eBay

zamo-zuan · ‎02-14-2019

This morning our stock management software was getting a strange error that some of our items could not be updated because "They do not contain a return policy".

To be clear, this is NOT saying that there's a policy of "no returns". It's saying that there's "NO policy found" so the item can not be revised!

This isn't possible as you have to select one of the policies when creating the listing.

Then doing some searching I found this issue affecting many of our listings, especially old ones:

I recommend all sellers to check their listings to see if this issue is affecting them! If you are having this please report it! It's a pretty big one as our items for example are Free Returns, yet if it's coming up as "does not accept returns" we will be losing our protections offered by Free Returns!

mam98031 · ‎02-14-2019

@tunicaslot wrote:
Well add another problem - I have free returns. Received a return req today which was automatically accepted but no where did it give me the option to have Ebay send the return label or for me to send the buyer a return label. I contacted the buyer to see if indeed Ebay already provided him with one and he responded no - I just spent the money to return it on my own and provided me with a tracking number. I've already told him that I will reimburse him for the cost of the return.

In your Site Preferences for Returns, check the box that says you require an RMA number. That will help this situation in the future and give you time to review stuff before a label is issued.

Having your buyer purchase the return label will cost you more money as they aren't likely to get the same discount as you can. You can go to PP and create a label for the return shipment. You do have to add their address to you ship to addresses on your PP account temporarily. But you can do it. Then edit the ship from address to be your buyers and the receiving address as yours.

mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999

"I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you." Quote from Edward I Koch

zamo-zuan · ‎02-14-2019

@tunicaslot wrote:
Well add another problem - I have free returns. Received a return req today which was automatically accepted but no where did it give me the option to have Ebay send the return label or for me to send the buyer a return label. I contacted the buyer to see if indeed Ebay already provided him with one and he responded no - I just spent the money to return it on my own and provided me with a tracking number. I've already told him that I will reimburse him for the cost of the return.

@mam98031 wrote:
@tunicaslot wrote:
Well add another problem - I have free returns. Received a return req today which was automatically accepted but no where did it give me the option to have Ebay send the return label or for me to send the buyer a return label. I contacted the buyer to see if indeed Ebay already provided him with one and he responded no - I just spent the money to return it on my own and provided me with a tracking number. I've already told him that I will reimburse him for the cost of the return.
In your Site Preferences for Returns, check the box that says you require an RMA number. That will help this situation in the future and give you time to review stuff before a label is issued.

Having your buyer purchase the return label will cost you more money as they aren't likely to get the same discount as you can. You can go to PP and create a label for the return shipment. You do have to add their address to you ship to addresses on your PP account temporarily. But you can do it. Then edit the ship from address to be your buyers and the receiving address as yours.

RMA option is a must or else you will be overpaying for eBay's labels. EBay's labels not only don't provide all shipping options, but also base their labels by weight which ends up being a lot more expensive.

But even if you choose the RMA option, eBay still opens returns and sends labels automatically sometimes. It depends on the reason they give when they call in.

I would guess in this case, either the label section isn't appearing (we had the vehicle selection box not appear in revise listing pretty often these last few weeks), or eBay tried to automatically force the labels and it didn't completely go through.

Regarding the bug I mention today, it could very well be a situation where the system was going to try to give a label to the customer, but the "return data" was corrupted, and the system didn't know what to do.

I highly recommend using the bulk updater to go through all your listings today and set the return policies again! If the bulk tool reports errors with return reason, this problem affected you too!

gracieallen01 · ‎02-14-2019

Hmmmmm, sounds like the Spring Seller Updates should be out soon.

Not saying 'NO' doesn't mean 'YES'.

The foolishness of one's actions or words is determined by the number of witnesses.

Perhaps if Brains were described as an APP, many people would use them more often.

Respect, like money, is only of 'worth' when it is earned - with all due respect, it can not be ordained, legislated or coerced. Anonymous

tunicaslot · ‎02-14-2019

Thanks mam for the info on the RMA. I did indeed plan to purchase the return label but wanted to make sure Ebay hadn't provided one since it was an automatic return. Unfortunately the buyer had already repackaged the item and returned it on his dime before he saw my message concerning the label. No problem - I'm just happy to have an honest buyer who was not pitching a fit about not receiving a return label.

tunicaslot · ‎02-14-2019

zamo - TY - I might go back to buyer pays remorse returns anyway. This buyer obviously didn't see I offered free returns and the last 2 negs were from buyers that claimed SNAD rather than fit issues which they were so people are not paying attention to the free returns option.

zamo-zuan · ‎02-14-2019

@tunicaslot wrote:
Thanks mam for the info on the RMA. I did indeed plan to purchase the return label but wanted to make sure Ebay hadn't provided one since it was an automatic return. Unfortunately the buyer had already repackaged the item and returned it on his dime before he saw my message concerning the label. No problem - I'm just happy to have an honest buyer who was not pitching a fit about not receiving a return label.

