Ebay First Class to Ground Advantage Bulk Edit Problem, LARGE QUANTITIES, No Business Policies

[maverickindustrialsales]

We have 30,000 active ebay listing, and do NOT use ebay business policies.  Instead, we have 20 listing templates that our team uses when creating new listings.  We have avoided using business policies because we like the ability to customize shipping specifics and return specifics when we are listing items because certain items are required to be shipped a certain way, or not allowed to be shipped a certain way (batteries, liquids, some test equipment, etc).

Around 10,000 of our listings are "calculated shipping" with USPS First Class as the first option which we have as free for the buyers.  Then we have Priority Mail, UPS Ground, and UPS Next Day Air as optional calculated upgrades for the buyer if they want to pay for a different shipping service.  

What do we do?  I am unable to find a way to bulk-edit these items.  The bulk editing tool does not allow us to filter our listings by first-class listings.  When I download a CSV of our listings there is no way for us to sort them by first class either.

Is there not a way for Ebay on the back-end to create a rule to automatically switch first-class listings to ground advantage?

Is there anything we can do to automate this or will all of my first-class listings be removed from ebay?

[ten_o_nine]

If eBay did that, it would probably show only the first shipping method offered in that column. Many sellers offer a choice between shipping methods.

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It can be expandable if more than one service, any developer can do that.

[fern*wood]

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@norskmediashop wrote:

ebay still working on solutions is what we were told, sounds like this is not over so hang in there.

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I hope for the sake of many many sellers that something is in the works to help, but count me in as skeptical.   It's not like this switch hasn't been known for months, so why wait till the sh*t hit the fan to look for a solution.   I also wonder about ebay for business reps that were giving out different information than other reps.   This gives me no confidence that there is a unified direction here.

[norskmediashop]

I agree with you, were in the same boat but fighting them to the core to do something about it, other platforms did they can just do it too or they will see a loss of revenue once many sellers/stores bail out and quit with ebay.

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

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@mr_lincoln wrote:

Hi @maverickindustrialsales 

I posted on my own thread about this and that they should have created a column on the Active list to sort by different hipping methods ... it's not like they didn't know this was coming so to me their support for this particular transition is a complete FAIL.

The Active list DOES have a Shipping column and you can sort it.  I tried it yesterday but since all my listings are set for Calculated not much changed when I sorted.  You might just see if that column sorts between Free Shipping and Calculated opposed to Flat rate and Calculated (which I suspect it was it does).

If you do not see that column use the Customize link and add it.  Here are all of the column choices we have:

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@mr_lincoln 

Unsure if this is addressed further along in the same discussion but it would be most helpful if there were filters for shipping options. Some sellers use flat rate. Others use free and others use either calculated with 1 option or several there is no way I have been able to find to edit or update listings seamlessly as most sellers require. Shipping policies do not work for everyone. Neither does bulk edit. When they implement changes such as these there seem to forget about potential consequences or the time involved to repair the bonus damage they caused.

What would be most helpful is when a seller clicks a filter it remains for the next time the seller returns to fix item 2 instead having to start from square 1 again. 

-Lotz

[mr_lincoln]

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@norskmediashop wrote:

ebay still working on solutions is what we were told, sounds like this is not over so hang in there.

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@norskmediashop   A day late and a dollar short ... 

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

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@dhbookds wrote:

lol           kyle@ebay 

Where is the magic door.......to understanding? 

The announcement clearly states

We are asking sellers to update listings to Ground Advantage over the next 30 days to ensure buyers see the most accurate shipping details. We realize this may take longer for some sellers and we will continue to support First-Class on existing listings for a longer period of time.

Now you are saying the listings will not renew? 

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@dhbookds 

I think in eBay speak GTC means until eBay cancels a listing unceremoniously in the dark of night. I have tried to ask in the past if a listing(s) get cancelled by eBay do they end up in a sellers unsold folder or to the poof into oblivion. (Same situation happened when they cancelled sellers permission to use the term "refurbished" as a condition.  I have never gotten a straight answer. A tool for searching out these critter listings would have been real hindsight!!!

-Lotz 

[suzysemporium]

"Companies that sell many SKU's with different weights and DIMM's along with International and shipping the the customers wishes cannot do what you are suggesting."

Are you scanning a bar code, and it fills in a template? Are you using a shipping service other than Ebay shipping labels? That is the only way I see business policies not being able to work.

If you are using Ebay labels, business policies make things super easy. In 30 seconds, I changed 3 shipping business policies from first class to ground that control 418 items. One first class only, One offering media mail and first class, and just for one listing First class no international.

I was against Ebay business policies until I watched this you tube video by the Auction Professor  "10 Best Tips Tricks Settings All Resellers Should Know."  10 Best Tips Tricks Settings All Resellers Should Know 

[allthingssurplus]

If that Seller has calculated shipping checked and ships using First Class Package bulk editing is just not possible.  We have tried and we use a third party as well.   The key factor is calculated.

