topic Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm in Chat with the eBay Community Team

Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

community-team@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 15:05:44 GMT

Hi everybody!

The Community Chat will open at 2pm and will remain open until 3pm on Wednesday. After that it will be closed for further questions. Of course, we will continue to take care of answering any questions that may still be unanswered—We’ll get to everything as quickly as possible.

Please ask your questions in the thread below. In order to be able to answer your questions as quickly as possible, we ask you to have one question per post. Of course, you can make as many posts as you like in the Chat- the more the merrier!

Our eBay Community Team is made up of kat@ebay, marco@ebay and dave@ebay. Between us, we have knowledge in Buying, Selling, Fulfilment, Payments, and the Community itself. Anything we aren’t sure on we’ll know the people who will be! Please ask us any questions you may have and we’ll do all we can to support. We understand that certain topics, such as concerns about businesses possibly using private accounts, can be frustrating and important to you. Please refrain from asking the same question repeatedly in our weekly live chats. We assure you that we carefully review all posts in the forum and ensure that your concerns are communicated to the relevant teams for appropriate action.
To maintain a constructive and community environment, posts that repeatedly breach this guideline may be removed. Continued violations could result in further action against your community account. We appreciate your cooperation and understanding in helping us keep our community focused and respectful.

To ask your question, click Reply in the lower-right corner of this post, type your question, and click Reply between 2pm and 3pm. The community team will answer each incoming question in chronological order and will quote the original question in each answer.

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If you missed the weekly chat time, please ask your question in the community boards and tag us or we will be back next week with another chat!

Many thanks,

Your eBay Community Team

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

nutrafituk — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:02:33 GMT

Hi all,

I’m posting this as an eBay business seller who goes to considerable effort (and cost) to remain fully compliant with eBay policies and UK regulations.

According to eBay’s Food policy and Prescription drugs, supplements, and OTC drugs policy, private sellers are not permitted to sell:

Food items (without being a registered food business), and
Medicines, vitamins, or sports supplements of any kind — these are restricted to business sellers only, with strict labelling, storage, and regulatory requirements.

Despite this, I have repeatedly come across private sellers actively offering food and sports supplements. These listings appear to be in direct breach of eBay policy.

What’s more concerning is that these listings have been reported multiple times, yet eBay has refused to take action, allowing them to remain live.

As a compliant business seller, this raises some serious questions:

Why are private sellers seemingly exempt from rules that business sellers must strictly follow?
Are there undocumented exceptions to these policies?
Or is this a case of inconsistent enforcement?

It’s increasingly frustrating to compete on an uneven playing field, where legitimate business sellers follow the rules while others appear free to ignore them without consequence.

I’d appreciate any insight from other sellers or moderators who may be able to explain what’s going on here.

Thanks.

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

more.treasure — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:04:40 GMT

Some of my buyers have not yet been refunded for unused simple delivery labels. The transactions I'm looking at are all more than 40 days ago - 1 from September, 1 in November and 4 in December. I called customer services on Sunday but their advice was to tell the individual buyers to contact Ebay customer services themselves to request repayment of the postage amounts. I thought this was supposed to be automatic.

Is there a problem with some cases, or is there now a significant backlog in dealing with these refunds? If the buyer does have to make a claim, at what point should they make it?

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

krafty-kreations — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:06:20 GMT

Hi All,

Could I make a suggestion, those never ending offers I receive every few months, get £200 off promoted ad fees and ads, 50% off promoted shop fees etc, can you add a decline button to clear them off the dashboard, none of these offers benefit me and once the shop subscription renews these offers will be at the top so I can no longer see how many shop subscription listings I have left without clicking on an arrow and scrolling down.

Another thought, why not offer us something like a free month shop once in a blue moon instead of offers that in my opinion only benefit eBay.

I cannot remember the last time eBay did anything to benefit me as a business seller, do we who are correctly registered and paying the fees not deserve something more than fee increases and offers that are just scream give us more money please.

In fact forget the free month shop, I would be happy with a fairer platform, one where those who break the rules and run a business on a private account, avoiding fees and breaking consumer law are dealt with instead of being rewarded with free to sell.

