I’m concerned about 2 recent buying experiences I’ve had with eBay’s sneaker authenticity guarantee. The first pair of sneakers showed the authenticity guarantee in multiple places on the listing page and I was even blocked from sending a message to the seller, so there was every indication it would be authenticated.
However, this order was drop shipped from Amazon directly to my address – it did not go to the authenticator first.
The package ended up being lost and I was able to get a refund with an INR claim, but I’m confused why this listing showed the authentication guarantee if it didn’t qualify and why the messaging was blocked if it did not in fact go to the authenticator.
My second sneaker buying experience was for a pair of shoes won on an auction for $39 – this also showed the authenticity guarantee and in this case the shoes did go to the authenticator and were then sent on to me.
The shoes appear to be as advertised, but again I’m left wondering why shoes under $150 are showing up when filtering for authenticity guaranteed only and why this pair went to the authenticator but the other one didn’t.
Looking at sold history shows this may not be an uncommon experience. If eBay is having cheap shoes sent to the authenticator, it could certainly explain some of the "explosion in demand" and delays that have been reported. 🤔
Has anyone else run into this situation? I asked about it in the weekly chat last week, but did not receive any answer or acknowledgement from the community staff.
@ittybitnot wrote:Why Is eBay Showing Sneakers Below $150 With Authentication Guarantee?
@valueaddedresource
Interesting post. My first guess was it was added to "ALL" sneakers with a LEARN MORE simply as a marketing ploy to entice buyers (who don't read) to purchase.
HOWEVER,
If they are really requiring sellers and buyers to use the authenticator for $39 sneakers that is something else indeed.
Thanks @ittybitnot - as far as the idea of it being a "learn more" type of thing, I originally thought it might be something along those lines too.
However, the fact that it said the delivery estimate "includes shipping to and from the authenticator" and messaging the seller was blocked because "messaging is turned off for sneakers covered by Authenticity Guarantee" gives an expectation that those shoes would in fact go to the authenticator.
I think there's a serious question about "truth in advertising" here, especially since another pair of shoes that was less than $150 *did* go to authenticator.
I have a hunch about what may be happening but it doesn't explain why there would be a discrepancy in how eBay handled these two different buying experiences.
My suspicion is that eBay is going by the BIN price, not the actual final sale price to determine whether Authenticity Guarantee is shown.
In the example of the pair that shipped from Amazon, it was a variation listing with multiple colors sizes. I suspect there was an "out of stock" variation that was above $150, which may have then caused all variations to get the Authenticity Guarantee.
The other pair was an auction with a low starting price and a BIN of $150 - winning bid was $39 and those did go to the authenticator. Here they are as I received them with the authentication tag and everything.
I suspect the same may be true for Best Offers as well, BIN of $150+ gets authenticated even if the accepted offer/final sale price is much lower.
The difference between a variation listing and auction may be why one went to authentication and not the other, but that still doesn't seem right to me considering both listings very clearly showed they would be authenticated.
Again, it's all just a hunch so take it with a huge grain of salt. I can only speak to my personal buying experiences above and have no idea if any others actually went to the authenticator or not, but if you search active and sold sneakers filtered for Authenticity Guarantee and price, it's interesting to note how many sold auctions ended below $150 and how many BIN with Best Offer listings are active at exactly the $150 minimum.
Whatever is going on here is very odd and I had hoped for an answer in the chat. If my hunch is correct, I'd really like to know why eBay is doing it this way - authenticating cheap shoes seems like a waste of everyone's time and almost guaranteed to cause the kind of delays others have reported, not to mention a waste of money for the authentication and shipping costs.
@ittybitnot wrote:
I will have to look at some "live" listings. Probably won't be able to see much for a couple of days. eBay is rearranging the "deck chairs" (categories) again and search filters are coming and going. And just imagine being a seller and waking up this morning to find that all your "item specifics" are gone again AND your item moved to a different unrelated category altogether. I am feeling for the person that posted on the Seller board that had their cake plate moved to ceramic figurines.
@ittybitnot - I know all of those other category and item specifics issues are far more pressing right now and totally agree, my heart goes out to those dealing with that mess today.
Just in case it helps, here's a link to sold auctions with Authenticity Guaranteed below $150.
You can't see "accepted offer" price on solds as far as I know, but here's a link to active Best Offer with BIN at exactly $150.
As far as the variation example- there's another wrinkle. When I bought the shoes and for about a week after, all variations looked exactly like in my screenshot - clearly showing authentication guaranteed in 3 different places on the listing. And this was all variation listings I saw, not just the one I ended up buying from.
I brought the issue up on Twitter and tagged the eBay Sneakers page as well as bringing it up in the chat last week - neither of which got a direct response from eBay. Since then I noticed they changed how variations are displaying.
Now they still show authentication guaranteed in the search results page, but when you click through to the variation it is only shown on shoes at or above $150. Did they change that in response to my questions/concerns? I don't know, but if so it would have been nice to have some kind of acknowledgement at least.
Again, the whole thing is just very odd and as someone with a lot of experience both as a buyer and seller on eBay I can make some pretty educated guesses about what is going on here. However, I'll admit that even educated guesses are still guesses and not a great substitute for actual answers from official sources - it's just the best explanation I've been able to come up with based on the info at hand.
Looks like eBay has dropped the minimum to $100 again. Q2 GMV must be needing a push. 🤣
@smounts wrote:No, I started at $79.99 I believe on the listing, lowered it about 10 days in if I recall correctly. The comps never supported an ask over $95 and these weren't in the condition that would have warranted an ask at the top of the current market for this model.
@smounts I'm going to say it's a glitch. It looks like right now there is no limit being applied at all to receive the authentication badge.
devon@ebay can you confirm if this is a technical issue or if eBay really has decided to do away with the price minimum for sneaker authentication?
