eBay's false estimated delivery dates, now several messages from buyers not happy.

[lincolnshiremarine]

I have been going on about this issue like a broken record.  I have reported it several times and even been on the community chat several times.  Ebay claim the EDD's are working fine.  They are not.

Ebay are giving buyers delivery dates as same day deliveries, next day deliveries.  Even when buyers have  have selected the free, three day delivery, they are including non working days as delivery dates being Saturday and Sundays.

I know that other sellers are being affected by this too, and have reported it too.

However, I am now spending hours replying to buyers whom think their parcel is late based on ebays estimated delivery dates. 

This leaves my business open for negative feedback and the issue of asking ebay to remove it.

The messages I am getting from buyers are:

" Hi not to pleased due to the fact I ordered this part from your company because of the delivery time and it’s not happened! Hopefully this item will turn up soon"

"parcel not arrived yet ??"

Both of those cases where when they purchased over a weekend, and they were dropped of at the parcel shop for collection the same day of purchase. However, this was over the weekend.  Ebay tracking has said to expect the delivery on Monday, which is wrong, as they included weekends as the courier collection and delivery days.

When you look on the couriers webiste the delivery dates are correct and ebays are incorrect.

We have had the same issue with Royal Mail tracked on ebay too.

How many more sellers are now getting messages like this on a daily basis, and what are you telling the buyers.?

I have been selling on ebay for 16 years and we dispatch the items on time, but, this ebay EDD are on another level now.

We look like we are fabricating delivery dates just to obtain a sale, and although we have tried tweaking the postage days etc, it does not help.

marco@ebay

Katie@ebay

Dave@ebay

[studiomaster_uk]

I noticed two "late delivery" items flagged today, both of which were send on time, marked as despatched on time, sent earlier in the year by RM 2nd class large letter. The report shows "Postal courier indicated late delivery" - this is nonsense, there is no tracking with RM 2nd class and RM don't scan an item with no QR code or barcode. It also shows "Buyer confirmed late delivery", yet they left 'good' positive feedback without any mention of late delivery. Looking at the estimated delivery dates  given by ebay one would think that it was likely they would have arrived within this window given that they were items sent to a domestic address which would fit a normal letter box BUT sellers have no control over RM 2nd class delivery times! On top of this, we all know that the once 'tacit understanding' that RM 2nd class transit time was 2-3 days has 'gone out of the window' and they now have release to handle 2nd class deliveries as it suits them. 2nd class deliveries times are now subject to so many variables it's impossible for either a seller or ebay to know the transit time which may be involved. (Let's be sensible ebay, we know that RM regularly default on 1st class delivery times where they are obligated, so we can't expect anything more than 'best efforts' for 2nd class, can we?) Some items only suit RM 2nd class shipment because the size and value dictates that a buyer is (sensibly) not willing to pay more for an alternate service.

There is no guarantee that the buyer would have paid the slightest attention to ebay's delivery time estimates (or even read it!) when completing feeback or that they didn't confuse orders, arrival date and / or accidentally check the wrong box.  The result is that ebay are, to all intents, issuing erronious and / or unfair late delivery strikes without any controls in place. This is ridiculous when sellers are using their best efforts to ensure that items are despatched on time using the buyers choice of carrier. It buyers don't want RM 2nd class they can select or request otherwise - but invariable they don't! They just click and checkout using the default arrangements - or sometimes ebay just does it automatically for them.

So, due to all this 'nonsense' I am now showing an appx. 5% delivery default rate when it should reasonably be zero. That isn't good enough, ebay, nor is it fair and reasonable. These 'defaults' were not there at one time, but the appeared at some point, I don't know when, and are only just spotted. I don't have the time to refer these cases for review every time they might crop up, nor should I have to. (They are now far too old for "request feedback revision" anyway.)

This is yet another issue to put sellers off using ebay as a platform, sellers don't come here to be unnecessarily castigated like this!

O/T:

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[alansalterationsstore]

Totally agree with this...most of my postage for the past 4 weeks....PURCHASED THROUGH EBAY.......has still not been delivered.....

The RM really need addressing.

[your.home.consoles.world.ltd]

I completely agree with you. Unfortunately, buyers have a different opinion on this. For some reason known only to them, people defend RM like lions; just mention that it is a delivery service like any other, where people work (just like everywhere), so mistakes happen (just like everywhere), and you start getting rather vulgar responses.

[tribalgiftsuk]

Royal Mail is truly on its knees this year and despite extending my delivery dates im still getting INR's for items over 10 days late. There is a huge list of postcodes they are not coping with deliveries in now and i have stopped selling as i cant afford any more INR's.

I think selling low value items on Ebay where you send normal 2nd class as letter or large letter is no longer an option at this time of year, i had loads of INR's last year as well but not as bad as this year. It would have helped if Ebay would properly show the benefit to the customer of upgrading to 1st or tracked but they dont.

So i am sure Amazon are rubbing their hands with glee and more and more customers are buying elsewhere and i cant blame them tbh.

[theelench]

Something I've wondered about. 

[ojewellery]

When people defend RM in this context, it is usually for a reason that goes beyond individual delivery errors. Royal Mail is not just “another courier.” It is the only UK delivery service that is legally bound by the Universal Service Obligation to deliver letters and parcels from the Highlands and Islands to central cities (and everywhere in between) at a single, uniform price. That obligation exists in law and is regulated by Ofcom.

Every other major carrier is free to do what makes commercial sense: cherry-pick profitable routes, surcharge remote areas heavily, or not serve them at all.

Royal Mail (in theory) cannot do that. It must serve rural, island, and hard-to-reach communities on the same terms as urban centres, although I'm not convinced this is truly being met

The ongoing reports, and so many sellers findings, of service failures, different service level in different areas - sometimes it feels like it operates like lots of franchises rather than one business.  The unpredictability of service, regular fines and random surcharges does bring up if it is fit for purpose and whether the Universal Service Obligation is what sellers are actually defending. 

Maybe its the USO we need to revisit to ensure that the whole country is catered for.