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Downgraded from Top Rated Plus to Above Standard
Hello,
I've been in complete freak out mode for the last couple weeks frantically trying everything I could to adjust my late shipment rates for the February 20th evaluation. I didn't realize (I'm about a year old in Ebay) until the beginning of last month that I had to personally stand and watch my packages get scanned at the post office to ensure they were accepted and registered into the system. All of 23, I never did that and late shipments rarely happened. Most months I didn't even have any late shipments. However, here in Houston, our two shipping hubs that filter everything going out of town, experienced extreme backlogs. They were getting new mail sorters installed - or that's the story I've been told - and something broke down in that process. It put all orders going out of Houston on a 2 to 4 week backlog. It got so bad that all the major news stations as well as state and local politicians got involved to figure out why all the mail was so delayed. My highest late shipment percentage of any month in 2023 was 1.5%. I never came close to hitting the 3% threshold. But, I also never stood in line. I always dropped the packages off into the pull slot and walked away without a receipt. Alot of the times I also had the mail person pick up the packages from my porch. In the time window of mid-December through January 21st, I received a late shipment percentage of 19%. My orders were sitting at the post office for 5-14 days, just sitting there not being scanned, and the packages were showing up at the customer's houses at a minimum of two weeks behind. I did everything I could to answer all the messages, send tracking updates, call Ebay, send screenshots of tracking updates, refunds in some cases, and got Ebay to remove a lot of the late shipments to send the percentage down to 4.37%. I must have called Ebay at least 20 times to see how many late shipments I could get overturned. After all that, the best I could get was 4.37%, which is way higher than the required 3% or less.
As a result, yesterday my account officially downgraded from Top Rated Plus to Above Standard. I feel disgusted and very concerned. I'm a full time reseller and everything is tight right now because I just started full time January 1st. Obviously, I learned about mid way through this chaos that I was supposed to be watching them scan my packages so I started doing that as soon as I found out. It was much too late though because the damage had been done.
I tried one last ditch effort on the phone with Ebay yesterday, but nothing budged. So, all I feel like I can do is reach out on here for experience and hope. I take care of my family through Ebay. I've been on Ebay for about a year, but I was doing it part time. I used Ebay to pay all the bills, and used my day job paycheck to build the biggest and fastest store that I could. Now that the Ebay is the only job now, my store is in maintenance mode instead of grow mode, but I'm worried that since I've been downgraded, my sales are going to tank.
I'm not really sure what all the ramifications are from going down a tier as a seller, but I know that there is no longer a 10% final value discount. But I have a lot of worrisome questions that I hope someone can answer in a somewhat detailed fashion:
1. Are my listing going to be suppressed?
2. Does it even make sense to promote anymore if nothing will get the listings ranked above sellers who are top rated and top rated plus?
3. Are customers able to see that I am above standard?
4. Is there some kind of notification on my listings that warns customers of late shipments?
5. What exactly am I losing going from top rated to above standard?
I hope I'm just worrying way too much and everything is going to be fine, but it would be nice to hear from someone who has been in my shoes and made it to the other side. Thanks for any feedback!
wooden_flower
Mentor2 years ago@sandjllc
The only way a buyer would know that you are not top rated is to look at your feedback page, where it no longer says top rated. (Top rated plus is the designation on items with free returns and 1 day handling, not a separate status.)
You are not demoted in search for not being top rated. You are only demoted in search when you fall below standard.
There is no notification about late shipments. eBay may adjust your estimated delivery dates based on your actual shipping results.
As a top rated seller, you get a 10% discount on final value fees on items where you offer 1 day handling and free returns. There are some seller protections that are only available to top rated sellers. You can see those here -
https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/selling-policies/seller-protections?id=4345&st=3&pos=1&query=Seller%20protections&intent=Seller%20protection&lucenceai=lucenceai&docId=HELP1267
Do you use a SCAN form? I would suggest asking your post master if they will scan a SCAN form, and do they have a place where you can put your packages with the form, so that you do not have to stand in line. My PO was very to assign a spot for drop off.
Or use carrier pickup - the carriers will scan the SCAN form. Maybe talk to your carrier the first time you use it so they know how important it is for you.
We can explain how to generate the SCAN form, if you decide to try this.