Shipping Metrics Have Real Life Impact on Top Rated Sellers

[davewearsredsox]

I can not tell you how disapointed I am with EBAY and the shipping metrics. I am so disaponted that after 5 years of hustler will be giving up the fight in March. I am sure others have have similar pain points and I am looking to vent.

 I have uploaded tracking on time on 99% of items purchased on all but 10 out of 1000 item orders received yet the item shipping garuntee (shipping on time) has me near out of compliance with at 2.65%. If this number reaches greater than 3% that equates to 1 or 2 additional late item, I loose my top rated seller status and loose the benefits for my hard work. 

Every day I print my shipping labels prior to 7:30 AM and take my son to school for 8:30. I am at the post office at 8:45 EVERY MORNING and all order ship within less than 24 hours. In my opinion I am meeting or exceeding the buyers expectation and my feedback is loaded with postives in regards to my shipping speed. I do not recall ever getting a slow shipping speed feedback and ebay's software is rating my service via USPS tracking. So basically if they are late delivering my items sold, I am being penilized.

This grading system is so badly flawed and has real life impacts on your business to include search results and discounts. 

I am done with this and have decided to opt out of my EBAY Anchor store in March. I have read discussions regarding sellers feedback and how ebay does not treat sellers well and are nickle and diming them at every street corner. I have decided not to allow corporate america dictate my business and life style. I have found some other niche sites that are performing well enough that my online sales will not end with the closing of my store.

I am not looking to start a rallying cry for others to do the same but I do suggest you look at your business and question if EBAY is still the solution or partial solution for your business.

[castlemagicmemories · Accepted solution]

This really makes me sad.  It is always sad to see a seller decide to leave after years of experience here.

I hope you will re consider.  There are things that you can do.  You can extend your handling time.  You can call CS and explain how you ship; if you have an acceptance scan within your handling time, that should count.  Talk to your Postmaster and explain the situation and see what he recommends.  

Don't let this defeat you.  Work with Ebay to get it resolved.  I wish you the best of luck and success.

[davewearsredsox]

Thank You for taking the time to reply.

I have already taken some steps to address that you reccomend to include contacting EBAY CS. The person was generally nice but basically I received "I understand your frustration", "Others have expressed saimilar concerns", "Most likely this will not effect your account". SORRY... This is not good enough.

One of my best friends works at my towns post office and at the couter. We play softball together and on the same team (NFG THAT STANDS FOR NON FURMENTED GRAINS) . So basically I wait in line to have my packages scanned most of the time as it allows us a few minutes together 3-4 days a week. 

If I extend my handling time, I will also loose my top rated seller status, so basically, I will be automatically penilized regardless if I continue with the same practises.

I do agree with you that an acceptance scan should count, but unfortunatly it does not and why you are at the mercy of the buyer to grade you correctly and that the post office does not have any delays delivering your packages.

If the acceptance scan was proof enough, I would not have any complaints.... I receive about 3-4 lost packages a month, I receive about 10-12 questions where is my package. I am not pointing fingers here but the post office is not perfect nor am I... This is simply a **bleep** shoot maintaining this metric! If I do nothing, then I have no say on how my business is run and that simply is unactable to any business owner.

[escuintla]

The most dumbest idea out there is that we as sellers have the capacity, if not the powers, to make a parcel get to its destination on time when so many challenges and problems make shipping like an imaginary ship navigating a sea full of mines. 

I just got a package not showing anything for almost a week. Now, it's half way. My thoughts are that somehow the package, small to fit 9 music cassettes got stuck or was put somewhere where nobody found it but a day or two later.  We can't control what other human beings do, but Ebay and its numbers are deaf and blind to our pleas. 

[lintbrush*]

If your items are late delivery, but have tracking and a scan uploaded on time, on-time delivery should not be counted against you.

As far as losing your TRS benefits, aside from the 3% savings on Priority Mail and the up to $100 insurance, I'm not sure what you're really losing.  That 3% is going away in January anyway.  Without Free Returns, you're not saving any FVFs.

You don't have to have 1 day shipping to maintain TRS.  I've been toying with 2 day handling as it won't change my fees (not doing Free Returns for now)

[davewearsredsox]

You nailed it... Like yourself I have experienced the same on a montly basis. **bleep**, sometimes the dang oders do not even ship to the right country.... Truth, I had 2 last month.....

I also had 1 order of magazines (6 total) that shipped on time but equates to 6 strikes.

