Sellers Ratings Help - Cancellations before shipping by seller
Our super small non-profit has an eBay store where we sell items to help us in revenue. Sometimes, after a purchase, the item is canceled due to upon final QC (we test every item functionally) it is noticed to be not within our standards so sale is cancelled and buyer is refunded. For some reason, eBay assumes this is negative to us and decreases our sellers rating.
This is confusing to me because in my real business, electrical power generation, these sorts of situations happen and our customers highly appreciate the final QC before shipping and allows them to look elsewhere or wait for the product to be within the quality and standards.
I have tried to explain this to eBay folks but to know avail. People have suggested that what should happen instead, do these QC checks before listing but since we typically build after sale due to the custom nature of some items and my limited time (real job is typically 80 plus a week), not really an option.
Perhaps an existing eBay seller has some suggestions or perhaps I need to classify the cancellation / refund in another way so eBay policy doesn’t come into play or we just have to live with this situation.
Will seek some advice for other eBay selling situations in regards to buyers but I will see how this is handled before asking on other processes.
Thanks for reading and advice .
truly best regards
mark
mtgraves7984
·11 months agoWe admire that you honestly cancel the transactions, but every 'Out-of-Stock/No longer available' cancellation irks eBay. Honestly, the only loophole I can come up with is that if/when this happens again, contact your buyer with your findings and ask if they'd like to cancel. It's not exactly 'Buyer requested' which doesn't 'ding' you, but it might fly.
chapeau-noir
·11 months agoFor some reason, eBay assumes this is negative to us and decreases our sellers rating.
This is confusing to me because in my real business, electrical power generation, these sorts of situations happen and our customers highly appreciate the final QC before shipping and allows them to look elsewhere or wait for the product to be within the quality and standards.
This *is* 'real' business, but you're selling on a marketplace, not a market-specific site, and the rules cover everyone. eBay doesn't do carve-outs for people's other gigs.
The QC needs to be done before sale. If you're doing custom builds, then maybe extending handling time would help.
tobaccocardyahoo
·11 months agoThe Seller Level system is working as intended.
Items must be tested before they are listed or they are not as described should they have undisclosed defects.
I hope your organization is not dependent on the money from your Ebay sales because it is likely to disappear, gradually when you start paying the penalty for below standard performance and have limited listing ability, and permanently when you lose the ability to sell.
soh.maryl
·11 months agoAre you saying that your items aren't tested for functionality until after they are sold and before they're shipped? And you then cancel the transaction? What reason do you use for the cancellation? And, yes, eBay considers this to be a negative experience for the buyer. Your buyer pays and expects to receive what he bought, not to have the transaction cancelled.
If you were the buyer in this situation, what would your reaction be?
bashort
·11 months agoIf you insist on doing it your way you will not survive here, ebay considers seller canceled sales as a very serious defect.
It would be much better to just ship the item regardless of any defects and then take a return or refund if needed.