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

[theelench]

You're probably right but that just shows how really, really stupid ebay is.

I've been here for about ten years and ebay has always been regarded by sellers as "optimistic" when it comes to when ebay "estimates" buyers should get their purchase delivered.  But neither sellers or ebay took much notice if delivery wasn't quite "On Time".

Ebay became a little more insistent after it started skimming money off P&P , but still wasn't too insistent and relied on "persuasion".  If it could persuade, cajole or frighten sellers into using more expensive delivery options, it could skim-off even more.  --   K-ching

A little later, ebay thought it was being clever and twisting arms further up seller's backs, by inventing the totally flawed "Late Dispatch Metric" where late DELIVERY was deemed to prove late DISPATCH, unless the seller sent by a tracked service to prove their innocence.  --  K-ching.

Only then did any seller with common-sense start to lengthen their Handling Time.  Only to give themselves a few extra days leeway before ebay deemed their delivery (and therefore) their dispatch was late and entirely the seller's fault.  Many, many sellers did this in self-defence. 

I think this level of dis-obedience infuriated ebay, as did the lost opportunity to make more money.

So it wasn't long before Late Deliver Defects were rolled out, with appropriate penalties (which I don't remember the details of) and as that didn't fill ebays pockets enough, ebay invented its very own "proprietary calculation" with even harsher penalties for those still dis-obeying. 

It was ALWAYS ebay that made Delivery Dates an issue.  It's ALWAYS ebay that has tried to beat sellers with Delivery Dates for its own gain and the situation we have now is ENTIRELY of ebays making.

IT has NEVER been about sellers honouring the dispatch times they promised buyers.

Nor has it EVER been about forcing sellers to be more efficient.

It most certainly isn't about buyer satisfaction.  You don't get satisfied buyers by consistently Over Promising and Under Delivering,  giving them impossible-to-achieve expectations and telling them lies.

This Is, Was and Always Will Be about ebay maximising its take from P&P charges.

[exponential_developments]

And ebay's attempt to compete with Amazon, personally i'd rather truthful dates so i can plan to be at home, not a load of carp that messes me around.

[xxxxxvalkyriexxxxx]

E bays solution to this is that buyers can now cancel an item without any
repercussion to themselves or the seller.

I have now had several cancellations with the reason 'will not arrive on
time' despite the items clearly listed as 2 to 3 days despatch time. When I
enquired with the buyers as to the 'real' reason why they have cancelled
their answers were that e bay had given them an estimated date of next day
delivery and that on thinking about it, their purchase would not be there
the next day so they had changed their mind. The cancellations were all
asked for before the items were even due to be posted!

As all my items are hand made to order I've had to abandon some half
finished projects at a loss to me.

[a45heaven]

Is this the only platform you sell on?

Expand to suit your needs.

[vintagechinashop]

One thing that always has annoyed me about the late delivery metrics is the total fantasy that is the peer percentage.  We have absolutely no way of verifying this   My rates have always been very high even though my current percentage is 2.1%. But according to eBay my peers are at 0%   I find this very hard to believe 

in addition I have lost 3 cases because the tracking was only uploaded after the case was opened 

I clearly remember being told when this metric was brought in that. As long as you despatched on time you would be protected however clearly we are now being measured by the delivery date.  2 of my late delivery marks are where the buyer failed to collect the item from the post office honestly how can that be my fault but in eBay land it is 

I've given up jumping through all these hoops to get top seller rated because it makes absolutely no difference as far as I'm concerned 

[station13thirteen]

Yes, we no longer jump through the ebay hoops.  If they want to keep making it harder for us sellers, not listen to us nor care, then the last thing we are going to do is indulge them unnecessarily.

Though we leave automated feedback on our sales, we now no longer bother leaving feedback on purchases we make since eBay made that more dificult and time-consuming by doing away with pre-written responses (at least we no longer have that option). We are continually bombarded with 'please leave feedback' messages from eBay, which we ignore and delete... up yours!

We are now considering not leaving any feedback at all. Nothing worse than leaving positive feedback automatically then having to deal with an obnoxious a-hole because his RM 2nd class post is not with him before we have even posted it!

[station13thirteen]

Also, we always post out next working day, so technically we should never get a 'not dispatched on time' penalty, but somehow eBay manages to achieve this for us.

This is what eBay say:  'If you dispatch on time and upload a validated tracking number, or your buyers tell us their items were posted on time when they leave Feedback, you've got nothing to worry about.'

