December 2023 Error code 80016 The seller doesn't offer combined postage discounts

[georger45]

In March 2023 I started to get complaints from buyers that when they clicked 'request total' to ask for an invoice with combined postage ebay was giving them an error message stating (wrongly) that I did not offer combined postage discounts. Some buyers protested that they would not buy from a seller who didn't offer combined postage. I had to explain to them that the ebay error message was a lie and that it was ebay that wasn't allowing combined postage, not me.

Ebay CS seemed unaware of the issue but said they would look into it. Googling led me to a discussion on this forum in which many other sellers said they were having the same problem. Some comments were from sellers who had the problem years ago and ebay never fixed it so it seemed like it was a long standing issue which seems to crop up on people's accounts randomly (or for reasons ebay will not disclose) and which ebay seems unable or unwilling to fix. Eventually an ebay representative called Kat created a support ticket to which we could add our accounts and we waited for the issue to be fixed...

While waiting (without much hope) for a fix I applied my own solution using a combination of refunding buyers after purchase and setting up what ebay calls flat postage rules to add a small increment for each additional item. This works well enough usually but is a bit hit and miss and some of my customers still prefer to use the 'request total' function.

Some weeks later the issue did get fixed, at least for my account, but not for long. It was soon broken again ... and then fixed again!

Six months later and it is broken again! But oddly, only for some customers. Some requests get through, others get the (lying) error message. It is unbelievable that a company the size of ebay can be incapable of fixing a simple tech issue so I begin to wonder if they just don't care.

I have tried to access the previous thread to ask for help but it no longer seems accessible, ebay says the content has been 'archived'. Swept under the carpet seems more like it.

So I am opening a new thread in a attempt to get ebay to take notice of this issue again. If any other sellers are having the same problem, please post a reply on this thread, if enough of us complain maybe someone at ebay will take notice. 

My request to ebay is this: FIX THIS ISSUE ONCE AND FOR ALL!. And if you can't, or won't, at least stop lying to my customers by telling them that I don't offer combined postage discounts and admit that it is YOUR FAULT, NOT MINE. And if you are still out there Kat, please come back and help us out.

[anita@ebay]

Hi @georger45, thanks for your post.

In order to look into this, can you give me an example of a sale where the buyer is unable to request a total.

If you can share the item number, date of the sale, and the screenshot showing the error message, that would be great.

Thanks,

Anita

[georger45]

Hi Anita,

Thanks for replying to my post. The most recent example of this was a
buyer in France just before Christmas. Here are the details:

Buyer name: 

Buyer id:

Order number: 20-10956-04483

Order date: 22/12/2023

I've included the order number above rather than the item numbers
because there were 12 items in that order. I can give you the individual
item numbers if you really need them. He sent me screenshots of his
basket and of the error message he got when he clicked the 'request
total' link which I have attached. They are in French, of course, but
the message seems to be same as the English one.

I had another buyer in Canada who got the error message on an order in
October, I think, but another buyer in Australia who placed an order in
December for whom the system worked. Also, before I wrote this reply, I
tried using the system on my listings by trying to buy some items from
myself (!) using another ebay account, and the system worked. I got the
invoice request. But I know that other sellers in the UK are affected
because I have seen that error message myself when buying things on ebay
from other sellers. So this time the problems seems to only affect some
ebay users or maybe only happens some of the time.

Thanks for offering to look into it, I will be interested to hear what
you find. Oh, and, as I hinted at in my forum post, if ebay is unable to
actually fix this, could they at least replace the error message with
one that does not blame the seller for the lack of combined postage?

George Horton

[anita@ebay]

Hi @georger45, thanks for your reply.

I'm afraid I am unable to see any added screenshots. Looking at the order, since the buyer has already paid, unfortunately I am also unable to replicate the error message. Would you have any other example of a buyer not being able to request a total that hasn't paid yet? That would be really helpful.

Also, due to PII we can only request an item number(s) (no buyer User ID or order ID), so if such information is in the screenshot, can you cover it please.

I would also recommend double-checking the Postage preferences (time period that allows to combine payments has different options/limited period).

I also noticed that you have created 'Flat postage rules' that may have interfered with requesting total invoice. Can you try deselecting the 'Flat postage rule' and only allow 'Combined payments' temporarily to see if that helps.

Thank you,

Anita

[georger45]

Hi Anita, thanks for getting back to me. Unfortunately I don't have another example of the problem because, unlike when this happened last year, it is only occurring intermittently this time and hasn't happened again, at least not to my knowledge. I don't know whether a buyer has been confronted with the error message and abandoned the transaction rather than contact me about it. My time for buyers to combine items for postage is set at 14 days so I don't think that's the problem and flat postage rules certainly didn't trigger the problem originally because I only set them up after this happened the first time early last year. In what way do flat postage rules interact with the 'request total' function?

[anita@ebay]

Hi @georger45, thanks for your reply.

Buyer would need to commit to buy the items first before they will have a chance to 'Request combined invoice', meaning there shouldn't be any abandoned transactions that you are not aware of, as you would see their order in your sold section before they attempt to request total.

As for the flat postage rule, noted. My guess was that it may have applied the flat postage rule, therefore didn't allow to combine postage for additional discount, but that's not that then. Since the order was already paid, I'm afraid I won't able to replicate the error, however if you do get another example, please do let us know and we'll be happy to look into this further.

In the meantime, if buyer pays for the shipping in full, you can still offer a combined shipping discount by sending a partial refund to the buyer from the Orders tab in Seller Hub or My eBay Sold.

Thank you,

Anita