Community team to start accepting solutions for posts

[sheila@ebay]

I'm recapping some of my comments made in this post, to my original post:

• We want to make sure all Community members see a great solution and sometimes that solution can be buried in a thread. We want to help those who aren't going to read 40+ posts in one thread

• The Community team will not jump into every post and mark solutions, but they do spend a lot of time on the boards and when they come across a post that has a very clear answer and within policy, they'll accept solutions.

• The Community team will also not change solutions that was previously selected by the OP. 

• If the OP isn't happy with the solution, they're free to change it
• Only the Community team and the OP can accept solutions, though I am aware of the problems with the OP selecting solutions.

• Our current team. even though they have less than a year of experience on Community, have many years of eBay support support experience (10+ years) so they're very well versed on all things eBay. They'll be very thoughtful when it comes to selecting solid accepted solutions that follow eBay policy.

• Sometimes an OP might not realize there's an option to Accept a Solution

• A lot of our Community members come to Community through Google searches. For someone who's brand new to the platform and who wants to find an answer right away, having an accepted solution will be helpful.

• Here's a sample question: 

  Q: How do I reverse negative feedback I left?

  A: Use the contact link to ask your seller to send you a Feedback Revision Request.

• We're staying out of opinion based posts or posts seeking general advice. For example, if a member is asking for advice on the success sellers have had running promotions, there could be several helpful posts from sellers. In this case, we won't accept a solution.
• Lastly, we want to give credit to those who provide great answers

Update as of 05/04 - I've made note of all the feedback from this post and will make modifications to the process if needed.

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Starting today, the Community team will start accepting solutions for post that have a clear answer and within policy. This will apply to all boards except for the Ask a Mentor board.

Short and simple announcement so you're aware. 😊

[bubu-luba]

Can you link an example of how it will look when a Community team member accepts a solution to someone's else post?

[buyselljack2016]

Will that happening lock the thread reducing/eliminating the number of added/repeat, correct/incorrect responses?

[wastingtime101]

I've already gotten a few of these the last month or two.

The average user cannot see who accepted the solution, but the person that wrote the post can see in notifications that the action was performed by eBay staff. To the average poster, the post will look the same as one where the OP accepted the solution.

It does not lock the thread.

An OP can still manually unmark an accepted solution if they want to mark a different post as the accepted answer.

[hurryagain]

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@wastingtime101 wrote:

I've already gotten a few of these the last month or two.

The average user cannot see who accepted the solution, but the person that wrote the post can see in notifications that the action was performed by eBay staff. To the average poster, the post will look the same as one where the OP accepted the solution.

It does not lock the thread.

An OP can still manually unmark an accepted solution if they want to mark a different post as the accepted answer.

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Can we mark this above statement as the solution?

[divwido]

Why?

[wastingtime101]

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@wastingtime101 wrote:

The average user cannot see who accepted the solution, but the person that wrote the post can see in notifications that the action was performed by eBay staff. To the average poster, the post will look the same as one where the OP accepted the solution.

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This is an example of a post where eBay staff marked my post as the solution.

I checked my notification feed and it does not show who marked it as the solution now that it's far down on the list, but when it first happened (when it was in the top 10 notifications that show in the notification hover pop-up) I could see who marked it from the hover preview.

If you subscribe to e-mail alerts, the e-mail will show you which ID marked your post as the solution. 

[wastingtime101]

It looks like this in the hover preview:

[nobody*s_perfect]

Will you also have the power to un-select "solutions" which are incorrect?

After all, the original poster is often not in a position to judge the validity of an answer and sometimes just selects the first plausible reply that shows up, even if it's incomplete or actually wrong..

[bubu-luba]

Sometimes a person is not sure how to ask a question and will receive answers "that have a clear answer and within policy".

They will come back and ask the question in a different manner trying to get an answer they understand or try to reexplain their question.

The Community team accepting solutions on their behalf would seem to be projecting that the conversation is now over.

[katzrul15]

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@bubu-luba wrote:

Sometimes a person is not sure how to ask a question and will receive answers "that have a clear answer and within policy".

They will come back and ask the question in a different manner trying to get an answer they understand or try to reexplain their question.

The Community team accepting solutions on their behalf would seem to be projecting that the conversation is now over.

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Agreed.  And the OP should be able to have input into the process as it is their question, which often, is not a question, at all OR very subjective at best.

[pburn]

sheila@ebay wrote:

Starting today, the Community team will start accepting solutions for post that have a clear answer and within policy. This will apply to all boards except for the Ask a Mentor board.

Short and simple announcement so you're aware. 

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sheila@ebay 

As you are well aware, I have objections surrounding several aspects of the "solution" feature; however, this change to the "solution" procedure is so wrong on so many levels.

I would also think the two remaining Community Team members, with all their other duties, would have enough to do without trolling the Community looking for "solutions." Why not just limit responses to Community Team members and leave the rest of us out of it?

Bad decision.

[dhbookds]

going to be interesting.......2 people to read 300 (?) boards.......and reread each, every day(?) to see if there is a solution? 

[mr_lincoln]

sheila@ebay   Will the Community Team be making their determination on the following?

-Chronology of the correct response?

-Thoroughness of a correct response?

What I've seen are some very short correct replies followed by comprehensive correct replies.  So while the first reply might be correct it may also lack the support information or Help Page explanation that would benefit the OP more then say a "yes" of "no" answer:  Example below

OP:  Can I sell some old African Elephant trunks on eBay?

First Responder:  "No"

Second responder 10 minutes later:  Unfortunately that would violate eBay's Animal Products Policy and here is a link the Help Pages that covers that policy in more detail.  (link)

There are other scenarios where two or more responders provide an accurate answer but the OP's question could apply to different issues AND they (the OP) have not provided enough info so the real question is unclear AND different accurate answers 'COULD" APPLY.

Some OPs never come back to their thread to read the replies we have given them, some come back and say thank you but don't click accept solution because 1) they are so new they don't know if the answers are correct of 2) they don't feel qualified to verify the answers given or 3) they go off and try what was suggested, have success but then fail to find their thread to mark an accepted solution or could care less about marking a solution.  If this new process is to basically do that form them then it makes sense.

How do we alert your team that an OP marked an incorrect answer as a Solution?

Regards,

Mr. L

[pburn]

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@dhbookds wrote:

going to be interesting.......2 people to read 300 (?) boards.......and reread each, every day(?) to see if there is a solution? 

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Agreed.

Wouldn't the Community Team members' time be better spent pursuing the answers to issues that are brought up on the Weekly Chat week after week after week? The continued claims that the appropriate teams haven't gotten back to them is getting a bit weak. Maybe they should be spending more time communicating with those fellow employees. Let's see how many times that excuse gets posted in the Chat today.

Of course, now they can say, "I was too busy perusing the discussion boards for solutions to other people's threads to get a response to the question."

Bad in theory, worse in practice.