wooden_flower Volunteer Community Mentor.
mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999
Hi everyone! Thanks for joining us for the Weekly Chat with eBay Staff. We don't have a specific topic this week, so feel free to share any general buying or selling questions you may have.
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@wooden_flower wrote:
I'm sure you are all aware of the seller scam providing a valid tracking # for an item delivered somewhere else in your zip. Buyer can't get info because it is not addressed to him. I assume the T&S are working on a way to counteract this, but it seems to be a painfully slow process, given how long this has been going on.
I have been telling buyers to get in writing from ups or fedex that the tracking # is not for a package addressed to or delivered to them, then appeal the case closed in the seller's favor. Mostly you never hear back from these members, but a number have told me that this does work.
This is such a clumsy way of handling it, not to mention that these are now buyers that will never buy here again. Any suggestions for smoother handling?
thanks!
@wooden_flower I'm not to familiar with this, but it sounds like the advice you're providing members is the right route to take. Buyers should contact customer service in a situation like this for further steps to resolve the matter.
brian@ebay wrote:
@valueaddedresource wrote:
Last week you asked me to report individual listings in the Funko Pop Funkoween event that violated the presale policy. I picked 15 at random from the many obvious violations if you just search for the word Funkoween.
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2380057.m570.l1313&_nkw=funkoween&_sacat=0
Of those 15 I reported, the only ones that are not still active are the ones that have sold - like this one. None of the other listings have been removed.
Again I have to ask - what is eBay going to do if this buyer does not get the item in October? Are they just going to be out $171 because eBay will not honor any Money Back Guarantee or buyer protections at that point?
Ebay has been aware of this issue for over 2 weeks. Not only does it violate your own policies, it also violates FTC 30 Day Mailing rules.
Why are these sellers getting special treatment and what is it going to take to get eBay to do the right thing here?@valueaddedresource we have reported this to the appropriate team. I don't have an update to provide beyond that, but will send another report to that team with additional listings. Thanks.
Thanks you brian@ebay - I have to ask though, when you told me two weeks ago that eBay acknowledged some listings in the event where in violation so you "ended the event", why did that only include removing the promotional banner for the event but not actually taking action on the violations?
I'm sorry but continuing to send reports to that team is not a sufficient response - it's obviously not getting the job done.
This needs to be escalated beyond that team and eBay needs to care about how this reflects on the platform as a whole. Every time a buyer gets burned on a presale violation like this and hung out to dry without any MBG protections, the odds they will ever come back to eBay to buy anything go down to almost none.
_____
Edit: Reply to this post can be read here
@mam98031 wrote:
In the forum community the page numbers at the bottom of the thread page/s are no longer appearing. You have to go to the top of the page to see or use the numbers. I have my preferences set at 50 posts per page. So once there is over 50 posts, the second page option is not appearing at the bottom.
I've notice this happening just in the last few days.
Hi @mam98031 - me too! We're currently waiting on Khoros to review and restore it.
brian@ebay wrote:
@wooden_flower wrote:
I'm sure you are all aware of the seller scam providing a valid tracking # for an item delivered somewhere else in your zip. Buyer can't get info because it is not addressed to him. I assume the T&S are working on a way to counteract this, but it seems to be a painfully slow process, given how long this has been going on.
I have been telling buyers to get in writing from ups or fedex that the tracking # is not for a package addressed to or delivered to them, then appeal the case closed in the seller's favor. Mostly you never hear back from these members, but a number have told me that this does work.
This is such a clumsy way of handling it, not to mention that these are now buyers that will never buy here again. Any suggestions for smoother handling?
thanks!
@wooden_flower I'm not to familiar with this, but it sounds like the advice you're providing members is the right route to take. Buyers should contact customer service in a situation like this for further steps to resolve the matter.
When they contact customer service to appeal, they are told the seller provided tracking that shows delivered, and nothing can be done. Can you get them to at least give the same info I am giving?
_____
Edit: Reply to this post can be read here
brian@ebay wrote:
@wooden_flower wrote:I'm sure you are all aware of the seller scam providing a valid tracking # for an item delivered somewhere else in your zip. Buyer can't get info because it is not addressed to him. I assume the T&S are working on a way to counteract this, but it seems to be a painfully slow process, given how long this has been going on.
I have been telling buyers to get in writing from ups or fedex that the tracking # is not for a package addressed to or delivered to them, then appeal the case closed in the seller's favor. Mostly you never hear back from these members, but a number have told me that this does work.
This is such a clumsy way of handling it, not to mention that these are now buyers that will never buy here again. Any suggestions for smoother handling?
thanks!
@wooden_flower I'm not to familiar with this, but it sounds like the advice you're providing members is the right route to take. Buyers should contact customer service in a situation like this for further steps to resolve the matter.
