💬 Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 05.04.23 @2pm

[community-team@ebay]

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 , dave@ebay  and katie@ebay . Between us, we have knowledge in Buying, Selling, ProTrader, Fulfilment, Parts & Accessories, 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. 

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. 

Please note that any reply without a question to the community team or discussion replies may be removed from the chat. We want to keep on track to get through as many questions as possible. We welcome all discussion to be moved to the discussion boards. 

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

[retroclub]

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dave@ebay wrote:

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@retroclub wrote:

Thanks Dave, using Royal Mail business CRL service so all items have a QR code for tracking but it's not required by Royal Mail for the post worker to scan the item so it will only be scanned/marked as delivered on eBay if the QR code is scanned.

If we mark the item as shipped at 8pm today on eBay my worry is does ebay then say this is DAY 1 so the expected delivery date would be one day sooner than if we had marked it as shipped one minute after midnight on the actual day RM will process it.

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Hi @retroclub 

Thats correct, once the item marks as dispatched it counts as day one. It sounds its overriding your cut off time. I will need to look further into it to make sure that's whats happening. 

Thanks,

Dave

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Could you confirm then if you ship the item (mark as dispatched) at 8pm in the evening then the ebay system would class that as on the way and that actually you shouldnt mark it as shipped until after midnight?

I would imagine millions of private users ship packages/print labels/buy labels in the evening which would mean that millions of buyers would see tracking and expect it one day early. 

[ducatimondo]

We sold an item on Thursday last week, 30th March at 9.55am

Was before our cut off for same day shipping.

Buyer picked the free delivery option of RM48 which is not now and never has been 48 hour delivery. It is merely a business equivalent of 2nd class post.

2nd class post is an economy service, the cheapest service Royal Mail offer and RM48 is the same service. Literally the difference between the two is that 2nd class has no VAT content in it's price, RM48 has VAT content it's price. They are otherwise the same, identical, no differences, one does not get special treatment compared to the other, equal in all regards, co exist in state of equitable parity.
According to the Royal Charter that the Royal Mai must follow, 2nd class post and all derivatives is a 2-5 working day service, excluding public holidays, bank holidays and the day of posting.

So why does eBay insist on telling the buyer the item will arrive between 31st March - 1st April?

I fully expect the eBay reply will be that you are constantly monitoring previous performance and it is a variable estimate based upon that.

Why have buyers constantly disappointed in delivery speed?
Why have sellers constantly wasting their time explaining to buyers that the item is not late.

Buyers constantly accuse us of sending items late, etc as they do not arrive withing eBay's cuckoo land estimates.

I am at the point of being sick and tired of the same being rinsed and repeated.

Can eBay just tell buyers that the cheap option is free, but not fast and certainly not priority delivery. Just tell buyers the truth. It would stop a lot of wasted time for sellers. It would stop a lot of disappointed for buyers. It would mean sellers would have more time to work on other areas of their business, which might include answering important questions that lead to more sales. Have more time to list items so they can grow their business. eBay could also have the chance of making more money too, as if there is no point to pay to upgrade the shipping to a faster service, then eBay and their shareholders loose an additional revenue stream, as you do not take a percentage of what has not sold. If no one buys the upgraded delivery, because economy is now told as priority, then you will not get the FVF's from the upgrade to 1st class / RM24 or Special Delivery.

Literally everyone wins if this is fixed and buyers are told the truth.

Buyers have a better experience and feel honesty has been restored with the sellers about realistic delivery times.

Sellers get less hassle answering about why something that is not late, is apparently late.

eBay get more return buyers as they have a better experience overall, as the service they receive better matches what they thought they were getting.

eBay have a chance of additional revenue from buyers that would happily pay more for faster shipping but do not bother as the free delivery is arriving the next day anyway!!

Please can some one from eBay have a proper look at this and get it sorted.

I am fairly sure that no one really cares about the dynamic delivery estimates, just say the following

2nd class / RM48 - 2-5 working day delivery

1st class / RM24 - 1-3 working day delivery

RM Special Delivery - 1 working day delivery

If everyone is told 2nd class / RM48 is 1-2 day, they are never paying for an upgrade and always blaming sellers, often sending us a message saying that "we told them" delivery will be 1-2 day, etc

If a buyer os told the item will be delivered in 2-5 working days and does arrive in 2-3 days, they are very happy. Versus them being told 1-2 days and it takes 3-4 and them being disappointed.

It is better to under promise and over deliver, than to over promise and under deliver.

Members here are constantly taking about this self same issue and nothing ever happens, eBay hold seller's to account for promises we cannot keep and definitely would not and do not make. Buyer will always be happier if you exceed their expectations, rather than constantly doing the opposite by failing to meet their expectations.

Please, please, please can you do something to stop this misleading buyers with the quite frankly bonkers and way out of touch delivery estimates.

Cheers

Russ

[maggna]

Taken from today's EDD announcement:

"In the event your items arrive after the end of the date range shown to your buyer, as long as tracking shows you dispatched your items on time and used both the service and carrier you specified on your listing, you’ll be protected against late delivery defects."

Is eBay going to be taking into account that there may be reasons that this may not be possible, and at times as a seller, we have to use different carriers or services to deliver an order? Such as some carriers may not cover a delivery address, the order is for multiple items and is too large for the carrier shown in the listing. Or in our case, we use multiple carriers that collect at different times during the day, if an order has come in after one carrier's collection time we may use another carrier that is still to collect later that day. 

[drymartini*]

Hi Dave

This is the same reply you gave previously.

It has nothing to do with the category not existing on .com (or other ebay sites) because it does.

