Ep 312 || Our Fall Q & A Episode

[podcast_team]

The week, Kayomi and Griff answer your questions; What to do if a return is shipped by the buyer but never received; eBay Standard Envelope and tracking; Item delayed in transit; Buyer requests to split up a lot; and auction winner requests to hold off shipping in order to combine shipping. Plus a special announcement from your podcast team.
Episode Links:
eBay Standard Envelope

Recurring Links:
eBay for Business Podcast
eBay for Business Podcast Listener Survey
eBay Seller News Announcements
eBay for Business Facebook
eBay Seller Center
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eBay Local Seller Events
Seller Hub
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Kayomi: I'm Kayomi Kayoshi.

Griff: And I'm Griff and this is the eBay for business podcast, your source for the information and inspiration to help you start, manage, and grow your own business in the world's most powerful marketplace. And this is episode three twelve. Welcome, Kayomi.

Kayomi: Hello, Griff. How are you?

Griff: I'm okay. I know we're recording this on a Friday, but by the time this launches, we'll be sitting next to each other in, in San Jose

Kayomi: for eBay open. We'll be face to face. Yes.

Griff: I'm looking forward to it. I haven't been to San Jose for a while. I know you were just there.

Kayomi: Yeah. I mean, I barely have unpacked from that trip, so I’ll just zip it back up and take it with me.

Griff: I guess there will be a few sellers on campus, although most of the action is online and at the, there's some kickoff. What day is are the kickoff parties again?

Kayomi: Kickoff Fridays are Tuesday, September twenty fourth.

Griff: Ah, okay. So we will be there. Am I right in saying there'll be some sellers in the, in the office?

Kayomi: I think so. I think Yeah. There might be a couple. Mhmm.

Griff: Okay. Good. Alright. So, it'd be fun to see everyone. I can't wait. And, fun to see you.

Kayomi: I know. It'll be fun to see you. I don't know when the last time we saw each other face to face, I think, earlier this year.

Griff: It was in the spring. Remember it was when we had that team building

Kayomi: or something. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Graff, I know we don't have a guest this week because it's our quarterly q and a episode.

Griff: That's right. It is our q and a episode, and we have a choice selection of seller questions coming up. But first, I think there's something in the news, isn't there this week?

Kayomi: Yes. We have one news item this week. Last week, eBay announced the first phase launch of a brand new AI driven bulk listing tool. This new tool can create listings simply by scanning a batch of item photos you provide. The tool scans the photos, suggests categories, titles, and item specifics, and generates ready to publish draft listings. You can review the listing details for accuracy and post them in bulk live to the site all in a fraction of the time. To learn more about this new feature, visit the post on the announcement board at community dot ebay dot com. Click the seller news to find this and all previous announcements of interest to all eBay sellers.

Griff: Well, there it is. Another use of AI here on eBay. I know it's kinda contentious with some sellers.

Kayomi: I know. I think it was worded well, though. I mean, the purpose of AI on the site is to save you time and to help simplify these processes. We always suggest and, like, encourage people to, like, review whatever the AI spits out. Review it, edit it if needed before posting. I would not trust it completely a hundred percent by now, but, yeah, I think it's a great tool.

Griff: And isn't that a way when you edit it to, help AI learn?

Kayomi: Exactly. I think it's kinda like a symbiotic relationship. The more you put into it, the more it'll get out of it, and then the more it'll benefit you in the future.

Griff: Yeah. And then one day you'll wake up and there'll be a robot in your, workspace packing your items and sending off your lit your shipments. It's great. It's the future.

Kayomi: You sound like my mother, every time I bring up AI, she's like, you need to watch this Terminator movie. And I'm like, oh, God. Okay.

Griff: Yeah. Okay. I don't think Skynet's in our future. Perhaps it is. I don't know at this point.

Kayomi: We can only wait and see.

Griff: Yeah. So you can read that announcement again. You don't it's not mandatory. You can test it out. Hey. Anything that saves time is worth a try. And like we said, if it's not perfect, just edit what's there. I'm I'm sure it'd be even it's still gonna be a time saver in most cases because, it's editing is a little bit different than having to enter all that data in yourself manually.

Kayomi: Yeah. From scratch. Yeah.

Griff: Well, thank you for the news. And now it's question time1

Kayomi: You've got questions.

Griff: We've got answers for this, our quarterly all q and a episode. And if I may, Kayomi would you mind reading our first question?

