Return Request From Order More Than 30 Days Old

[teltuooutlet]

It seems no one at Ebay can answer how an order that was placed on November 20th and received by the buyer on November 22nd, was allowed to open a return request on January 8th? Leaving me no option but to accept the return or refund the customer.

How is more than 30 days allowed? I tried to get an answer from Ebay reps but they tell me to wait until January 14th because there is a 5 day seller response period they have to wait out before they can step in.

Are you kidding me?

I just want an answer.

[wastingtime101]

I finally remembered that the post I was thinking of was about returns being extended at the start of Covid. eBay didn't announce the change for several weeks.

Here's the thread @valueaddedresource (link). The comment I was referencing is this one, emphasis mine:

"we have historically provided additional time for returns during widespread outages, service disruptions, or other natural disasters. In light of recent events, we are providing extensions to buyers to return items and for sellers to issue refunds. The time frame for returning an item and issuing a refund is communicated to both the buyer and the seller within the return and via any related eBay messaging. If someone has a specific question about a return they are addressing, they can contact Customer Service to discuss it further."

I think that's exactly what your Twitter rep was saying. They'll alert sellers by way of showing them dates in eBay messaging related to the return, but there was no formal announcement to impacted sellers. eBay never announces tests.

It's too bad @teltuooutlet didn't see the extended return window posted on her live listings when the extended return window was in play.

eBay didn't tell either of you how long the return window extends or what dates the test ran, did they? I'm sure valleegirls would like to know what period of sales were part of this test and how long buyers that purchased during that time have to open returns.

I combed through the User Agreement last night, and while they have the familiar text about announcing changes to the UA 30 days in advance, the MBG section of the UA cleverly omits any reference to time frames. It just says sellers have to abide by it. So it appears (to my non-legal eyes) that if eBay secretly extends the MBG with a test, sellers are bound by it even when eBay didn't alert them in any way that it was changing.

[wastingtime101]

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@teltuooutlet wrote:

In follow up... I contacted them on Facebook and someone replied IMMEDIATELY to me. They were SO very helpful and closed the case. They said it was part of the "extended holiday return period which you may not have been made aware of". 

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When they closed out the return request by escalating it to a case @teltuooutlet, did they issue a courtesy refund to the buyer?

[valueaddedresource]

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@wastingtime101 wrote:

I finally remembered that the post I was thinking of was about returns being extended at the start of Covid. eBay didn't announce the change for several weeks.

Here's the thread @valueaddedresource (link). The comment I was referencing is this one, emphasis mine:

"we have historically provided additional time for returns during widespread outages, service disruptions, or other natural disasters. In light of recent events, we are providing extensions to buyers to return items and for sellers to issue refunds. The time frame for returning an item and issuing a refund is communicated to both the buyer and the seller within the return and via any related eBay messaging. If someone has a specific question about a return they are addressing, they can contact Customer Service to discuss it further."

I think that's exactly what your Twitter rep was saying. They'll alert sellers by way of showing them dates in eBay messaging related to the return, but there was no formal announcement to impacted sellers. eBay never announces tests.

It's too bad @teltuooutlet didn't see the extended return window posted on her live listings when the extended return window was in play.

eBay didn't tell either of you how long the return window extends or what dates the test ran, did they? I'm sure valleegirls would like to know what period of sales were part of this test and how long buyers that purchased during that time have to open returns.

I combed through the User Agreement last night, and while they have the familiar text about announcing changes to the UA 30 days in advance, the MBG section of the UA cleverly omits any reference to time frames. It just says sellers have to abide by it. So it appears (to my non-legal eyes) that if eBay secretly extends the MBG with a test, sellers are bound by it even when eBay didn't alert them in any way that it was changing.

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Thanks @wastingtime101  - I did try to get more details from the Twitter rep, but they said each situation is different and they'd need to review the impacted account individually.

I'm not sure if that means there could be different versions of the pilot program with different timeframes/variables or if they were just trying to give as few specifics as possible to a public question, but unfortunately acknowledging the existence of a pilot program for this was all I was able to get for a general, non-account specific answer.

[wastingtime101]

Got it. If valleegirls feels like going back to Facebook to ask for details she might get some since her account was impacted.