You promised to give an update, but now it's as if you do not even accept there is a problem?!

[dave@ebay]

---

@presentdays wrote:

Hi,

I received an email today from eBay telling me that by adding gtin numbers to some of my listings will help improve their visibility on promotions.

It says there are 41 listings with an issue but they are not listed on my overview and the few that are listed on the email when clicked do not have the option to add a barcode.

Any help appreciated

---

Hi @presentdays 

When the system scans over an account there can be a delay between it processing and the automated mails getting sent. This can mean some items have ended and relisted under a new item ID. Some of the suggestions may not have been a specific when the item was originally listed so if you revise a listing that has been autorenewing for some time the suggestion may not be there. 

For the items that are active but don't have the specific you can create one for the GTIN and add the number. 

[dave@ebay]

---

@ducatimondo wrote:

We sold an item on Thursday last week, 30th March at 9.55am

Was before our cut off for same day shipping.

Buyer picked the free delivery option of RM48 which is not now and never has been 48 hour delivery. It is merely a business equivalent of 2nd class post.

2nd class post is an economy service, the cheapest service Royal Mail offer and RM48 is the same service. Literally the difference between the two is that 2nd class has no VAT content in it's price, RM48 has VAT content it's price. They are otherwise the same, identical, no differences, one does not get special treatment compared to the other, equal in all regards, co exist in state of equitable parity.
According to the Royal Charter that the Royal Mai must follow, 2nd class post and all derivatives is a 2-5 working day service, excluding public holidays, bank holidays and the day of posting.

So why does eBay insist on telling the buyer the item will arrive between 31st March - 1st April?

I fully expect the eBay reply will be that you are constantly monitoring previous performance and it is a variable estimate based upon that.

Why have buyers constantly disappointed in delivery speed?
Why have sellers constantly wasting their time explaining to buyers that the item is not late.

Buyers constantly accuse us of sending items late, etc as they do not arrive withing eBay's cuckoo land estimates.

I am at the point of being sick and tired of the same being rinsed and repeated.

Can eBay just tell buyers that the cheap option is free, but not fast and certainly not priority delivery. Just tell buyers the truth. It would stop a lot of wasted time for sellers. It would stop a lot of disappointed for buyers. It would mean sellers would have more time to work on other areas of their business, which might include answering important questions that lead to more sales. Have more time to list items so they can grow their business. eBay could also have the chance of making more money too, as if there is no point to pay to upgrade the shipping to a faster service, then eBay and their shareholders loose an additional revenue stream, as you do not take a percentage of what has not sold. If no one buys the upgraded delivery, because economy is now told as priority, then you will not get the FVF's from the upgrade to 1st class / RM24 or Special Delivery.

Literally everyone wins if this is fixed and buyers are told the truth.

Buyers have a better experience and feel honesty has been restored with the sellers about realistic delivery times.

Sellers get less hassle answering about why something that is not late, is apparently late.

eBay get more return buyers as they have a better experience overall, as the service they receive better matches what they thought they were getting.

eBay have a chance of additional revenue from buyers that would happily pay more for faster shipping but do not bother as the free delivery is arriving the next day anyway!!

Please can some one from eBay have a proper look at this and get it sorted.

I am fairly sure that no one really cares about the dynamic delivery estimates, just say the following

2nd class / RM48 - 2-5 working day delivery

1st class / RM24 - 1-3 working day delivery

RM Special Delivery - 1 working day delivery

If everyone is told 2nd class / RM48 is 1-2 day, they are never paying for an upgrade and always blaming sellers, often sending us a message saying that "we told them" delivery will be 1-2 day, etc

If a buyer os told the item will be delivered in 2-5 working days and does arrive in 2-3 days, they are very happy. Versus them being told 1-2 days and it takes 3-4 and them being disappointed.

It is better to under promise and over deliver, than to over promise and under deliver.

Members here are constantly taking about this self same issue and nothing ever happens, eBay hold seller's to account for promises we cannot keep and definitely would not and do not make. Buyer will always be happier if you exceed their expectations, rather than constantly doing the opposite by failing to meet their expectations.

Please, please, please can you do something to stop this misleading buyers with the quite frankly bonkers and way out of touch delivery estimates.

Cheers

Russ

---

Hi @ducatimondo 

Thanks for the above, I will as always send these examples back to the shipping to review.

Thanks,

Dave

[kat@ebay]

---

@maggna wrote:

Taken from today's EDD announcement:

"In the event your items arrive after the end of the date range shown to your buyer, as long as tracking shows you dispatched your items on time and used both the service and carrier you specified on your listing, you’ll be protected against late delivery defects."

Is eBay going to be taking into account that there may be reasons that this may not be possible, and at times as a seller, we have to use different carriers or services to deliver an order? Such as some carriers may not cover a delivery address, the order is for multiple items and is too large for the carrier shown in the listing. Or in our case, we use multiple carriers that collect at different times during the day, if an order has come in after one carrier's collection time we may use another carrier that is still to collect later that day. 

---

Hi @maggna ,

While I understand sellers will have different circumstances according to their own situations eBay offer protection by the information stated in your listings. 

Thank you,

Kat

[dave@ebay]

---

@drymartini* wrote:

Hi Dave

This is the same reply you gave previously.

It has nothing to do with the category not existing on .com (or other ebay sites) because it does.

You promised to give an update, but now it's as if you do not even accept there is a problem?!

---

Hi @drymartini* 

There is no tech issue with how these items are displayed, when buyers search, your items are showing as they should. 

I have asked for clarification on how sellers items are displayed when viewing their other items, I'll come back to you with an explanation when I have one. 

Thanks,

Dave