To be honest - I think Ebay will be looking at a class action with this type of practise. You cannot hold someone to a grading standard that they have no control of and has real life impacts. Hell.... We are using USPS - WHO SO HAPPEN TO BE THE PREFERED VENDOR FOR EBAY SHIPPING....

I am so ticked off over this, that I am calling it a day! So much for posting Masters Of The Universe collectibles that I picked up yesterday. Instead they are going on Facebook......

[zamo-zuan]

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@davewearsredsox wrote:

I can not tell you how disapointed I am with EBAY and the shipping metrics. I am so disaponted that after 5 years of hustler will be giving up the fight in March. I am sure others have have similar pain points and I am looking to vent.

 I have uploaded tracking on time on 99% of items purchased on all but 10 out of 1000 item orders received yet the item shipping garuntee (shipping on time) has me near out of compliance with at 2.65%. If this number reaches greater than 3% that equates to 1 or 2 additional late item, I loose my top rated seller status and loose the benefits for my hard work. 

Every day I print my shipping labels prior to 7:30 AM and take my son to school for 8:30. I am at the post office at 8:45 EVERY MORNING and all order ship within less than 24 hours. In my opinion I am meeting or exceeding the buyers expectation and my feedback is loaded with postives in regards to my shipping speed. I do not recall ever getting a slow shipping speed feedback and ebay's software is rating my service via USPS tracking. So basically if they are late delivering my items sold, I am being penilized.

This grading system is so badly flawed and has real life impacts on your business to include search results and discounts. 

I am done with this and have decided to opt out of my EBAY Anchor store in March. I have read discussions regarding sellers feedback and how ebay does not treat sellers well and are nickle and diming them at every street corner. I have decided not to allow corporate america dictate my business and life style. I have found some other niche sites that are performing well enough that my online sales will not end with the closing of my store.

I am not looking to start a rallying cry for others to do the same but I do suggest you look at your business and question if EBAY is still the solution or partial solution for your business.

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First, I would like to say I agree about metrics for top rated sellers. It seems intended to punish "poor" sellers, but return metrics actually get harder to meet the more sales you have, and the "peer" calculations are not too accurate, especially considering many categories get bunched together in "Motors" for ourselves.

But I do have some advice for you.

Regarding the shipping on time metric, there's something you can do to ensure you meet this one. I'm not sure what shipping software you use, but most of them support "End of Day" sheets or "Scan forms". 

Basically, these allow you to print out a SINGLE barcode on a sheet after you do all of your shipments. Then when you ship the items out, if you have them scan this single barcode, it will count EVERY single item in your shipment as being scanned! 

We visually confirm that they scan these forms daily. This makes sure that our items get that initial scan and DO come up as shipped on time!

This can protect you if the postal service decides to skip scanning. In Los Angeles, our USPS service is horrible, constantl losing packages or not scanning. We must do this to protect ourselves. 

By doing this we are able to keep a near 100% shipment on time! 

Also for some additional information, if you ship with the speeds you mention, you shuold be able to enroll in Guaranteed Delivery. This should protect you from negatives and some defects for late shipment.

Something else you might not be aware of, is they typically don't hvae the ability to remove "unfair lates" from your record, but DEFINITELY record them! If at some point you are ever supposed to receive a penalty, it is NOT non-negotiable. They actually CAN remove lates off your record. They just don't do this up front, as I think it's a lengthier process. But I have been told directly by multiple staff members, that if you are up for penalty, they DO have the ability to assess any lates. So please don't let the metrics alone scare you. Lates CAN be removed, and if you actually would have a penalty you CAN appeal it!

[castlemagicmemories]

Losing Top Rated is not the end of the world, but I do think you can get this addressed with CS.

Many sellers have given up TRS and don't report a change in their sales.  Many buyers don't feel TRS mean anything, due to bad eperiences they had.

While that TRS may give some buyers a good impression, I think those are minimal. 

[davewearsredsox]

Yes and no..... I am TSR but not TSR+.... Yah that's correct, they now have two levels of TSR.....

It will effect the visibility of my posting, You are correct that I do not receive a discount.

But not being TSR is painfull and what we experienced back in June after taking a vacation and utilizing "vacation mode" Seller is away and returning. Little did I know that was also going to effect my TSR rating and found sales to be nearly non existent.

[davewearsredsox]

This is extremely helpful. So if I get this software and the scan the bar-code then I am safe? What happens if the item still does not reach the buyer in time?

