Advice around sanction for alleged breach of eBay policy.

[uktopo]

Hi, I have run an eBay shop for almost 23yrs. I have a 100% Customer Satisfaction rating. I have been accused by eBay of breaching policy by attempting to arrange a sale outside of eBay and have been sanctioned around this alleged violation. I have tried to get further information around who I am alleged to have offered an off-site sale to without success. I have been advised to make revisions to my listings but have been given no information as to what revisions are being asked for? Apart from mailing the CEO office I can think of no further steps I can take as I completely refute the violation. I am considering simply closing my account and moving to another platform. Any advice of suggestions you could offer would be very welcome. Thanking you in advance, Brian.

[tommystrezures · Accepted solution]

Hi Brian,  we don't have access to your account, but we are buyers and sellers like yourself.  Having looked at some of your listings at random etc, I can't see anything there that would appear to be encouraging shall we say an offsite sale.

I am not sure that with these sorts of notices that a human generates these messages and AI will be checking in the background etc. I can only think that say in your title where describing a pub for example that AI thinks you will be concluding the sale in the pub, futile I know.

Was it a particular item that was the cause for this?

One of my other fellow mentors may see something that I have missed and will assist where possible.

[john1297576]

Ebay’s bots. have been known to take end of one word and beginning of next to form another word which may offend the system.

Impossible to guess if this is the case, as it would take ages to view all possible combinations of words, and being human we are not as stupid as AI.

[red_magpie]

I agree withe tommystrezures that this is probably down to eBay's so-called AI, which I suspect is in reality nothing much more than glorified keyword scanning.

We often receive questions about apparently inexplicable decisions taken by eBay, which even their own customer support are able to explain.

All I can suggest is that you try to look at what you said in these listings from the perspective of a brain-dead, computer which is programmed to finds words or phrases that might appear suspicious if lacking any comprehension of the context in which they are used.

[uktopo]

Thanks for replying, appreciated. I've been on eBay nearly 23yrs and never
had a policy violation until one last month and one yesterday. I have been
sanctioned for attemting to arrange a sale outside of eBay. Never ever done
that, wouldn't know how to. I sell old postcards for a few quid nothing
more. EBay haven't explained how this came about except to say it wasn't a
'human' assessment but an automated one. They say I need to make amendments
to the listing but don't say what! One of their agents looked at it ad hoc
and could see nothing wrong with the listing. A bit fed up here. All the
best, Brian.

[tobiasd4]

We're you adding a link to any website?

Even if it was for details of item. 

AI can pick this up as off ebay deal.

[uktopo]

Thanks mate, beats the hell out of me. Seems to be more of an alien world
now eBay.

[uktopo]

No mate, I have no idea what the issue is but you are right, it wasnt human
eyes but bots who glagged this

[uktopo]

Yeah, got you. Seems like a likely scdnarion. Cheers, appreciatd. B.

[tommystrezures]

You are welcome, any other questions always feel free to call in and ask.

[uktopo]

Hi, and many thanks for the replies. I eventually got an answer from a lovely switched-on agent called Joan. On my Clovelly card it was because I had mentioned the name of a social media site as part of my description and on my hotel card it was because I had included the URL of the hotel from the card I was selling in my description. Seems the eBay Bots didn't like that, so heads up to all. Who knew eh? I understand the need to protect eBay etc but Joan identified the issue in minutes, said to me to relist the items and take out what the eBay Bots didn't like. Much ado about very little. Thanks for your interest and help guys.

Best Wishes,

Brian.

[uktopo]

Many thanks for that, it does seem a system in need of revision. The lack of clarity around any advice - although you very seldom get any from the eBay peeps who are supposed to help - just makes an issue worse. 

Thanks for replying John.

[uktopo]

Yeah, it was a postcard of a hotel was the card in question. I added a link to the hotel as part of my listing thinking that if a viewer or potential buyer was looking for more information this might help. It was a bot which reported this as an 'offence'. I got another because the word Instagram was on a listing. Context was I was writing the description of a topo card and to illustrate how popular a place it was I said there were "photographs of it all over Instagram".  So it seems that was a policy violation as well. One of the agents who answered a text from me simply said it's not worth the hassle amending your listing. 'Cleaner' just to delete it and make a new listing. Only thing there was the system wouldn't let me delete it, I was told the listing would 'fall off my account' in about 3 months or so.  Seriously, I sell such cards at around £2.95 or so, I do increasingly wonder if this level of harrasment is worth the bother. Yeah, you were right mate. AI bot seems to somehow think I was tring to arrange an off-site sale. I'd love to think that someone with half a brain on the eBay side would pick issues like this up and amend their policies, but that's not going to happen.

[uktopo]

G'Day sir! All sorted now but all it was is that when I was writing the description I included the .com address from the back of the postcard so that any potential buyer could get a proper look at the item I was selling. That was it, end of. On another card I was describing an English harbour town and to demonstrate how pretty and popular it was I made the comment "It's a beautiful place, photo's of it are all over Instagram". Turns out you are not allowed to use the names of Social Media sites in your listing, The eBay systems make the assumption you are trying to sell an item outside of eBay. You are right, it's not humans who are responsible its bots, but eBay say if the bots flag up something suspicious a 'human' will always check it out, which just isn't true. Much ado about nowt. I couldn't get any change out of the customer service team dishing out the violation notices so I wrote to Eve Williams, the eBay Managing Director, described the situation and overnight she, or one of her team, put the matter right for me.  A lot of wasted time all round. Anyway water under the bridge now. All the best, Brian.