But read through that thread I linked @valueaddedresource because there were several posts from the eBay rep that expanded on the lack of an announcement and how the messages from the return were seen as good enough communication. The context is more clear when you read the entire discussion rather than the one post I quoted. I think you'll see why I believe the Twitter rep you spoke with was saying the same thing, that essentially it's not announced anywhere to impacted sellers and that's by design.

[teltuooutlet]

I read the follow ups you all have posted and thank you all for the additional information. I did not have any messages from Ebay on this topic and I also did not get further information on dates from the rep on Facebook I spoke with. I did however just try to reach out again to see if they could provide me with more information after reading your posts. I will let you know if I get anywhere with that. 

[teltuooutlet]

Thank you for sharing more on this as it has been a bit baffled for the past 2 days. 

I did look back through my messages to make sure and I don't have any communication from them on this. I tried to reach back out on Facebook just now to see if I can get some further information after reading through everyone's responses. I'll let you all know what they say. 

[valueaddedresource]

Thanks for that confirmation @teltuooutlet.

 @wastingtime101 - I agree, after looking at that whole thread you linked, I believe the Twitter rep was likely referring to just the regular messages giving the return timeframes like you mentioned, not any kind of separate explicit announcement of a change.

[wastingtime101]

Deciphering eBay-speak is an art form @valueaddedresource.

[valueaddedresource]

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@wastingtime101 wrote:

Deciphering eBay-speak is an art form @valueaddedresource.

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@wastingtime101 made even more fun by Twitter character limits. 😉

[velvet@ebay]

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@wastingtime101 wrote:

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@teltuooutlet wrote:

In follow up... I contacted them on Facebook and someone replied IMMEDIATELY to me. They were SO very helpful and closed the case. They said it was part of the "extended holiday return period which you may not have been made aware of". 

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Wait, what?? eBay didn't announce an extended MBG window for the holidays.

tyler@ebay velvet@ebay   -  Can you guys get us some information on this please?

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Hi @wastingtime101 and @teltuooutlet! I'm not aware of extended holiday protections having been offered this year, outside of some sellers offering their own, but as you've mentioned there may be a pilot I'm not aware of. I'm going to do some asking around and I'll follow-up with whatever I find out. 

[santamonicajeweler]

How chaotic?! Order was placed on November 20th, Buyer forced and  was allowed a return on first week of January and you don't know why! Looks more than 45 days

"We are aware of a technical issue which may be causing sellers to see an incorrect, extended date for buyers to ship their returns. We have not made any changes to our return policies.  Buyers are not seeing the incorrect dates, and they will not have additional time to ship their returns.  

We expect the issue to be resolved in the coming hours, and we will update this post if there are further delays.  

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. As always, thank you for selling on eBay."

community.ebay.com/t5/Announcements/We-are-aware-of-a-technical-issue-causing-sellers-to-see-an/ba-p/32291450

Could it be one of these? Is it 60days, 45 days or 30 days?! Are we renting stuff out for free and paying shipping twice or selling? 

This is exactly why many choose 'No Return' policy. eBay needs to ease up on Sellers with "No Return" policy.  An INAD should be proven by Buyers' expert written document or no return awarded 

Sellers know how to protect themselves, apparently, eBay is not protecting them

[velvet@ebay]

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@wastingtime101 wrote:

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@teltuooutlet wrote:

In follow up... I contacted them on Facebook and someone replied IMMEDIATELY to me. They were SO very helpful and closed the case. They said it was part of the "extended holiday return period which you may not have been made aware of". 

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Wait, what?? eBay didn't announce an extended MBG window for the holidays.

tyler@ebay velvet@ebay   -  Can you guys get us some information on this please?

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I've heard back that while we've extended return timeframes for the holidays in the past, we did not do it this year. It sounds like the teammate may have been confused and they'll be made aware that it's business as usual. Thanks for the tag @wastingtime101 and I hope this helps to clarify things @teltuooutlet.

[teltuooutlet]

Thank you for helping to clarify the policy confusion. However, this still does not explain what happened. I'm going to chalk this up to a system glitch and move on. 

[wastingtime101]

Thanks for the update velvet@ebay. Can you confirm what happened? Was there a site glitch?

[valueaddedresource]

velvet@ebay  this was the exact answer I received from support on Twitter - is this incorrect?