Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 21.02.24 @2pm

[community-team@ebay]

Hi everyone,

Our eBay Community Team is made up of marco@ebay, @dave@ebay  and katie@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. 

How the chat works:

• The chat will open at 2pm and will remain open for new questions until 3pm each Wednesday.
• We will answer the questions chronologically and will reply after 3pm if needed.
• To ask your question, click Reply in the lower-right corner of this post, type your question, and click Reply.
• We will reply quoting your question.

• This chat is designed to provide quick replies from eBay employees on subjects we can assist you with publicly. 

Rules:

• One question per reply. If you have multiple questions, please do multiple replies.
• Follow the community guidelines, which can be found here. 
• Your reply must contain a question. Please do not reply to another members question with an answer. Replies with no questions may be removed to help with the reading of this thread.
• This thread will close in one hour, so please open a discussion thread and @mention our team if your question is in-depth, ongoing, or more of a general complaint. This way, we can reply to you in a way that is most beneficial to all.

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

[williabaxte7]

Hi. All  this is more of a moan . Regarding ittem not received cases as a buyer .

ordered an item on 9th of feb by best offer which was accepted. Item not received case opened on the 15 th as item was not despatched to me . Now forward to today . Still no response from seller. As from tomorrow I will ask eBay to step in to sort out  as seller has still not communicated with me as regarding a refund . I ha e noticed there are 3 live items on the sellers page . This needs to be reported .

[truly-personalised]

I know we have discussed EDD's many times on here but it is getting absolutely ridiculous. As my business is so slow I have got a job one day a week so I don't post out on that one day, midweek. I have always had 2 day despatch I don't have to actually post out until the day after my day off anyway. But the orders that come in on an evening before I have my non post day, tell the customer that they will be there the day after my non post day. So then when I am back at work they are due to be delivered that same day. I know it's an algorithm blah blah blah but Ebay seriously needs to stop micro managing my business for me. I have had 3 complaints this week already of late delivery and wanting refunds. Do I need to put 10 days despatch so that it won't show the customer that it will be there the day I post?

[dave@ebay]

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@williabaxte7 wrote:

Hi. All  this is more of a moan . Regarding ittem not received cases as a buyer .

ordered an item on 9th of feb by best offer which was accepted. Item not received case opened on the 15 th as item was not despatched to me . Now forward to today . Still no response from seller. As from tomorrow I will ask eBay to step in to sort out  as seller has still not communicated with me as regarding a refund . I ha e noticed there are 3 live items on the sellers page . This needs to be reported .

---

Hi @williabaxte7 

Thanks for the feedback, Ill have a look at the details of the transaction and ask the policy team to review the account. 

Thanks,

Dave

[marco@ebay]

---

@truly-personalised wrote:

I know we have discussed EDD's many times on here but it is getting absolutely ridiculous. As my business is so slow I have got a job one day a week so I don't post out on that one day, midweek. I have always had 2 day despatch I don't have to actually post out until the day after my day off anyway. But the orders that come in on an evening before I have my non post day, tell the customer that they will be there the day after my non post day. So then when I am back at work they are due to be delivered that same day. I know it's an algorithm blah blah blah but Ebay seriously needs to stop micro managing my business for me. I have had 3 complaints this week already of late delivery and wanting refunds. Do I need to put 10 days despatch so that it won't show the customer that it will be there the day I post?

---

Hi truly-personalised, thanks for your question.

I understand where you are coming from. However, we keep reviewing this on a daily basis and we still have not found any faults. If you wish, like you are saying, you can adjust your dispatching and delivery times to the ones you think that would suit you better if you don't like the current ones are working for you.

Thank you,

Marco

[rainbowtrax]

With the introduction of the new Regulatory Operating Fee, are ebay going to use this latest fee to cover the cost of enforcing the regulation of trading legally - now that we will be paying them for enforcing regulations to make ebay a fairer trading platform for all? Or will ebay CS still tell illegal traders that they can continue trading illegally on a private account? Will reports of illegal traders now be acted on or will they still be ignored? Genuine questions posted with the utmost respect.

[lamppostelectrical]

I include VAT invoices with all items, however buyers often ask for a digital copy.  No problem, except I can't just click a button, I have to download the PDF and send it to them, except I can't send a PDF via eBay messages.  Please can you look into a way of either the buyer downloading a VAT invoice from their end or a way to automatically send one.

Many Thanks

[returns_andexdisplay]

Will ebay be using the new regulatore fee to tackle all the private sellers who clearly run a business. Currently have one competitor who has at least 6 different accounts?

All same location, same style of listings/pictures all similar items accross their accounts.  No doubt taking advantage off all the free listings you keep giving private sellers and no doubt getting final value offers as well on each of their accounts. Looking at their sales history over the 6 accounts for the quater they would be close to a VAT threashold for the year if sales continued the same. 

I have reported them many times already and nothing is ever done as they are still a private account trading and have been for a long time. 