Kayomi: But of course, Griff. This was sent by Daniel to podcast at ebay dot com. Hello, Kayomi and Griff. Love listening to the podcast. I have two questions.

Griff: Maybe we should take them one at a time, shall we?

Kayomi: Yes. That sounds like a plan. Alright. Daniel's first question is, what to do when I get a return request and I accept the return, but the item gets lost by USPS when being shipped back to me. I usually issue a refund without having the item returned for less expensive items, but what about expensive items? The buyer did their part and shipped it back, but USPS has lost the item. Should I refund the buyer even though I didn't get the item back and file a claim with USPS, or is there something else that I can do?

Griff: I don't think this happens very often, but, yeah, this is, this is tricky. So, Daniel, with a eBay managed return, the window of time for refunding a buyer doesn't officially start until the tracking for that item shows that the buyer has shipped it and it's been delivered to your address. But that said, if the item was expensive, that value is something every seller has to determine, by the way, what is the, you know, the the ceiling for what is expensive and isn't. And if you wanna have the item back before refunding, and if tracking shows the buyer did ship the item, tracking shows that means tracking shows an acceptance scan or a transit point at some somewhere along the path back, but delivery back hasn't happened to you, ask the buyer to open a case. EBay will sometimes refund the the buyer out of eBay's pocket. Another option is to is to let the buyer know that the parcel shows it's still in transit back to you and to ask them have a little patience when this has happened to me. And it has happened to me over the years, maybe a few times. I kindly ask the buyer to wait for, like, another x amount of time, like, a week or so to see if it shows up. In the meantime, you have the tracking number. You can also ask the carrier to check on the parcel status and you can file a missing package claim if it if they can't find it. Now many times this can result in the package being found. It's like a miracle. And the buyer ultimately receives the you the you, the seller, I mean, received the package back and then you can refund. If not, then you can be on record that the package has gone missing and you may recoup the item value from the carrier depending on how the item was insured. So it's not a cut and dry thing. Whether or not you should refund is up to you. If it's low value and for me, for example, low value is anything under fifty bucks, I'll take the loss and write it off. And if it does come back, if you give the refund and the package suddenly shows up, well then, you know, it kinda worked out. If it doesn't show up, you have to file a missing package and you may be able to recoup from the carrier.

Kayomi: Alright. Okay. Here is part two to Daniel's question. I have purchased many trading cards that were shipped through eBay standard envelope and sometimes I never received the cards and the tracking hasn't updated. I talked to the post office and they said that they cannot track the tracking number since it is not a USPS tracking number. Yeah. We know where this is going. Is there anything that I can do but issue an item not received to the seller? Thanks for your help, Daniel.

Griff: You have seen this, haven't you,Kayomi? On the discussion board. Yeah. I have too. Okay. So actually, USPS actually can track the parcel, maybe not to the same extent as a regular package because it's an envelope. But many USPS clerks still seem to be kind of in the dark about this service, this eBay standard envelope service, which was created with eBay in a partnership with USPS. So, yeah, it's not that it's not tracked. It may not be tracked to the same extent, but they it is a tracking number that USPS can use.

Kayomi: However, we have heard this happening from a few buyers and sellers. And as a buyer, you can and should file an item not received case with eBay. Depending on the total purchase amount of the items in the eBay standard envelope shipped, the seller may be off the hook for issuing the refund. In that case, eBay will issue it to you out of pocket.

Griff: Yeah. That's true. In fact, I I think a lot of sellers aren't aware of this. It's a good point. You should know that each eBay standard envelope shipment includes a twenty dollar shipping protection plan on a single order and up to fifty dollars on combined orders if you put more two or more cards in the envelope. And this is to help in case of lost or damaged items. So, yeah, the with that protection, I would, as a buyer, not worry about the seller so much. You didn't get your cards. You need to get some redress, and the way to do that is to open an item not received case.

Kayomi: If you are a seller and your buyer claims that they have not received the item or item sent via eBay standard envelope, we suggest working with them to resolve the issue and then raise a claim with the included shipment protection to cover your losses.

Griff: If you need to understand or you wanna learn more about eBay standard envelope, you can do so either on seller center. If you click the shipping tab, you can find a link to the splash page for eBay standard envelope. You can also find information on the help and contact pages by searching eBay standard envelope.

Kayomi: I think a lot of not misinformation, but maybe lack of information from people. So definitely recommend looking into this.