[simply-the-best-for-you]

I find it VERY hard to believe that Ebay will suddenly with no announcement,  allow the vast majority of listings on their site, to not renew. 

Most sellers, the VAST majority still have no idea they're supposed to do anything. 

Third party listing tools including the one promoted by Ebay (Sixbit) as of the 11th, cannot support the change b/c Ebay hasn't updated the API to allow for Ground Advantage.  I was just informed in another thread (and confirmed it myself) that that has now been done for Sixbit.  Who knows how long the other 3rd party tools will take to implement?  

Ebay initially (2 months ago) told people to start making the change over the next 30 days from that announcement.  Just one little problem with that.  You can't make the change until the product actually existed on July 9th.  How did no one at Ebay notice that?  

And now I'm supposed to believe that on August 9th, virtually every GTC listing on the site will suddenly cease to renew?  Let's just say I won't be holding my breath.  

[simply-the-best-for-you]

Oops, too late to edit, just wanted to also say that my annoyance at this nightmare fiasco is NOT directed towards Kyle, who is great & just doing his job. 

[norskmediashop]

I find it VERY hard to believe that Ebay will suddenly with no announcement,  allow the vast majority of listings on their site, to not renew. 

I agree, this would cut off business for ebay, and the seller, something has to give here. Or many are just going to walk away from ebay. Ebay does not seem to understand the many stores with thousands of listings that can not be changed with bulk edit or bus policies. (though we were told they do understand and are working on it....that could be good or who knows). But bulk edit and bus policies will not work, every item has a different set of ship configurations based on the item. Again the other platforms are rolling into the ground advantage, its just a name change, this fiasco is inexcusable. 

[luckythewinner]

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@maverickindustrialsales wrote:

 We have avoided using business policies because we like the ability to customize shipping specifics and return specifics when we are listing items because certain items are required to be shipped a certain way, or not allowed to be shipped a certain way (batteries, liquids, some test equipment, etc).

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I simply set up a separate business policy for each of those scenarios.

[maverickindustrialsales]

Kyle,

Thank you for trying to help, but again we are unable to use business policies for our application. We are not anti-business policies. We have tried and there is no way to use them with our business model. We know that we are not alone in that and would really like for your voice as a moderator to pass this up the ladder.  

Surely as has been voiced by others in this thread, eBay would not benefit from having thousands of listings drop off of their site due to this issue. 

Because weights and dimensions are stored on eBay, could anything over 3.5 oz be automatically moved to Ground Advantage on the back end? It would seem that could be a solution so that first-class envelope users could retain their products as well. 

[onefootflipper]

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@maverickindustrialsales wrote:

Kyle,

Thank you for trying to help, but again we are unable to use business policies for our application. We are not anti-business policies. We have tried and there is no way to use them with our business model. We know that we are not alone in that and would really like for your voice as a moderator to pass this up the ladder.  

I have never seen a store more usable with business policies than yours.

Do you even know what they are? Like actually, for real, what they do and what your options are. They literally allow you to do every single thing you do without them, including customizing for specific items, but they allow you to fix things like this in seconds.

98 percent of your store seems to be free ship items. You create ONE policy, called "Free ship" and you apply that to 98 percent of your items. Problem solved right there. The other 2 percent or so seems to be local pickup and some heavy UPS items. Policies for those and you are done. Handling cost baked into calculated shipping on the item? You hit the override button on the shipping policy when listed and change the handling price on that listing alone.

Or if you won't do that, then just select 2000 at a time everything in your store that has free shipping on it and change the shipping to "Standard Shipping", that fixes that problem right there. I could do your entire store in about 20 minutes.

[wastingtime101]

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@maverickindustrialsales wrote:

Thank you for trying to help, but again we are unable to use business policies for our application. We are not anti-business policies. We have tried and there is no way to use them with our business model. We know that we are not alone in that and would really like for your voice as a moderator to pass this up the ladder.  at could be a solution so that first-class envelope users could retain their products as well. 

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Hey @maverickindustrialsales . I say this with every intention of trying to help you and not to push you into something you don't want to do.

When you tried using biz policies, what specifically was the road block you faced?

Asking a mod to escalate FB that a product doesn't work for you is not going to be effective. You have to let them know why something doesn't work, or what specific part of the feature needs to be changed along with what it needs to be changed to in order to work for your business. Without providing that kind of info, the feedback isn't productive.

Having said that, you mentioned setting up a variety of shipping options through your listing templates. As a biz policy user I can say with confidence:

There is no reason you can't create a biz policy that replicates the exact shipping settings in your listing template and repeating the process for all your templates. Once that's done, assign listings to those policies using bulk edit tool.

Are you able to convey which part of biz policies don't work for you and why, with the purpose of either getting past a hurdle, clearing up a potential misunderstanding about how policies work, or if there's truly a problem with the system and its compatibility with your business, providing specific FB to eBay letting them know why biz policies don't work for you?