eBay is looking for customers' advice on how it could best solve one of the biggest dilemmas of clothes-buying online – that of describing garment colours accurately.

It currently uses a limited set of primary options, such as red, green or blue, then includes a secondary 'Exact Colour' option so that sellers can describe the exact shade of their products.

But this has caused lots of confusion among buyers, because if they specify a singular version of a colour, they are simply presented with items just matching that specific word. Equally, sellers' products are not indexed by colour unless they have first chosen a primary option, and then added a further description, if necessary, under 'Exact Colour'.

According to Tamebay.com, though, eBay wants sellers to tell it whether they find the current system confusing, and to give it suggestions for how the specific options could be made more user-friendly from both a seller's and a buyer's perspective.

Only certified PowerSellers are eligible to join the discussion, and eBay is asking for views on three specific questions:

· How are you currently using the fields, and are you using one or both?

· How could we improve the way we capture colour information, and do other platforms have easier ways of describing colour values, and

· Would you like the two colour fields to be merged into one?