I like many others have no problem with genuine private accounts selling a few things they no longer want. But when competitors run a business and get better offers than business, don't have to accept buyer remorse returns we get a little fed up and look for other options to sell. 

[marco@ebay]

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@lamppostelectrical wrote:

I include VAT invoices with all items, however buyers often ask for a digital copy.  No problem, except I can't just click a button, I have to download the PDF and send it to them, except I can't send a PDF via eBay messages.  Please can you look into a way of either the buyer downloading a VAT invoice from their end or a way to automatically send one.

Many Thanks

---

Hi lamppostelectrical, thanks for your post.

Yes, absolutely. I will pass that on for you now, so it can be considerated for future updates. Any other suggestions you may have, please let us know.

Thank you,

Marco

[messier44000]

Just cuious. When reporting a listing and you get the auto reply email saying

"We’re looking into it now. We’ll let you know once we’ve reviewed it and provide you with details of any decision that we make"

Is the time scale for their findings usually days, weeks , months. Or dare I say never.

In years of reporting I am yet to have a reply other than the auto response above.

Thank you

[truly-personalised]

Thanks for the reply.

I just don't see how you can't find any faults when I have got 2 day despatch, buyer buys yesterday evening (20th), I am not despatching today, so will despatch tomorrow (22nd) (which is my 2 day despatch anyway) and yet 2nd class postage shows delivery 22nd-23rd. How is not a fault that it shows delivery on the same day as despatch? 

[leadhills_scot]

This update states that new fee hike will first appear on your May 2024 invoice. Normally fees show on a per item basis so how will this one show?

[dave@ebay]

---

@rainbowtrax wrote:

With the introduction of the new Regulatory Operating Fee, are ebay going to use this latest fee to cover the cost of enforcing the regulation of trading legally - now that we will be paying them for enforcing regulations to make ebay a fairer trading platform for all? Or will ebay CS still tell illegal traders that they can continue trading illegally on a private account? Will reports of illegal traders now be acted on or will they still be ignored? Genuine questions posted with the utmost respect.

---

Hi @rainbowtrax 

The fee was introduced address the rising costs associated with the increasing number and complexity of regulations, including consumer and environmental protection, as well as new taxation and customs measures. 

The are no changes to how we handle reports but we will continue to review these accounts as they are reported.

Thanks,

Dave

[marco@ebay]

---

@messier44000 wrote:

Just cuious. When reporting a listing and you get the auto reply email saying

"We’re looking into it now. We’ll let you know once we’ve reviewed it and provide you with details of any decision that we make"

Is the time scale for their findings usually days, weeks , months. Or dare I say never.

In years of reporting I am yet to have a reply other than the auto response above.

Thank you

---

Hi messier44000, thanks for your question.

The timeframe would depend on how many reports we may be handling at the time, sometimes it can be pretty quick, and sometimes it could take a bit longer. However, we would never communicate all actions taken about a different account as that would be sharing personal information about different users, which is not allowed.

Thank you,

Marco

[best-range]

Can the ebay reps advise me which Royal Mail economy 2 class service delivers items the same day as posting/dispatch day ? as the one I'm using takes 2-3 business days for delivery yet according to ebay it's Same Day as Dispatch service or Next Day express, are Royal Mail wrong ???

I also checked ebay's couriers list & there is no such courier in the UK that can deliver the same day as dispatch.

[tommystrezures]

In light of the latest offer of zero fees and transaction fee paid for, for private sellers. What support and offers will they be offering correctly registered business users to help support them?

or will it be like clarksons farm diddly squat?

[technthread]

Is the 0% FVF promotion that was rolled out for selected private accounts last week likely to be rolled out to more eligible accounts over the coming weeks? I am asking this for a friend who asked me why some private sellers got this amazing offer and others haven't heard about it yet. 

A question for myself - can sellers with eBay business accounts expect an FVF promotion at some point? A lot of us are feeling a bit jealous when we pay shop subscriptions and full FVF fees and could do with a bit of help even if it is just a small limited time promotion. As a small seller paying £32.40 for a shop subscription so I can list a limited number of items and access eBay terapeak, I feel like a bit of a mug paying this at the moment. Thanks 

[plum993]

Hi 

dave@ebay 

Is a mobile device still the only option to get verification codes by email or text when signing in.

A member was asking earlier if they could get email codes to there email address when signing into ebay as they can no longer pay to keep there mobile phone.

[rainbowtrax]

Thankyou for your reply dave@ebay . Would it be helpful to ebay for me to submit a list in a few months of all the reports that have been ignored so that they can be further reviewed? [question highlighted] I'm now keeping a record of all reports made with a date and time stamp of when they were ignored by ebay. Reports are only made for accounts where there is public proof that they are trading, not any accounts where they may not be, but will still run into hundreds, if not thousands. In over a decade, not a single valid and correct report has ever been acted on so something is clearly very wrong with ebay's mechanisms for dealing with this.

[tommystrezures]

Dave what would those new taxation and customs regulations be exactly that you refer too?