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

retrogam3s — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:07:55 GMT

Hello,

Upon the request of a buyer, I am trying to cancel an order (order number 27-14108-61323 – a Nintendo 3DS, item number 127611776567). However, a series of technical issues on eBay’s end are preventing me from doing so. I have received no help or answers from eBay so far.

Here is a detailed outline of what has happened:

The buyer purchased the item on January 21st at 23:22

The buyer then request to cancel the following morning at 06:42

Having tried to accept the buyer’s cancellation, I kept being presented with the error message “Well, that didn’t go as planned. Please go back and try again.” This was the same on all browsers and all devices, including PC and mobile, as well as the eBay mobile app itself. I tried all the usual troubleshooting steps including clearing cookies and logging in and out, but this didn’t work.

I contacted eBay customer services by phone call and explained the situation. They could not help me, but I was informed that someone would get back in 24 hours with a solution.

The next day came, and nobody got back to me as promised. I phoned eBay customer services again, who once again could not help, but this time told me that someone would get back in 48 hours with a solution.

Further technical issues regarding the same transaction have been noted. The order has completely disappeared from my order history, and cannot be found with any search terms such as the item title, order number or item ID.

Additionally I noticed that the payment for this transaction has been stuck processing since January 21st, with an expected completion date of January 22nd. This has long passed, and I have never known a payment take so long to process. There are no restrictions on my account, and I am a business seller with thousands of sales – usually payments are therefore processed within 24 hours.

If I try to bring up the order details from the “payment processing” section (which is the only place the item can be found at this point), I am given the error message “Unfortunately, there has been an error retrieving your order. Please try again later”.

48 hours after the previous call to eBay, I received a message from eBay which only explained the simple steps on how to cancel an order and nothing more. I am completely aware about the process of cancelling an order and have been for many years – but a technical issue is preventing me from cancelling. I contacted eBay once more. This time, I was told under no uncertain terms, that all the issues had been passed on to the technical team and “would be fixed within 48 hours”. I requested a call back to confirm this in 48 hours time, which they agreed to.

eBay have wasted so much time with this, that the buyer’s cancellation request has passed the 3 day time limit and has now timed out.

It has now been a further 48 hours, and none of the issues have been fixed as promised. Nobody has called back as requested. I do not know if eBay are taking any of this seriously, or even if the issues are genuinely being looked into. I feel like I’m getting nowhere with this, and that I’m being left to deal with this on my own. I keep being told that someone will help or get back to me, but nobody ever does.

Due to all of the above – I am now left unsure of what to do. I cannot bring up the order details, so I cannot send the item even if I wanted to. I also can’t find the order in my order history to attempt another cancellation. eBay have taken this buyer’s payment – but it’s still processing, and neither myself or the buyer have this. It does not seem right that the buyer’s payment is left in limbo until this is sorted, and it does not seem like my responsibility to sort out eBay’s technical issues.

In addition to all of this, I have been charged a promoted listing fee for the transaction which HAS been charged and deducted from my funds, and I will be requesting that this is reimbursed.

I have attached screenshots to show all of the technical issues experienced with this transaction so far.

I am now reaching out for help here, as so far I have not received any competent help from eBay customer services whatsoever. All I am simply asking is that this order is cancelled (as per the request of the buyer). I would appreciate any help, and thank you for your time.

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

marco@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:08:11 GMT

@more.treasure wrote:

Some of my buyers have not yet been refunded for unused simple delivery labels. The transactions I'm looking at are all more than 40 days ago - 1 from September, 1 in November and 4 in December. I called customer services on Sunday but their advice was to tell the individual buyers to contact Ebay customer services themselves to request repayment of the postage amounts. I thought this was supposed to be automatic.

Is there a problem with some cases, or is there now a significant backlog in dealing with these refunds? If the buyer does have to make a claim, at what point should they make it?

Hi more.treasure, thanks for your question.

I've just checked there, and no we have no reports suggesting an issue with this particular topic. This is an automatic process, and the buyer should see the refund eventually in their bank statement.

If they are not seeing a refund, they will have to contact us themselves, as you as the seller are not involved on the refund of the label, so we cannot action this from your account, they will have to contact us, so we can get that resolved for them.

