Giving refunds
Could someone humor me and explian why the ability to give a refund to a buyer has now become another unnecessary, complicated, multi step procedure? Sometimes when the eBay shipping calculator is on break, my buyers pay way to much for shipping, and just like so many other issues on this site, its easier and quicker to figure out a work around. So lets say I want to give my buyer a $10.00 refund on shipping. Before, it was enter in the total amount of the refund, (which would spread the refund over the whole order) hit send refund, and move on. But no, someone has to mess things up, and now instead of spreading the refund over x items, now I have to go and enter in a specific amount for individual items, and have to come up with the grand total of the $10.00.
Dont get me wrong, its your sandbox. But with SO many other issues that should be addressed, this ranked high on someones punch list? Again, any insight sure would be interesting.
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoWell the eBay gods have smiled on us! I was able to give a refund just now, and it allowed me to spread it across the 17 items I sold to one customer.
A sincere thank you to whoever pushed this up the ladder. Makes life a bit easier!
wastingtime101
·2 years agoYes! I spotted this change on May 13, but forgot to post the update. Thanks to everybody that fought for this. That said, we still have problems in the send refund area.
When you do a partial refund, it auto-splits that amount between item and ship cost. Seller should be able to choose if the refund amount goes entirely to item, entirely to shipping, or split. I brought this up back in February.
Also - why the heck is shipping divided in 2 amounts? Buyer paid one ship cost on this order. I did not refund this buyer, just pulled up the screen as a test sample.
@ihave2manycars @mcdougle4248 @mr_lincoln @devon@ebay and anybody I may have missed.
Here's a screen showing they restored the order level refund that auto-splits the amount across every item in the order.
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoferris...bueler....anything?
mr_lincoln
·2 years ago@ihave2manycars , @krazzykats , @12345jamesstamps , @wastingtime101
I started a thread on this too, I see this one is on the Technical issues page ... it's more of an example of poor programming in my view then a technical glitch or something.
Re: Sending partial refund: how to complicate a pr... - The eBay Community
wastingtime101
·2 years agoLinking another discussion about this:
https://community.ebay.com/t5/Selling/The-new-Refund-The-Buyer-page-another-degradation/m-p/34317401#M2362881
12345jamesstamps
·2 years agoI haven't given a refund for a few weeks on shipping.
When I do a shipping refunds on 2+ items from same buyer...it has broken down a shipping refund for the 2+ items by just me entering one amount. Has this changed?
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoAs of 2/15 yes. Now you have to assign a specific amount per item. eBay will no longer "spread" the refund amount across the items in the order.
wastingtime101
·2 years agoI just checked things out and I'm seeing the same thing you are. We can no longer enter an order-level refund and have the system prorate each item for us. We are now required to enter a specific dollar amount for each item. That's incredibly inefficient.
Can you get this feedback submitted please @devon@ebay ? eBay is creating more time consuming work for sellers with (from the seller's end) an unnecessary change.
That said @ihave2manycars , not sure what you mean by eBay's shipping calculator being on vacation, but we can probably help you with that part of things. The shipping calculator is accurate with the exception of accounting for irregular packages (think round tubes) and a few other exceptions. As sellers we have the option of charging retail rates or carrier discounted online rates or a fixed percent off retail rates. We also have the option of setting up combined shipping rules. If something like that would be beneficial to your business and you need some assistance with shipping settings and preferences let us know.
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoIn my listings, I have a price for shipping one item. If a buyer buys multiple items, its set up in my rules to add a certain amount for each additional item. Probably in the last 30 orders of multiple items purchased, I have had to go in a give refunds on 18 orders, as the ebay calculator did not figure it correctly. I actually dont mind, as many of the buyers are pleasantly surprised by the unexpected refund. But to have to now go in and give refunds, that total the amount I want to refund, is, for lack of better wording, a pain. On a side note, I find that the majority of the refunds I give, originated with orders using the app, as compared to the desktop site.
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoHas anyone heard of any changes on this nightmare? Bueller?
devon@ebay
Hey @wastingtime101! I will be sure to have this sent over to the correct team.
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoTo you as well...a sincere thanks for getting this addressed.
krazzykats
·2 years agoHow does eBay address the location "right next to me" on the shipping calculator for a refund?
Does the location on a listing even matter for refunds?
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoRegarding location.....My zip code in my profile settings would be how the postage is calculated. I dont use the ebay shipping calculator, as my items ship for the same price USA wide, and each additional item has an additional shipping charge. ( set this up in my shipping rules) So like this morning, buyer bought 3 items, and shipping should have been $7.28. Instead, and I dont know why, eBay charged him $17.64. Mind you this was on the same order, not the customer made 3 sepeerate purchases. So I owed them the refund of the overage. Instead of just issuing the refund for $10.36, I made two for $3 each and the third for $4.36. In the past, I would just send the reund for the $10.36, and the mystical magical ebay would spread that out ove the three items.
Location refunds.....I dont see why it would
wastingtime101
·2 years agoIf you want to diagnose the combined shipping issue @ihave2manycars start a thread here and include the item numbers. We can help you figure out why it charged a rate different than you expected.
https://community.ebay.com/t5/Shipping/bd-p/shipping-returns-db
wastingtime101
·2 years agoThanks a lot @devon@ebay . I noticed another issue with the feature as I am processing a partial refund right now. There was only 1 item in this order, but upon sending a partial refund I noticed the amount is prorated between item cost and shipping. Previously we could arrange it so the amount came off just the item cost.
albertabrightalberta
·2 years agoI wish I'd saved a screenshot of what I saw but sadly, I did not and it's no longer showing.
I did a partial refund and it showed as a "plus" and a "minus" for shipping, so it really didn't prorate the discount to shipping.
This is the final summary but originally, there was also a shipping credit of +$4.83 then -$4.83. I have no idea why that had anything to do with my credit. I wasn't issuing a partial credit of the shipping payment. The shipping portion doesn't show once the refund is issued.
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoDevon
Have you heard anything?
ihave2manycars
OP2 years agoI just wanted to say thanks as you not only saw what I saw, you too agreed that this was a bit awkward, and (obviously) you knew who to get this in front of to get looked at. It is appreciated!