I agree that I need to create a log. Up until today, I did not even know where what orders were considered late ships. I found it under seller dashboard that allows you to expand the file.

Thanks for the info, I am most certainly going to spend sometime looking into this!

[castlemagicmemories]

That's great!  You can do this!  

[escuintla]

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@lintbrush* wrote:

If your items are late delivery, but have tracking and a scan uploaded on time, on-time delivery should not be counted against you.

As far as losing your TRS benefits, aside from the 3% savings on Priority Mail and the up to $100 insurance, I'm not sure what you're really losing.  That 3% is going away in January anyway.  Without Free Returns, you're not saving any FVFs.

You don't have to have 1 day shipping to maintain TRS.  I've been toying with 2 day handling as it won't change my fees (not doing Free Returns for now)

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I am not that savvy on all these problems, but a package put in the hands of my friend the mail carrier, who is a real friend, but gets scanned a week later doesn't make me look good, is it? It looks like I printed the shipping label, went to Las Vegas, then I dropped the box at the USPS office. 

[lintbrush*]

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@davewearsredsox wrote:

Yes and no..... I am TSR but not TSR+.... Yah that's correct, they now have two levels of TSR.....

It will effect the visibility of my posting, You are correct that I do not receive a discount.

But not being TSR is painfull and what we experienced back in June after taking a vacation and utilizing "vacation mode" Seller is away and returning. Little did I know that was also going to effect my TSR rating and found sales to be nearly non existent.

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@davewearsredsox

You can maintain your TRS rating and have 2-day handling.

If you ship in 1, that'll give an extra day to absorb some of the USPS delays that you can't control.

But if those packages you dropped off on time were scanned in, the late delivery isn't supposed to count.

[zamo-zuan]

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@davewearsredsox wrote:

This is extremely helpful. So if I get this software and the scan the bar-code then I am safe? What happens if the item still does not reach the buyer in time?

I agree that I need to create a log. Up until today, I did not even know where what orders were considered late ships. I found it under seller dashboard that allows you to expand the file.

Thanks for the info, I am most certainly going to spend sometime looking into this!

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Yes, basically the scan counts as a "received" scan. This will at least let them know that you shipped it on time.

Then if you have Guaranteed Delivery and use the "Handling Time" option, you should be protected from at least some of the cases if they arrive late. If you used GD and call in, they typically remove late feedback/defects as long as you ship on time within handling time!

Although sadly it doesn't apply if the customer files a Item Not Received. Those are a different defect than "lates". But customers typically don't do an INR unless more time passes.

But I should also mention, sometimes we have called in to get lates removed, and some CSR's are not able to do it. This is for the reason I describe in the earlier post. I believe if the CSR does not have a certain authority, they don't remove the lates directly. But if the lates are bringing you close to losing TRS or any other penalties, they WILL escalate it and remove the lates for you. It's just not an "every time" thing.

As long as you use the scan forms, it's mostly a non-issue. Your amount of lates will be low enough that a few won't matter. And if you ever get close to that penalty, eBay WILL help you out. It's just the CSR's don't communicate this too clearly.

I have been told that even if you receive the potential service metric penalty of 4% extra FVF, this IS negotiable. This is another reason you should track your defects, and mention if they are fair or unfair! If you were unlucky enough to potentially have those increased 4% FVF, you can then take your logs & send over the unfair return cases, and this might allow eBay to "whitelist" you, and not have additional FVF if you truly don't deserve it!

These days it's always best to track anything that doesn't seem a bit fair. EBay's metrics themselves are unfair, but as long as you get a competent CSR, they do try to assist in unfair situations.

[zamo-zuan]

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@escuintla wrote:

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@lintbrush* wrote:

If your items are late delivery, but have tracking and a scan uploaded on time, on-time delivery should not be counted against you.

As far as losing your TRS benefits, aside from the 3% savings on Priority Mail and the up to $100 insurance, I'm not sure what you're really losing.  That 3% is going away in January anyway.  Without Free Returns, you're not saving any FVFs.

You don't have to have 1 day shipping to maintain TRS.  I've been toying with 2 day handling as it won't change my fees (not doing Free Returns for now)

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I am not that savvy on all these problems, but a package put in the hands of my friend the mail carrier, who is a real friend, but gets scanned a week later doesn't make me look good, is it? It looks like I printed the shipping label, went to Las Vegas, then I dropped the box at the USPS office. 

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That's exactly why you should always use the SCAN forms I mention. It protects you from these cases!