encountered.. No change to the system is going to "fix" that...If a person is afraid to click neutral and write down a problem, they are going to be afraid to click a 2 out of 5...

Problem is, we do not hold eachother accountable until someone gets screwed...We need to hold accountable (dont know how) the people who do not use the feedback correctly..Finding out in a bad trader thread that others had a problem with a trader and they still click good trade, they are a big problem..Not the system!

One last thing..We as a community NEED to get out of our heads that NEUTRAL is bad...It is NOT..Stop treating it like its something bad..As I said, its not the system that is at fault..Its US traders who refuse to use it correctly and no other system can change that..

tommy

 

Yes...I am replying to my own post.

The more I think about it the more sense it makes to adopt a process for feedback that I mentioned, it addresses everyone's wants and still leaves it relatively simple.

How it would work:
Categories are created that are deemed appropriate by the BA Team. If you left a 5 (assuming a 1-5 rating for each category) then it moves into the next category. If you left less than a 5 for any one a "conditional" question is written into the code. In this case a simple text box that requires the person giving the feedback to leave comments on why. A minimum amount of characters would be required in the text box to be able to submit. This holds the person leaving less than a 5 accountable to give reasons behind their rating.

This seems to address everyone's concerns. All I ask if this is adopted is 2 boxes of beer with 100oz minimum and rated 95 or higher for my consulting fee

Edit: this system would require a different set of categories for an IP trade vs a shipping trade.