Consumerist reader Ed recently had a rather unpleasant experience with a merchant on eBay, so he did what many of us would do — he posted a negative review detailing his problems. But then the seller reached out to him with a proposition.

The backstory: Ed ordered a 5′ VGA cable on Feb. 4 from a seller in Hong Kong. The price, including shipping, was only $2.69. But when he finally received the cable, almost a month later, on March 2, he noticed it was actually only 4 feet long.

After he posted his negative feedback on eBay, he received the e-mail shown above. In addition to an apology, it reads, “We would like to do anything possible to fix our relationship… Is there any possibility to make the revision for the negative feedback? we can give you 10usd reimbursement if you can simply remove the negative feedback for us.”

And so Ed wants to see what the Consumerist hive-mind would suggest.

“I would like to take the $10 but eBay feedback is there for a purpose,” he writes. “Should I take the $10 and feel guilty or leave the negative feedback to notify other future customers?”

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