Thank you,

Marco

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

kat@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:11:40 GMT

@krafty-kreations wrote:

Hi All,

Could I make a suggestion, those never ending offers I receive every few months, get £200 off promoted ad fees and ads, 50% off promoted shop fees etc, can you add a decline button to clear them off the dashboard, none of these offers benefit me and once the shop subscription renews these offers will be at the top so I can no longer see how many shop subscription listings I have left without clicking on an arrow and scrolling down.

Another thought, why not offer us something like a free month shop once in a blue moon instead of offers that in my opinion only benefit eBay.

I cannot remember the last time eBay did anything to benefit me as a business seller, do we who are correctly registered and paying the fees not deserve something more than fee increases and offers that are just scream give us more money please.

In fact forget the free month shop, I would be happy with a fairer platform, one where those who break the rules and run a business on a private account, avoiding fees and breaking consumer law are dealt with instead of being rewarded with free to sell.

Hi @krafty-kreations ,

We do appreciate you raising these points and understand where you are coming from as businesses sellers. I can't guarantee changes will be made regarding the decline button for the offers or a free month shop subscription but I will share your feedback with the relevant teams.

Thank you,

Kat

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

marco@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:12:01 GMT

Hi retrogam3s, thanks for your question.

Sorry to hear about this, but I will take a look at this for you no problem. Thanks for all the details, this is highly appreciated.

Leave this with me for now, I'll take a look to see if this can be resolved quickly, and if I can find an issue, I will get that reported to tech, so it can be resolved for you. Once I have an update, I will let you know over here.

Thank you,

Marco

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

cobwebcottage — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:12:36 GMT

Hi All,

Prompted by a recent post on the boards, can you tell me why private sellers are allowed to list pre sale items? Doesn't this directly contradict their own policies ( Business or private seller) as these items are purchased from another supplier?

It is very easy find these listings by searching 'pre sale'.

One seller has sold 148 items at £46 per item. Surely this would trigger an alarm bell somewhere.

Maybe Ebay have been concentrating too hard ending listings such as spatulas and cat claw scissors and have overlooked other serious offences.

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

dave@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:19:14 GMT

@nutrafituk wrote:

Hi all,

I’m posting this as an eBay business seller who goes to considerable effort (and cost) to remain fully compliant with eBay policies and UK regulations.

According to eBay’s Food policy and Prescription drugs, supplements, and OTC drugs policy, private sellers are not permitted to sell:

Food items (without being a registered food business), and

Medicines, vitamins, or sports supplements of any kind — these are restricted to business sellers only, with strict labelling, storage, and regulatory requirements.

Despite this, I have repeatedly come across private sellers actively offering food and sports supplements. These listings appear to be in direct breach of eBay policy.

What’s more concerning is that these listings have been reported multiple times, yet eBay has refused to take action, allowing them to remain live.

As a compliant business seller, this raises some serious questions:

Why are private sellers seemingly exempt from rules that business sellers must strictly follow?

Are there undocumented exceptions to these policies?

Or is this a case of inconsistent enforcement?

It’s increasingly frustrating to compete on an uneven playing field, where legitimate business sellers follow the rules while others appear free to ignore them without consequence.

I’d appreciate any insight from other sellers or moderators who may be able to explain what’s going on here.

Thanks.

Hi @nutrafituk

When you report a listing, it's routed to the relevant department for handling the query. They will then decide on the best action to take depending on the information available to them.

Unfortunately, we can't see any of the reports so I can comment on any action that was or wasn't taken. As we aren't part of the policy team and wouldn't be up to date on all the policies and so wouldn't be in a position to answer the above questions.

You can speak to the Customer Support teams through the usual channels, they will have agents who may be able to review reports and will have more information on the different policies.

Thanks,

Dave

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

marco@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:21:29 GMT

Hi @retrogam3s,

I was able to replicate this issue, and I can confirm the issue is from our end, not you nor the buyer. I've reported this for you now, and once this is resolve, I will post here again to let you know, so you can try again.

Please note that we don't have an estimated fix time, so I couldn't confirm when exactly this will be resolved, but again, I will let you know as soon as this is resolved.

