mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999
Join the Community team here at 1 PM PT on October 30th for our Weekly Chat with eBay Staff. We don't have a set topic this week, so please bring any general questions you may have on buying or selling.
The chat will be open for questions from 1-2 pm PT, at which point we'll close thread. While no additional questions can be submitted after this time, we'll continue to work on responding to any queries that may still be unanswered.
If you're new to the chat, welcome! Simply Reply to this post with your question from 1-2 PM Pacific Time and we'll be happy to look into it for you.
Please note that this is a general topics chat, and we're happy to work on getting you answers. For the latest information and updates on the Item Specifics technical issue please review the the Seller News Announcements.
@vrykalak wrote:
Many audiobooks are in the catalog as regular books. I think this is misleading. "Audiobook" is a "hard category" meaning there's no doubt if it's true or not. "Fiction and Literature" or "Children & Young Adults" are soft categories, meaning they are open to interpretation. I think the catalog should give precedence to "Hard Categories"
Hi @vrykalak - interesting suggestion! I know that the catalog team would love to hear from you on this. You can send them the suggestion (as well as any examples you have come across) to sdsupport@ebay.com.
Thanks!
@medallion-trading-company wrote:
My account recently fell into the 'very high' range in my service metrics.
Keep in mind that eBay has recently changed their policy to remove any false SNADs from the service metrics moving foward from the seller update in October. This would literally remove all but 2 of my 10 SNAD cases affecting my service metrics. But whatever.
Also, one of my SNADs will fall off as of Oct 19, putting me back down at only 9 and the restrictions will be removed again upon my next evaluation. Of course nobody from eBay told me this, I had to figure it out myself after going around and around from people from India. Also, they were going to look into the false SNADs on my account and get back with me, but alas I got an email from eBay saying they couldn't call me back to discuss it because the phone number was not updated. FALSE! Oh the games they have played with me.So, that's only the beginning of this chaos.
A customer opened a return, because he didn't like it, which is fine because I offer free returns. He said it got stuck on his sweater. Well, he certainly did get it stuck on something. He sent back a completely damaged and broken $500 coin pendant. I was told by eBay that I would be able to refund partially, so my plan was to refund all but the $100 it would take to repair and replace the broken bail. However,the option to partially refund was never available to me. Despite talking to two agents AND a supervisor, the only answer they could come up with was that it did not show as delivered yet in their system. But, in fact, it DID show as delivered. So, I opened a case to help me with this. I OPENED THE CASE based on incorrect information from eBay. Now it is a defect. Let that sink in.
When I called in regarding the case I opened, I was told to partially refund through Paypal. I was told this buy an eBay agent. So that's what I did, since I was still convinced that I was doing everything correctly.
Then, after no progress on the open case after 24 hours, I called back. I was told the case was on hold until October 29th. So I called back then, on October 29th, and I was told that they needed to confirm with the buyer that the partial refund was received.
Then today the case closed out in the buyer's favor and my credit card charged the remaining $100 for the partial refund.
This is completely the opposite of everything I was being told by eBay up to this point.
So, I called AGAIN today.
After speaking to another agent who said I would not be covered on the appeal because the buyer sent item back and I received it, and another supervisor who said that the buyer would have to admit to the damage before they could do anything (After opening the case I sent pictures and an explanation of why I partially refunded to which the buyer never responded) and then finally, and agent who told me that the reason the option to partially refund wasn't available to me was because of my high service metrics. FINALLY, after almost 4 hours of calls with eBay and days and days of working on this, I got the information that nobody else gave me and instead gave me WRONG information.
Keep in mind that if I would have been told this from the beginning, I would have 1. Never opened a dispute to partially refund in the first place 2. I would have completed the refund at any time that the dispute was open so it didn't count against me rather than following the instructions of the Ebay agents and supervisors.
Finally, I would like to point out that the purchase was made by my buyer before I was being punished for very high service metrics (and presumably still covered by eBay's seller protections), the return was opened by my buyer while I was not being punished for very high service metrics. At what point did I stop being covered? Because this entire transaction took place while I was presumably covered. If I appeal it in 30 days, I will no longer have 'very high' service metrics. Will I be covered when I appeal it?
So, as you can see, I have a lot of concerns.
THANK YOU! Jodi
Hi @medallion-trading-company, I'm sorry to hear that customer service didn't inform you of the reason why the partial refund tool wasn't available earlier in your conversations with them. Just to confirm, being 'very high' in Service Metrics does make the account ineligible for the partial refund tool. This information can be found on the Seller Protections help page.
I understand that this situation could have gone in a much better direction if you have been told the correct information with your first interaction with customer service. I'll send you an email later today to see what options may be available to help out, so keep an eye out for that. Thanks!
@millcreekrescue909 wrote:
Because eBay is showing our PayPal email address as invalid, which is not the case, I cannot do any of the things I mentioned. I reported this on last weeks chat.
Hi @millcreekrescue909 - thanks for the extra insight! There is a known issue with the Require Immediate Payment option that gives this error. If you uncheck that box within your listing flow you will be able to list and revise as you see fit. I've added your account to the open ticket to let the right team know you're impacted by this.
We require buyers to pay if they want to commit to purchase an item (for those items less than $1000), so unchecking the box should not open your items up to a higher than usual Unpaid Item case rate. Thanks!
tyler@ebay wrote:
@millcreekrescue909 wrote:Because eBay is showing our PayPal email address as invalid, which is not the case, I cannot do any of the things I mentioned. I reported this on last weeks chat.
Hi @millcreekrescue909 - thanks for the extra insight! There is a known issue with the Require Immediate Payment option that gives this error. If you uncheck that box within your listing flow you will be able to list and revise as you see fit. I've added your account to the open ticket to let the right team know you're impacted by this.
We require buyers to pay if they want to commit to purchase an item (for those items less than $1000), so unchecking the box should not open your items up to a higher than usual Unpaid Item case rate. Thanks!
How does that work exactly?