I find this interesting. This is a scam that is becoming more and more common on Ebay as well as elsewhere. It certainly isn't new or a small issue. As I stated earlier in the thread I've fallen victim to this myself. It can be very difficult to battle in Ebay.
Now I've always been grateful as a seller that Ebay is VERY good at protecting sellers on an INR. I really don't want that to change. But with this scam growing in frequency or so it appears, IMHO Ebay really needs to get ahead of it instead of being behind it and having more and more buyers hurt by this.
@my-cottage-books-and-antiques wrote:
tyler@ebay ebay personal (including Griff and Rebecca) have told us repeatedly...if an item specific is Recommended and Doesn't Apply, just skip it. Do NOT fill it in. These Recommended item specific notices should not show up once you select the "do not show me again" option (or whatever the actual wording is). I've had no trouble with that. (Yes, the IS themselves will still be in the listing form if you go to revise it, but you just ignore them.)
Hi @my-cottage-books-and-antiques - my info must be old on this point. If a specific is completely irrelevant for the category I'd still rather make sure that it gets reported to the structured data team, but this is valuable to know to avoid using 'does not apply'. Tagging @divwido for visibility. 🙂
Hello,
Here is a screenshot of what I see under "revise listing" when we opt out of "business policies". Notice there is not a section for return options under sales tax where there normally is. I have multiple other screenshots that I can share with you when you reach out. I've spoke with customer service 3 times now and received different opinions but still no resolution.
Thank you!
motivervtrailer
@zamo-zuan wrote:
In a follow up to my post on the Seller forum, we encountered an issue that persisted for nearly 3 months where our handling time was ignored, and listings with Handling Time 10-15 days were coming up in our listings as "Arrives in 4 days".
I have SR#'s where this bug was confirmed and reported to eBay, and they reassured us that we would be protected as we will only be held to the information we put in our listings. On March 18th in the morning was one of the calls, and there was many in between, most recent being yesterday.
We expressed concern not only for the regular defects, but also for the Item Not Received service metrics, as those are usually not removed by eBay. I was reassured that they typically do not remove those, but there is a process, and that we would be protected as the glitch was confirmed and not in our listings.
Then on May 11th, I also have the SR# where I spoke to someone in escalations who reassured me that they were removed.
Now I've went over our report from the 20th and it seems there's still MANY INR's from this issue.
Furthermore, you can see evidence in the report of the issue I describe, as even eBay's system says our listings had 10-15 day handling time, and they allowed the INR to be opened before this time frame!
I then looked over our INR's from the month of May, which will be included in the review in 4 days, and there's over 20 that I could see!
It's absolutely outrageous that due to a glitch in eBay's system, we're now potentially vulnerable for the Service Metrics - Item Not Received penalty!
We have been told time and time again that we will be protected, as this is not a normal INR circumstance and a glitch in their system. But so far, nobody has protected us!
It's extremely unfair if we will have a penalty that can cause tens of thousands of dollars of losses (Maybe even hundreds of thousands, considering the review is 3 months for INR!) due to a glitch eBay should be responsible for!
The eBay system should not have been telling customers these listings would arrive in 4 days, this hurts our reputation in the eyes of buyers, and there's no way to recompensate for that.
Furthermore, these customers should not have been allowed to open an INR until the handling time + shipping time of our listings was passed! And as you could see, they were allowed to open an INR before the handling time was even reached!
It keeps going back from some saying INR Service Metrics are a "Peer metric that can not be changed", to reps saying that's "typically" the case for normal INR's opened, but reassuring me that they WILL ALWAYS protect a seller in the cases of eBay glitches. So why are we not being protected???
From the SR#'s we have where eBay reps confirmed the issue, as well as the report alone that shows our handling time, we have more than enough evidence to prove our case. What could we do to get this situation handled before the review on the 20th?
@zamo-zuan there is a processing time when a case is removed from metrics. In doing a quick check it do see that the agents you spoke with did take action to do as they said. Now we need to wait for the system to process those actions. If you have further questions then you'll need to contact customer service again. They'll be able to provide more details. Thanks!
@mam98031 wrote:
There has been an issue in the Seller Hub that has been happening for several months. Not a overly big deal but still it is incorrect.
When you have an order for any given product and you pop into the listing itself to look at something, your current buyer shows at the top along with how many FB they have. While that is still there, the buyer's FB is always at ZERO. You can back out and get to the order and see the correct FB amount, but not when you pop into the listing.
@mam98031 - well that's a neat trick, isn't it? I'll let the Seller Hub team know!
@glasser wrote:
Here’s an idea around Top Rated Sellers
INHO. The Top Rated Seller system is unfair. To be top rated you need to have sold at least 100 items and $1000 worth of merchandise in the preceding 12 months. Nothing wrong with that per se.