Thank you,

Marco

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

retrogam3s — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:24:27 GMT

Thank you for helping with that so quickly, and hopefully this is all sorted soon. Yes if you could please give me an update when the issue has been fixed, that would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again.

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

marco@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:26:17 GMT

@retrogam3s wrote:

Thank you for helping with that so quickly, and hopefully this is all sorted soon. Yes if you could please give me an update when the issue has been fixed, that would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again.

That's no problem, retrogam3s. Happy to help!

Yes, I will let you know once that's sorted, don't worry about it. I will tag you, so you get a notification as well.

Thank you,

Marco

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

more.treasure — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:26:57 GMT

Hi Marco,

Thanks for the reply. Are there any Ebay help pages covering this, and/or a telephone contact? I doubt anyone wants to spend time trying to get through the chatbot for a relatively small sum.

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

nutrafituk — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:27:33 GMT

Hi Dave,

Thank you for your reply. I understand that individual agents may not have visibility of reports or policy details. However, as a compliant business seller, I’m still unclear on the broader issue of consistent enforcement regarding private sellers offering food items and supplements.

I continue to see multiple listings from private sellers that appear to clearly breach eBay’s Food and Prescription Drugs, Supplements, and OTC Drugs policies. These listings have been reported repeatedly, yet no action seems to be taken.

This raises serious questions:

Why are some sellers seemingly exempt from rules that business sellers must strictly follow?
Are there undocumented exceptions to these policies?
Or is this a case of inconsistent enforcement?

eBay provides an appeal feature for sellers to challenge decisions, which suggests there should be consistency and transparency in enforcement. If reports against policy-violating listings go unresolved, it undermines both compliance and fairness for legitimate sellers who follow the rules.

I would greatly appreciate it if this could be escalated to the relevant policy or compliance team for clarification. Specifically, I would like insight into whether:

Reports for these types of listings are being reviewed systematically.
Private sellers are truly permitted to sell items restricted to business sellers.
There is guidance available for business sellers regarding enforcement consistency.

Understanding this would help me continue to operate fully within eBay rules while competing fairly.

Thank you for your time and assistance.

Thanks again.

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

kat@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:27:42 GMT

@cobwebcottage wrote:

Hi All,

Prompted by a recent post on the boards, can you tell me why private sellers are allowed to list pre sale items? Doesn't this directly contradict their own policies ( Business or private seller) as these items are purchased from another supplier?

It is very easy find these listings by searching 'pre sale'.

One seller has sold 148 items at £46 per item. Surely this would trigger an alarm bell somewhere.

Maybe Ebay have been concentrating too hard ending listings such as spatulas and cat claw scissors and have overlooked other serious offences.

Hi @cobwebcottage ,

There isn't a policy against private sellers listing pre-sale items. While I understand that it would primarily be business sellers for these type of items there can be cases of private sellers having once off pre-sale items. Your seller example is not one of these once off items as they seem to be selling more like a business seller due to the amount of items. I appreciate you don't always see the action taken by eBay for private accounts but there is regular reviews taking place. I'll share your feedback for this particular category having more business like sellers trading as private.

Thank you,

Kat

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

marco@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:31:41 GMT

@more.treasure wrote:

Hi Marco,

Thanks for the reply. Are there any Ebay help pages covering this, and/or a telephone contact? I doubt anyone wants to spend time trying to get through the chatbot for a relatively small sum.

Hi more.treasure, thanks for your reply.

Yes, you can share this page with your buyers if you want, so the can they contact us from there,

Thank you,

Marco

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

cobwebcottage — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:32:19 GMT

Thank you Kat,

Although it is worth noting that the majority of private sellers who are selling pre sale items are selling these in bulk.

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

kat@ebay — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:35:53 GMT

@cobwebcottage wrote:

Thank you Kat,

Although it is worth noting that the majority of private sellers who are selling pre sale items are selling these in bulk.

Thanks @cobwebcottage that is a fair point. I'll include that in the feedback.

Thank you,

Kat

Re: Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 28.01.26 @2pm

notimpressedatall — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 14:36:51 GMT

I have many more pictures to share that ebay seems not to have any issue with - another one attached here. If you struggle to act, I am happy to reach out outside ebay if needed.