Why did eBay remove the 48-hour option on offers?

[revenue-collector]

If you get eBay's new popup interface for offers (looks like it is being split tested or only rolled out on certain devices at the moment), there is no longer any option to choose the duration of best offers. All offers are 24 hours, period.

It already was difficult enough as a buyer, if you made an offer on a Friday or Saturday to a bigger seller that didn't have weekend hours, as the offers would expire before they even saw them. I posit that there should have also been 72- or 96-hour duration options for offers.

Why would eBay do this? It's beyond dain bramaged. Once again, eBay proves they're utterly clueless and NOBODY in charge of anything actually uses the platform. Morons.

[nobody*s_perfect]

Maybe some intern was assigned to look at the pattern of choices that had been made and saw that 24 hours was the most popular. So the other options were eliminated even though there are times when they are more appropriate (such as weekends). There doesn't seem to be any benefit to limiting the options.

[fab_finds4u]

If your items are available for sale on the weekends then somebody should be minding the store.  It only takes a minute of your time to check offers.  Most people have their phones within reach 24-7.  

[revenue-collector]

You're missing my point. My complaint is as a BUYER, not a seller. From experience (my feedback is split roughly 50-50 as buyer and seller) I know that large sellers, brick & mortar operations, etc., frequently DO NOT monitor eBay over the weekends, so the 24-hour offer limit is annoying as a buyer.

It's an arbitrary limitation that does nobody any good, so why have it? Why insert an artificial barrier between buyer and seller that can only reduce the opportunity for purchases?... especially since the 48-hour option was viable for years.

[mudshark61369]

@revenue-collector,

Thanks for posting this topic, because of it, I just learned that ebay has changed their Offer time frame to 24 hours now.  That was probably done because buyers complained about waiting 48 hours.   While I understand that, as a seller, I feel they should have left the max time at 48 hours with the options to select shorter time frames.   After all not all sellers use their phones to conduct business with ebay, and may not be able to have computer access 24/7.  Another fix it till it breaks idea from the brain trust.

[revenue-collector]

Exactly! They could leave 24 hours as the default, but allow buyers to place longer durations if so desired. What would the harm be in that? But noooo.....

[7606dennis]

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@fab_finds4u wrote:

If your items are available for sale on the weekends then somebody should be minding the store.  It only takes a minute of your time to check offers.  Most people have their phones within reach 24-7.  

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That might be true for large operations but not for the small individual seller, in my opinion.  Perhaps they should change the validity time for offers to business days instead of hours.  That way an offer made on a weekend or holiday stands a better chance of being accepted.

Of course, not adding the BO option to seller's listings unless they specifically request it might help buyers know which sellers are willing to entertain offers.  Just a thought. 

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

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@revenue-collector wrote:

If you get eBay's new popup interface for offers (looks like it is being split tested or only rolled out on certain devices at the moment), there is no longer any option to choose the duration of best offers. All offers are 24 hours, period.

It already was difficult enough as a buyer, if you made an offer on a Friday or Saturday to a bigger seller that didn't have weekend hours, as the offers would expire before they even saw them. I posit that there should have also been 72- or 96-hour duration options for offers.

Why would eBay do this? It's beyond dain bramaged. Once again, eBay proves they're utterly clueless and NOBODY in charge of anything actually uses the platform. Morons.

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The sending best offer option on dot ca was released much later in a strip down form. On the Canadian site we were never given the option of choosing a timeframe. Also can/could be an issue where listings is about to end before the offer does. As far as I know there is no rollover. Lastly when a buyer sends a seller an offer they are able to make it for multiple units when multiple units are available. When a seller sends an offer it would most likely and only be for 1 unit per new watcher.

In checking an available to Send offer  does not specify a time frame(dot ca). The What do you think link is another of many  that are currently broken.

-Lotz

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

@7606dennis 

Even basic access to where a buyer/s is/are supposedly located would be most helpful when it comes to a seller sending random offers. Buyer feedback history would be a bonus but that's not going to happen.

-Lotz

[the-beatchapter]

Why have a time limit on an offer? 24hrs is not long enough. Sellers should have the option to counter offer after any time chosen by the buyer. If the buyer is not interested then so be it. There is no reason to complicate matters. This is not working for me. I have missed 5 offers in one month because I do not work on weekends. I'm often away from my PC. I do not do eBay on my phone because it's too much hassle when I lose it or if it gets stolen. Time off work is time off work. No ebay.

[mcgurf]

I'm running into this a lot recently (as a seller).

Monday I check ebay at 9:00AM and there are no messages, no sales, and nothing new to list, nothing to bid on, and I'm off by 9:05AM.

Tuesday I'm on ebay 9:00AM again, and there's a sale and a couple messages, which I get to by 9:02, but I missed the offer which came in at 9:01 on Monday, immediately after I checked messages.

What makes this doubly annoying is if I make a counter offer to a buyer they get 48 hours to think it over.

[kh-vince]

Hi everyone,

Due to the age of this thread, it has been closed to further replies. Please feel free to start a new thread if you wish to continue to discuss this topic.

Thank you for understanding.