Weekly Chat with the eBay Community Team- 26.06.24 @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 marco@ebay and anita@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. 

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

[daytona-500]

Hi Marco,

I posed the question below on 17th April and you replied that I should submit a fresh application and that if I haven’t heard back within 8 weeks to contact you again. Well, I did submit a new application but it is now 10 weeks and I still have not heard anything. Could you please look into this for me so that I can get an answer one way or another? As I mentioned before, it has been very successful on Etsy (65k turnover last year) so it is good business for both eBay and myself.

Thanks once again for your time.

Hi team, I would very much appreciate some help with an application for approval to sell items in a restricted category. I have applied a few times since last year but without any reply unfortunately.
I would like to sell a range of hand made stainless steel rings in the sex toys category which I have been very successfully selling on Etsy for a couple of years now with a surprisingly large turnover. I appreciate that you probably receive numerous similar requests but I am hoping to have answered one way or another if it is worthwhile pursuing my application, or if eBay are no longer accepting new sellers in this category.
May I just add that I have two eBay accounts, this one since 2008 with 2700 feedback and another account since 2004 with 19000 feedback, all positive.
Thank you.

Have you put an application through recently, so I can try to follow that up with the team? If you haven't, I would suggest applying again, and if you don't hear back from them within 8 weeks, you can create a thread and tag me on it, so I can look into it for you.

Thank you,

Marco

[technthread]

I sold an item this morning. Item number 315171519346. The buyer is 0 feedback, it may be guest account I am not sure.

The buyer has emailed me directly outside of eBay asking me to change the address to a different number on the same street citing an error when they placed the order.

I have posted it to the updated address. I know that isn’t recommended, I may get scammed but it is a small sale and not really a concern to me but what this highlights is again buyers are able to place orders using addresses that don’t match the postcode. I wish eBay would flag the address error so they can’t complete at checkout. In the case of my order, I can see on Royal Mail’s website that the house number I got on the order doesn’t exist under the postcode but the updated house number that they emailed to directly does so I have gone off trust that they are genuine and not after a free item.

Can I ask, if buyers checkout as a guest are they unable to message the seller through eBay? I have assumed they are unable to hence they had to email me direct but I would be grateful if you could clarify this for me for future reference.

[technthread]

I sold an item internationally on 19th June. Item number 315395289484.

I posted the same day and it arrived with GSP on 21st June, all good.

GSP started to process it on 24th June and then on the 25th when it was shipped, they shortened/updated the EDD to 27th June.

The sale was to the US so 2 day delivery is optimistic to say the least. The EDD doesn’t really matter to me as I delivered to GSP on time (unless I get undeserved negative feedback from the buyer due to it) but I wanted to flag it up to you. As of today the parcel has only just left Heathrow…

[anita@ebay]

---

@daytona-500 wrote:

Hi Marco,

I posed the question below on 17th April and you replied that I should submit a fresh application and that if I haven’t heard back within 8 weeks to contact you again. Well, I did submit a new application but it is now 10 weeks and I still have not heard anything. Could you please look into this for me so that I can get an answer one way or another? As I mentioned before, it has been very successful on Etsy (65k turnover last year) so it is good business for both eBay and myself.

Thanks once again for your time.

Hi team, I would very much appreciate some help with an application for approval to sell items in a restricted category. I have applied a few times since last year but without any reply unfortunately.
I would like to sell a range of hand made stainless steel rings in the sex toys category which I have been very successfully selling on Etsy for a couple of years now with a surprisingly large turnover. I appreciate that you probably receive numerous similar requests but I am hoping to have answered one way or another if it is worthwhile pursuing my application, or if eBay are no longer accepting new sellers in this category.
May I just add that I have two eBay accounts, this one since 2008 with 2700 feedback and another account since 2004 with 19000 feedback, all positive.
Thank you.

Have you put an application through recently, so I can try to follow that up with the team? If you haven't, I would suggest applying again, and if you don't hear back from them within 8 weeks, you can create a thread and tag me on it, so I can look into it for you.

Thank you,

Marco

---

Hi @daytona-500 , thanks for your post.

I can help you with that. Can you confirm, which restricted category did you apply for?

Thank you,

Anita

[bojangled]

Good Afternoon Community Team

I've been trying to opt out of the Low Cost FVF Promotion for the last two months. 
Last communication was with a CS agent on the 3rd of June, who said it would take 2 weeks.

It's still on my promotion overview as activated.
Any advice?

Jo

[marco@ebay]

---

@technthread wrote:

I sold an item internationally on 19th June. Item number 315395289484.

I posted the same day and it arrived with GSP on 21st June, all good.

GSP started to process it on 24th June and then on the 25th when it was shipped, they shortened/updated the EDD to 27th June.

The sale was to the US so 2 day delivery is optimistic to say the least. The EDD doesn’t really matter to me as I delivered to GSP on time (unless I get undeserved negative feedback from the buyer due to it) but I wanted to flag it up to you. As of today the parcel has only just left Heathrow…

---

Hi technthread, thanks for your post.