Griff: And there is a lot of discussion online about the tracking for eBay standard envelope. And I think the situation last time I inquired with the shipping team is it's getting better and better. But it was one of the reasons why we just didn't wanna release this to all pertinent categories because we knew that this could be a bumpy rollout a few years ago when we introduced it. And we have extended the service to a few more categories, and that will continue over time as long as we see that the service overall is working well for both buyers and sellers. Our next question that was sent is a variation of Daniel's first question, and this was sent in by a seller called Intrepid Store. And he writes, well, hello. I have a question for you. My buyer opened a case for item not received. I dropped off the item the following day after receiving the order. Because it was more than two weeks since shipment and despite buyer being amenable to wait for a few more days, I had to refund because I don't want ding on my account. I'm a new eBay seller, and I wanna keep my status on the up and up. I refunded the buyer on Thursday, and now Saturday was just contacted by the buyer saying that he's received the item. So how can I get paid back the amount I refunded the buyer? Please advise. Thank you. Well, this is one of those questions because unfortunately, unless the buyer is willing to send you payment, which by the way is not easy to do and we'll explain in a minute why, you're pretty much out of luck here.

Kayomi: Crystal, in this situation, what should Intrepid Store have done differently?

Griff: Well, since the buyer agreed to wait for a few more days, you probably should have told them, you would wait for, say, a week, and if it didn't arrive, then issue a refund. A buyer in this situation can stipulate in the case process that they're willing to wait. So, it's not necessarily that eBay will simply automatically refund. We assume the item had tracking. Right? I think that's goes without saying. And delivery delays happen. Usually, eBay doesn't require a refund if the tracking shows the item is still in transit, but there is a point of time in which eBay will issue a refund without tracking showing delivery if it's gone on for a long time.

Kayomi: And we have to mention that the way eBay messaging is currently set up, arranging for the buyer to send payment to you through a third party payment processor like PayPal, for example, is pretty difficult.

Griff: Yes.

Kayomi: If you send a request through eBay messaging, you could receive a warning from eBay about outside trading. If a buyer tries to send you their payment processor email or phone number, they could also receive a warning.

Griff: Yeah. I know. This is so frustrating. I know. But there is that obstacle. Is this an ideal situation? I gotta admit, personally, absolutely not. I really believe we should have some sort of process and system in place that allows for buyers in this situation like yours to send payment. But at the moment, there isn't one. So if you wanna pursue it, you're gonna have to improvise and do it yourself, and that's all I'll say about that.

Kayomi: Well, our next question is from the seller Mary who writes, I am a long time eBayer. My username is Mary the family manager. I have recently returned to selling on eBay on a limited basis selling personal items no longer needed. I have found your podcast to be very helpful and eagerly await each week's episode. Why thank you, Mary. Recently, I was contacted by a potential buyer regarding one of my listings. I had a lot of twelve women's tops for sale at a fixed price and was not taking offers. She wanted only five of them and asked if I would split the lot. Because the listing was getting a lot of views with few watchers, I was inclined to work with her. In hindsight, maybe twelve was too many items. In any case, I was not sure how to handle her request to split the lot. What I did was end the listing with twelve tops, then I relisted it, including only the five tops she wanted, and I messaged her to let her know. She was appreciative and purchased the new listing immediately. Was this a good way to handle the situation? Thank you so much, Mary Walcott. Mhmm. Well, Mary, I'm so glad that that story had a happy ending, and it was an excellent way to handle the situation. You obliged the buyer's not unreasonable request, in the buyer purchase the items they wanted. Remember, the point of listing on eBay is to sell, which you did. So congratulations.

Griff: Yeah. Congratulations, Mary. You did exactly the right thing. This type of buyer request, Mary, is not unusual, by the way. We hear about this happening a lot and it's perfectly okay. It's a great way as you said, maybe twelve was too many items. It's a good way to learn what works and what doesn't work. And in this case, it ended up working out really well. So congratulations again and you're one smart ducky. You know exactly what you're doing, so keep doing it.

Kayomi: Yeah. You're getting back into the swing of things already.

