eBay offers compo for search failure

eBay is offering customers hit by the failure of its search engine last weekend the chance to relist items, rather than sell them at lower prices. They are also offering discount vouchers to buyers who are disappointed to have lost out.

In an email sent to sellers last night, the online tat bazaar said search was unavailable from 4.45pm GMT on Saturday till 8.00am Sunday morning.

Because of this, anyone whose auction ended during that time is no longer expected to fulfil the order- although sellers can choose to do so if they wish too, of if they're Fixed Price items.

Sellers are asked to contact bidders, who would have won, by the end of today (Tuesday) to let them know.

Secondly the firm is refunding all auction fees for sales that ended during or within an hour after the outage. Negative feedback for auctions which ended within the downtime will also be removed.

Any bidders who won an auction which was then cancelled gets a 10 per cent off voucher up to a top value of £70.

eBay said: "We know this was a very serious disruption, especially as you look to increase your sales for the Christmas shopping season. Because you had listings ending during or within an hour after the outage, I wanted to let you know, personally, what we will be doing to support your business and protect your eBay reputation."

The email includes suggested text for an apology and explanation email to send to customers.

Refunds should appear in sellers' next eBay invoice. ®