'Nothing to worry about', lol. Not that we worry anymore about the eBay nonsense, but it is ridiculous and infuriating

Just how the hell can the buyer know if it was dispatched on time?  All the buyer knows is when the item arrives. So if RM dily-dalies or the buyer expects a 2nd class RM package to arrive next day and when it doesn't they then call it a late delivery implying that it was not dispatched on time, then even if it was dispatched next day it's our fault, on the naughty step, and there's another penalty mark!

For crying out loud... the world has gone nuts!

[johnwash1]

RM 2nd class is supposed to be a couple of business days.  But I've had such packages take well over a week sometimes this year.

[station13thirteen]

We've recently had some RM 2nd class post take between 7 to 10 days! 

Then trying to keep irate buyers calm and understanding can be a pain.  The thing is buyers often open a INR claim before giving it a chance to arrive, and before even contacting us.  In our experience the post nearly always does arrive, eventually, but it is us, not RM that have to suffer the consequences from eBay and buyers.

I always wonder just how much priority 1st class RM post take over 2nd class.  I can imagine that at times the pressure to keep 1st class post delivered on time keeps pushing 2nd class post further down the delivery ladder.

[johnwash1]

---

@station13thirteen wrote:

We've recently had some RM 2nd class post take between 7 to 10 days! 

Then trying to keep irate buyers calm and understanding can be a pain.  The thing is buyers often open a INR claim before giving it a chance to arrive, and before even contacting us.  In our experience the post nearly always does arrive, eventually, but it is us, not RM that have to suffer the consequences from eBay and buyers.

I always wonder just how much priority 1st class RM post take over 2nd class.  I can imagine that at times the pressure to keep 1st class post delivered on time keeps pushing 2nd class post further down the delivery ladder.

---

More likely in some areas they're rarely delivering either, from some of the news stories.  I think I'm quite lucky that I send out several parcels a week with Click and Collect, and on those days I get my post.  The days between, not so often.  Coincidence?  And that's despite the fact that our postie is excellent and friendly, so I think the problem is further back in the chain.

I rarely get hit with INR, but my settings are 5 days to despatch, using a 5 day 'other courier'.

[delightful-uk]

I have today tried to ask for the specific EDD calculations on the following scenario.

Our working days are set for 7 days with no despatch on Sunday and a cut off of lunchtime on Saturday.  Our listings have zero handling days and Tracked 48 (2-3 working day delivery).

So a purchase made on Saturday pm, would get despatched Monday then 2-3 working days delivery time ie Thursday.

Ebay gave the buyer an EDD of Monday-Tuesday 

Ebay have confirmed that if the item was delivered Thursday then any late defect would be removed.  

BUT if the buyer leaves bad feedback against the order it would NOT be removed - as they use a different EDD for feedback - it would have had to be delivered on the Wednesday.

I have no idea why they are using a different EDD for Feedback than the one being used for late defects and it makes no sense to me whatsoever - but when asking specifically why I get told that it is working as intended.   

If anyone can help me understand why they are doing these please let me know.

[technthread]

They have lost the plot.  

They won't change it in the assumption that if they do, sales will plummet. So the seller either upgrades to 1st Class / next day equivalent or hopes for sensible buyers who won't neg over it. 

[a45heaven]

or not include any tracking or postage info onto the ebay system , including online postage which inter links.

[technthread]

In eBay's world you promote at a high %, offer Tracked 24 and price high.

No good for buyers imo, I think they would accept a great deal and 3 day delivery but maybe I need to adjust my thinking.

[station13thirteen]

---

If anyone can help me understand why they are doing these please let me know.

---

I have now concluded that there is nothing to understand really. They simply do not care; they just do as they please and let us suffer the consequences. And you just can't reason with idiots. 

As Mark Twain once said:  “Never argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience".

[technthread]

Great quote 

[technthread]

I have been selling a bit on Vinted. If a buyer chooses InPost Home Delivery it's taking 4-5 days as it takes a while to get to Royal Mail for delivery. Nobody cares. I can price lower and am getting sales. 

If eBay want to become like Am Prime great, take my stock off me in a fulfilment centre and crack on I'll pay them to do it. 

[dch2112011]

ebay already offer fulfillment and seperately will promote a product for you for a price (they will decide whether the product is suitable and it must have a large quantity - This has been around for a few years 

Now it looks like Prime is being rolled out for sellers replacing top rated plus and for buyers getting free delivery -  it is aimed at the medium to big sellers in reality 

[technthread]

Thanks I'll check that out

[dch2112011]

here's the link to ebay fulfillment 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sellercentre/postage/fulfilment