Griff: Exactly. Now our last question is from seller Kim who posted her question on our eBay for business podcast Facebook group. So I thought we should post it here and give her an answer. Kim asks, I have a buyer who won two auctions and is currently bidding on another auction of mine. The last auction ends in four days. They're asking me to hold the first two auctions and ship with the third. How does this affect me? If I don't ship in a timely manner, I get a ding. Right? Should I let customer service know? Any advice? They have not paid for the first two yet. Well, Kim, first thing, don't contact customer service. This is not the kind of thing you should ask them. Again, this is not an unusual request, especially for sellers who tend to list in the auction style format where the seller has stipulated a shipping fee, and the buyer has won two or more of the seller's auction listings. So what the what's happening here, and I'm sure it's plain to you, is the buyer is hoping for a reduction in shipping charges if you ship all three items together. What I love here is the assumption they're gonna win the third one. It's, you know, it's like it's mine.

Kayomi: Confident.

Griff: Yeah. They could lose that.

Kayomi: So But, yeah, like you said, this is not unusual, and I feel like I hear about this happening all the time when people wanna combine shipping with auctions.

Griff: Yeah. And

Kayomi: I know that some sellers who sell in the auction format will often add terms to their description stating that they will combine shipping, but the buyer has to hold off payment for the auction listings one, at which point the seller will send an invoice for combining shipping for the lot.

Griff: That's a common thing, isn't it? We see that a lot. Other sellers, by the way, who sell on the auction format will sometimes state the opposite. They'll say they do not combine shipping. This could, be due to the size, maybe, of the items, the weight, the fragility, the value of the items. Maybe they're antiques, maybe they are, you know, maybe it's artwork, whatever. So in that particular case, the seller probably doesn't want to combine them in one package. So they'll say we can't, unfortunately combine shipping. So they let the the buyers know beforehand.

Kayomi: And, Kim, the fact of the matter is that you as the seller are free to accept or decline such buyer requests. I know from experience that many sellers will decline these requests if they are sent after a buyer has won an auction listings. Again, it is up to you, the seller, not the buyer.

Griff: Yeah. And it's it is important if you're a buyer, if you're interested in having this kind of arrangement that you don't wait until you've won some items. You actually contact the seller beforehand so that you get a clear picture whether or not they're going to say yes or no. So, yeah. For your situation, Kim, as a seller, the clock for shipping within your stated handling time only starts when a buyer pays for an item. So you you don't have to worry about the ding if they haven't paid. If the buyer has already paid, well, if you want to avoid the ding, you'd have to ship within your handling time or else you will take that hit to your on time shipping metric. Keep in mind that that metric like all of the others, they have a percentage buffer. I can't remember if it's three or five percent so that you can as a seller accommodate the occasional request like this one without risking your status. Now, if the buyer hasn't paid, then you can at your discretion accept or decline the buyer's request to ship the items together. If you do agree to combine shipping for auction listings that close over a period of time, there's one other step you want to do after you've communicated with that buyer. You're going to want to add that buyer's user ID to your payment exclusion list. This is a little known setting in your seller preferences. By adding the buyer's user ID to this list, the buyer will not receive payment requests from eBay or risk getting an unpaid item strike because they haven't paid.

Kayomi: Very interesting. Where would one find this buyer exemption list, Griff?

Griff: Well, I'm glad you asked, Kayomi. To find this list, you just go to my eBay, then click the accounts tab. From there, click selling preferences. You'll see it at the bottom of the left hand column, and then the edit link for the setting that's labeled preferences for items awaiting payment. Add the user ID of the buyer to the text box provided and then click save. And if, your buyer is a regular customer for whom you're willing to combine purchases over a period of time, you can keep their ID on the list. Yeah. So, oh, and one more important point, if you agree to defer payment in a situation like this, be sure to make a window of time clear to the buyer. Like, you know, okay, I'll give you a week or I'll give you two weeks. Don't just leave it open ended.

Kayomi: Yeah. Clear communication. Well, Griff, are you ever faced with the situation or are you ever faced with a request like this? If so, are you more inclined to accept, deny? Where do you fall?

Griff: It's not applicable for me because I only use the auction form on on very rare occasions, and I don't think I've used it in a long time. But when I did, the items I use it for are either too big, too fragile, or too valuable to combine them safely in one package. So when I've done it in the past, I've made it clear that I'm unable to combine shipping. Now I wanna make a point here. Wording is important when you're writing your terms of service. Try to avoid saying things like, I do not combine shipping because that sounds really harsh. Say something instead like, unfortunately, we're unable to combine shipping for this item. So whenever your terms of service states something that you won't do, make sure you use the word unable instead of don't or won't.