However, it doesn’t seem fair to many others. For example, I sell about 70-80 items a year with a value of $20-30,000. Yet I am just above standard even with zero negative feedbacks and 100% hitting other factors like shipping on time. Occasionally, I have sold more than 100 items in a year and have briefly enjoyed the rarefied air ( 😊) of top rated seller.
It seems to me the idea for Top Rated Seller is two-fold 1) it signals to buyers that the seller and the marketplace can be trusted, and 2) an incentive for sellers to sell more. Just number of transactions doesn’t seem like the only measure (the $1000 min in my mind is a throw away factor that’s 100 items a $10 each). It doesn’t account for sellers, yes like me, who have a track record of selling numerous items, some for $1000 plus, with 100% satisfied customers, and no negative feedback for 20+ years. How does that not make me top rated or trusted? It is likely I generate more revenue for eBay on annual basis than some sellers who are top rated do,
So here’s a suggestion ( I give knowing there is virtually no likelihood of it ever happening).
Adjust Top Rated Seller to have some other ways to achieve it:
- Of course keep current.
- Add an items plus money threshold something like sell 50+ items with a total value in excess of $10,000 ( shows can sell higher priced items and deliver constant results) in the preceding 12 months.
- Have a historical Top Rated Seller criteria like been on eBay for more than seven years and had more than 350 sales and an average feedback rating over X% and total sales volume over $XX,XXX. This would allow sellers to be rewarded for consistency over time not just what have you done for me lately. BTW, its also OK to reward people for loyalty.
If they fall below any of the metrics around shipping, returns, etc. they lose the rating for a period of time until they correct the deficits for over a period of time.
And yes, I know you can’t make everyone happy. That shouldn’t stop you from making some changes that are more inclusive.
My .02
@glasser thanks for the suggestions!
@jk_zone_20 wrote:
Can Use MP as a beginner seller,when the starting the selling with 1st listing?
@jk_zone_20 you can definitely give our payments team a call (go to the bottom of this page and select "Have us call you") and they'll be happy to review your account and let you know what options you have regarding payments.
tyler@ebay wrote:
@mam98031 wrote:
There has been an issue in the Seller Hub that has been happening for several months. Not a overly big deal but still it is incorrect.
When you have an order for any given product and you pop into the listing itself to look at something, your current buyer shows at the top along with how many FB they have. While that is still there, the buyer's FB is always at ZERO. You can back out and get to the order and see the correct FB amount, but not when you pop into the listing.
@mam98031 - well that's a neat trick, isn't it? I'll let the Seller Hub team know!
Yes it is, LOL. When I first started seeing this I originally thought I sure was getting a lot of orders for new buyers. I thought it was great to have so many new buyers come my direction, then I quickly realized that was all I was getting and I finally noticed that this was a Ebay issue coupled with a sight issue for me because everywhere else showed they had FB!! Some times it just takes awhile for things to sink in. LOL
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Edit: A reply to your comment can be found here
@vrykalak wrote:My store is set on "time away" 'til June 23. Why are people making purchases and offers?
Are you sure. I can see your listings and there is no banner saying you are on vaca as there is a setting where your listings can stay visible when you set time away or hide them. But unless something changed, there should be a banner on your listings, so this could be even a bigger problem if your settings are correct.
@valueaddedresource wrote:
brian@ebay wrote:
@valueaddedresource wrote:
Last week you asked me to report individual listings in the Funko Pop Funkoween event that violated the presale policy. I picked 15 at random from the many obvious violations if you just search for the word Funkoween.
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2380057.m570.l1313&_nkw=funkoween&_sacat=0
Of those 15 I reported, the only ones that are not still active are the ones that have sold - like this one. None of the other listings have been removed.
Again I have to ask - what is eBay going to do if this buyer does not get the item in October? Are they just going to be out $171 because eBay will not honor any Money Back Guarantee or buyer protections at that point?
Ebay has been aware of this issue for over 2 weeks. Not only does it violate your own policies, it also violates FTC 30 Day Mailing rules.
Why are these sellers getting special treatment and what is it going to take to get eBay to do the right thing here?@valueaddedresource we have reported this to the appropriate team. I don't have an update to provide beyond that, but will send another report to that team with additional listings. Thanks.
Thanks you brian@ebay - I have to ask though, when you told me two weeks ago that eBay acknowledged some listings in the event where in violation so you "ended the event", why did that only include removing the promotional banner for the event but not actually taking action on the violations?
I'm sorry but continuing to send reports to that team is not a sufficient response - it's obviously not getting the job done.
This needs to be escalated beyond that team and eBay needs to care about how this reflects on the platform as a whole. Every time a buyer gets burned on a presale violation like this and hung out to dry without any MBG protections, the odds they will ever come back to eBay to buy anything go down to almost none.
@valueaddedresource these are two different teams, not the same. The team in charge of marketing that event took the banner down, but they are not over policy or listing removals.
We have reported the listings in violation to the correct team. They will review this and take appropriate actions. Thanks!