The other problem to worry about is if the customers use the labels on the correct boxes.

Just today USPS attempted delivery for 5 packages and wanted $65 postage on delivery, because customers sent in a brown box instead of flat rate boxes...

EBay has no protection in these cases 😕

zamo-zuan · ‎02-14-2019

@tunicaslot wrote:
zamo - TY - I might go back to buyer pays remorse returns anyway. This buyer obviously didn't see I offered free returns and the last 2 negs were from buyers that claimed SNAD rather than fit issues which they were so people are not paying attention to the free returns option.

It would be best to take note of your return rates and test for yourself. It's really different depending on product types/etc.

As Free Returns we definitely do still get SNAD's, but our rate of SNAD's did decrease by going to Free Returns.

People do fail to check the return reason, but there's a little bit less incentive to lie.

Also, the amount Free Returns helps your visibility seems very dependent on category as well. There's no sure-fire "best practice" rules to follow on eBay these days. We're forced to constantly test everything to see what works, and test again to see if anything changed.

zamo-zuan · ‎02-14-2019

Update:

So the bulk updater does work to fix the return policies, but it takes MANY attempts to go through fully.

For example.

Open bulk updater for 500 listings and it says 50 don't contain a return policy, 25 invalid return policy.

Attempt to bulk update all, and it updates to "42 don't contain a return policy, 22 invalid".

Then on the top, it has the red/yellow indicators with the test for the "42 don't contain a return policy" message. You can hit the checkbox next to this error, and then set return policies for those items specifically.

Then it updates to "12 don't contain a return policy".

You basically have to repeat this over and over until it's fixed.

Annoying, but at least there's a way to fix it...

dtexley3 · ‎02-14-2019

From a software dev and design point of view. eBay probably has thousands of return policy types, because different categories have different variations. Each of those policies has a unique "Key" identifier that the end user never sees but ties the specific policy to the listings that use it.

So, an eBay programmer is told : remove all policy types where the policy is for 14 day returns. OOPS, they accidentally remove a bunch of 30 day ones as well. Quick! Put them back before anyone notices! eBay programmer quickly recreates the policy types. Unfortunately the backend Database does NOT allow the reuse of Keys, even when they have been removed so the replacement policies all have new keys. Your listings still have the old key values, so you have to go in and "reselect" the new/old policy to get the new key added to your listing.

Of course as a software developer I've NEVER made that type of mistake, nope, not me, maybe a guy I know might have, but not me, nope, never.....

Member of the Grumpy Old Man crew

zamo-zuan · ‎02-14-2019

@dtexley3 wrote:
From a software dev and design point of view. eBay probably has thousands of return policy types, because different categories have different variations. Each of those policies has a unique "Key" identifier that the end user never sees but ties the specific policy to the listings that use it.

So, an eBay programmer is told : remove all policy types where the policy is for 14 day returns. OOPS, they accidentally remove a bunch of 30 day ones as well. Quick! Put them back before anyone notices! eBay programmer quickly recreates the policy types. Unfortunately the backend Database does NOT allow the reuse of Keys, even when they have been removed so the replacement policies all have new keys. Your listings still have the old key values, so you have to go in and "reselect" the new/old policy to get the new key added to your listing.

Of course as a software developer I've NEVER made that type of mistake, nope, not me, maybe a guy I know might have, but not me, nope, never.....

Haha, yes I understand.

But it's more than that. The bulk updater is having the same issues. Sometimes you update all 500 listings to free returns, and then you have MORE with missing return policies than when you began!

Also, it's not properly updating to the new return policies.

Seems less likely of a key/ID error, and more likely a data corruption error.

Also, in the bulk updater, the previews will still show "Buyer Pays" even if it's free returns... yet once processed they show up normally.

Our listing dept is having issues with this happening on revising items 1 by 1 as well.

I'll be uploading a video displaying the issue soon.

zamo-zuan · ‎02-14-2019

Okay I have an updated visual example of this issue: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGXzK-O_6PQ

Let me walk through the steps of what happens in this video:

1) Attempting to edit 500 listings, it says 14 with return policy not supported.
2) Set all 500 to Free Returns.

3) Now 22 with return policy not supported, 7 return policy not specified.

4) Attempt again, now 17 return policy not supported, 10 not specified.
5) I attempt to edit only the 17 items not supported, results are 1 not supported 1 not specified (even though I did not touch not specified).

6) I submit the final ones not specified, and successfully have 0 listing errors.

7) Submit Listings: Result - 7 listings did not update.

😎 Attempt again. Result - 1 not specified.

9) Attempt again - 0 listing errors.

10) Submit again. Result - 2 listings did not update.

You can clearly see the pattern/issue.

Now, I highly recommend everyone reading this, please check the bulk editor to see if this issue is affecting you. I was straight up told by eBay, "we're not getting any other reports of this, unless many people report it, it may take months for them to fix this issue".

Even though it seems others on here have this issue, and have reported it...

I hope this does not indicate any larger issues at hand 😕