Kayomi: That's a great point. And I think that that's a note I can take from my personal book. Earlier when I mentioned that I learned I was a very direct person, this was news to me. And I feel like I usually if I was filling this out, I would have said I do not combine shipping.

Griff: So I, I list, mostly fragrances. And when I list, I've got a huge list waiting to go up. And because I use eBay International Shipping, that precludes that category. But occasionally, a buyer from outside the United States will search ebay dot com and they'll see the listing. And I'll get a request saying, oh, won't you ship this to me here in Germany or China, wherever? And I'll say, no, I can't. And in my those listings, I usually I used to have a statement says, I can't ship this item to destinations outside of the US. I think when we started EMA International Shipping, I may have taken that out, but that reminds me I wanna I might wanna put it back in. I don't get that many requests, maybe a couple of year.

Kayomi: Mhmm. Okay.

Griff: But I remember when we used to talk about listing quality, one of the things that we used to always say is, how you voice or how you you word your terms of service is almost more important than the terms of service themselves. You don't see it much anymore. But back in the early days till about maybe ten years ago on eBay, I would constantly run into listings. I know they're still out there. I still see them. They're just not that many where the terms of service are like a list of, you know, the ten commandments of thou shall not, thou shall it's so off putting.

Kayomi: Yeah. I mean, it's kind of jarring reading it.

Griff: Yeah. It is absolutely it's like, I don't know if I wanna buy from this person. I think if I do one wrong move, I'm gonna, like, get, you know, stung or something. So

Kayomi: I know. Yeah. But that's a good point. Softening it up a little. Putting some cushion in.

Griff: Exactly. Well, those were our questions. I hope they, you enjoyed them. We, wanna thank all of you who sent in questions this week. Thanks always for the questions. And now a special announcement. Now as of this episode, the eBay for business podcast is discontinuing production. We want to thank the many sellers and eBay employees who've been guests on our podcast since its launch in August of 2018. And we would also be remiss without recognizing our past co hosts, Alan Aizbitt, Doug Smith, Audrey Tracy, Liz Austin, Brian Burke, and of course, Kayomi Kayoshi.

Kayomi: That's me.

Griff: Yes. Our library of past episodes will remain available throughout two thousand twenty five, but I do encourage you to download those that are a special interest. We also encourage you to check out many of the wonderful eBay and selling related podcasts online. There are so many. Just search on the terms eBay selling, e commerce. Tons of sellers out there are offering really good podcasts. So, check them out.

Kayomi: And you can still post your questions about selling on eBay to our eBay community forums at community.ebay.com.

Griff: Well, of course, the eBay community is always a great place to find answers and support.

Kayomi: Oh, yeah.

Griff: And finally, we want to thank all of you who have supported our podcast over the last six years. Your questions have helped make this podcast so interesting and often really entertaining. Sometimes I just I get your emails and I just, you know, laugh at some of the things that you guys say. So thank you for sending them in. And they've certainly kept us on our toes. They've been proof that I don't know everything. I had to research almost every question that comes in. We hope we were always able to provide you with answers that helped you manage your eBay business.

Kayomi: And I cannot express my gratitude enough, but I'm so happy that I stepped out of my comfort zone a little to join you as a cohost, Griff. I've enjoyed every minute of it, and I now have a treasure trove of information, fun stories like you were just talking about, and fond memories from both you and also the listeners.

Griff: Yes.

Kayomi: Thank you all so much for tuning in, supporting us, and welcoming me with open arms as the new cohost earlier this year. And Griff, thank you so much for having me.

Griff: Kayomi, it was a pleasure. It's been such a joy watching you grow so much in just a few months. It hasn't even been a year yet. So thank you. Yeah. Well, I've enjoyed working with you and, who knows? We may work together again, so fingers crossed.

Kayomi: Yeah. You're gonna boomerang. Yeah. When you're ninety, we're gonna do twenty years from now, we'll do a reunion episode.

Griff: Okay. It's you're on. I'll put it on my calendar. And now for the last time, we roll the credits. Georgea Mpampanis has been our monthly co host and guest coordinator. Thank you, Georgea.

Kayomi: And I'm your weekly co host, Kayomi Kayoshi.

Griff: And I'm your editor in chief and your honored host, Griff. The eBay for Business podcast has been produced in house and distributed by Quill and cohost. Bye bye, Kayomi.

Kayomi: Bye, Griff. See you later.

Griff: Yeah. We'll see you. So long, everyone, and continued happy selling.