I appreciate you bringing this up, we will flag that transaction with the shipping team, so they are aware of it. If you need anything else, feel free to let us know over and we will give you a hand no problem.

Thank you,

Marco

[marco@ebay]

---

@bojangled wrote:

Good Afternoon Community Team

I've been trying to opt out of the Low Cost FVF Promotion for the last two months. 
Last communication was with a CS agent on the 3rd of June, who said it would take 2 weeks.

It's still on my promotion overview as activated.
Any advice?

Jo

---

Hi bojangled, thanks for your question.

Could you please elaborate this further for me? Normally, these promotions wouldn't last for more than a couple of days, once they expire, they just disappear from your account until you get a new one. Is one of them stuck in your seller hub/selling page or something similar like that?

Thank you,

Marco

[anita@ebay]

---

@technthread wrote:

I sold an item this morning. Item number 315171519346. The buyer is 0 feedback, it may be guest account I am not sure.

The buyer has emailed me directly outside of eBay asking me to change the address to a different number on the same street citing an error when they placed the order.

I have posted it to the updated address. I know that isn’t recommended, I may get scammed but it is a small sale and not really a concern to me but what this highlights is again buyers are able to place orders using addresses that don’t match the postcode. I wish eBay would flag the address error so they can’t complete at checkout. In the case of my order, I can see on Royal Mail’s website that the house number I got on the order doesn’t exist under the postcode but the updated house number that they emailed to directly does so I have gone off trust that they are genuine and not after a free item.

Can I ask, if buyers checkout as a guest are they unable to message the seller through eBay? I have assumed they are unable to hence they had to email me direct but I would be grateful if you could clarify this for me for future reference.

---

 Hi @technthread , thanks for your post.

It is a good point, and I will make sure to pass that on to the relevant team. There could be a reason system is allowing that, but I'll flag it anyways.

If buyer purchases as a guest, they won't have a registered eBay account unless they complete the registration afterwards, so that would be correct - they can only message from their email address.

Thank you,

Anita

[daytona-500]

Thanks for your reply Anita, I think it was restricted Adult Items Policy > Health & Beauty > Health Care > Sexual Wellness

[anita@ebay]

---

@daytona-500 wrote:

Thanks for your reply Anita, I think it was restricted Adult Items Policy > Health & Beauty > Health Care > Sexual Wellness

---

Thank you @daytona-500 , I'll reach out to the team and will ask them to review it for you. I'll update you as soon as I hear back from them.

Thanks,

Anita

[daytona-500]

Thanks Anita, I appreciate it.

[bojangled]

Hi Marco

I signed up well over a year ago, it is an ongoing rolling promotion. Renews every month.
But it denies me my 10% TRS discount. 

[tressygirl]

Good Afternoon All !

An interesting point came up when I was helping an OP,  if by paying with PayPal for a collection item so MBG covers a refund here,  opening a case for the return for a faulty item,  the buyer is happy to return the item themselves back to the seller,  but the case is asking for tracking.

How can they prove that the item has indeed been received, also what happens if the seller refuses to accept that faulty item,  all well within 30 days.

Will escalating the case work even though there's no proof of the return/ refusal  ?

Thanks.

[vintagewatchpart]

Afternoon, team!

https://community.ebay.co.uk/t5/Business-Seller-Board/Reversed-impressions-a-new-one-on-me-Any-thoug...

Would appreciate some insight here or could this be looked into?

There are clear changes going on with the search algorithm throwing up lots of additional impressions and with it a decrease in sales for many sellers.

[marco@ebay]

---

@bojangled wrote:

Hi Marco

I signed up well over a year ago, it is an ongoing rolling promotion. Renews every month.
But it denies me my 10% TRS discount. 

---

Ah lovely, thanks for that, bojangled.

I am not entirely sure you can opt out from these promotions, but let me follow this one up for you, and as soon I get an update on it I will let you know. Just to confirm, if it is possible to opt out, you would like to opt out, correct?

Thanks very much,

Marco

[bojangled]

Just another thing, the June Seller Updates posted about 15 minutes ago all point to to the Regulatory Operating Fee Update for April.

Or am I missing something?

Jo

[bojangled]

marco@ebay  I would love to opt out!

It does state you can.

Thank you!

Jo

[mysterious_cities_of_mold]

I put a post on the Weekly Chat dated 15.05.24 (6 weeks ago) about missing images in Best Offer emails and the problem has still not been fixed. Below is the original message I sent -

I am surprised this is still broken as I pointed out there is only a single dot that is missing from the image URLs and should have been relatively simple to fix. Can you give me an estimated time when this will be fixed?

[anita@ebay]

---

@vintagewatchpart wrote:

Afternoon, team!

https://community.ebay.co.uk/t5/Business-Seller-Board/Reversed-impressions-a-new-one-on-me-Any-thoug...

Would appreciate some insight here or could this be looked into?

There are clear changes going on with the search algorithm throwing up lots of additional impressions and with it a decrease in sales for many sellers.

---

Hi @vintagewatchpart , thanks for your post.

That's no problem at all. I will look into this thread after the weekly chat.

Thank you,

Anita