Appealing listing suspension for 'policy violation' taking ebay ages to respond

[mod81]

Ebay removed one of my listing for a claimed policy violation of 'offering to buy or sell outside of ebay'
This was because I had listed a PC peripheral which i didn't have the software for so linked to the manufactures support website where the buyer could download the software directly. So unless i'm now a multi million pound tech company anyone real person who viewed the listing could see I wasn't trying to sell outside of ebay.

Of course this was probably a bot that saw a link on a listing and suspended it automatically, but this was almost a week ago now and I followed the procedure to appeal the listing suspension and yet still not heard anything back from ebay support.

I contacted ebay customer services today and was told that the CS rep would email the specialist appeal dept to chase it up and they will get back to me within 48 hours as it was not possible for me to speak to anyone in that dept directly.

This once again shows how sellers are treated as low importance on ebay, as if i was a buyer they would not make me wait a week for the result of a simple appeal will will take someone 2 minutes to investigate. 

[xyz307xyz]

Is your whole account suspended? Someone else on here had exactly the same issue - they relisted the item removing the web address from the description and all was ok.

[mod81]

No the rest of my listing are OK thankfully, they just removed the listing which had the web link to the manufacturer.

I appealed to get the listing reinstated as i had watchers on the listing and i'm waiting on ebay to look at the appeal case.  Not update or response from ebay in a week, even though I phoned up yesterday and spoke to customer support to chase it up.
So ill give them until tomorrow morning and if still no response ill be back on the phone asking to speak to a manager at ebay who can actually get something sorted there and then.

[jonatjonatjonat]

if you remove the link - you can relist it.

ebays policy is NO links to websites outside ebay. No ifs, no buts.

If you need to include a link to the software - write down the web address and include it in what you send in the parcel.

[4_bathrooms]

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@jonatjonatjonat wrote:

if you remove the link - you can relist it.

ebays policy is NO links to websites outside ebay. No ifs, no buts.

If you need to include a link to the software - write down the web address and include it in what you send in the parcel.

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There are some ifs and buts but they don't cover the OP's inclusion of a link in their item description:

"To protect our members, listings or products can’t contain links that direct customers to a site other than eBay, even if the link is not clickable.

While there are some exceptions, listings or item descriptions can't contain links that direct customers to any other site.

What is the policy?

• We don't allow shop names to be a web address or include (for example) ‘.com', ‘.net', ‘.org' or ‘.edu'
• Links in a description are only allowed for the following:
  • Other eBay pages (eBay Messages, other eBay items, Shops pages, Follow Seller or Add to my Favorite Sellers)
  • Product videos
  • Freight shipping services approved by eBay
  • Legally required information
  • Credit for third-party providers"

[mod81]

I think your missing the point of my original posting on here, im not saying that I should be allowed to have links on my listing if that is their policy (as stupid as it is not be able to provide potential buyers links to the information they require to have an informed purchase), My issue is that despite me editing the listing to remove the link and filed an appeal just a couple of hours after i was notified of the issue. 7 days has now passed and ebay have yet to even look at the case they told me to open to appeal the defect on my account and get the listing restored.

7 days for what would take someone at ebay 30 seconds to check to see if the link has been removed is not an acceptable amount of time to have to wait. 

[4_bathrooms]

eBay typically remove listings that violate listing policies; it is up to the seller to relist the item in a compliant state.

If you can't see the original listing anywhere on this page it has been removed i.e. it has been deleted and cannot be restored. If that is the case you have no option but to create a new listing.

[mod81]

Although I can relist the item under a new listing, I am following what ebays own email told me I can do, which is to revise the original listing to remove the link and then appeal to have the listing reinstated.

This is from the email ebay sent to me

How this affects your account
Some details in your listings need to be revised, so we’ve hidden them until you can make the necessary updates. 
These listings are still in your Active Listings folder in My eBay and Seller Hub so you can edit them to address the issue. However, until they are revised, new buyers can't purchase them, shoppers can't see them, and you will not be charged additional listing fees for them. Once you revise the listings, we will review them. If the issue has been fixed, they will be visible to shoppers and buyers with any past sales and activity intact. If you prefer, you can end them to move them out of Active Listings.

​Listings that don't follow this policy or that are reported to us by authorities in the future will be hidden. This determination was made using automation or artificial intelligence. This came to our attention through automated detection.

[4_bathrooms · Accepted solution]

Ah, OK - eBay haven't haven't removed the listing; they've "hidden" it. My guess is that their automaton spotted the link but it requires an actual human to review. Anything requiring human intervention on eBay's side is taking ages at the moment; probably due to all the fallout from the introduction of mandatory "Simple" Delivery for private sellers.

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@mod81 wrote:

I contacted ebay customer services today and was told that the CS rep would email the specialist appeal dept to chase it up and they will get back to me within 48 hours

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The "someone will get back to you in 48 hours" is seemingly eBay Customer Services' current ruse to get callers off the line. As it is a one-off item the quickest resolution would be to end the current listing and relist from scratch; there is no sales history that requires preserving.

[purechaosx]

This happened to me today, and it's never happened before.

I'm selling a Panasonic camcorder, and so I didn't have to list every single feature and specification of the camera, I added a link to Panasonics website so the full specs can be viewed there instead.

A few minutes later, I got an email to say my listing was hidden for the same reason you did... accused of trying to buy or sell outside or eBay. What do they think I'm trying to do... sell Panasonics camera back to them??

I appealed, only a short time ago, so just waiting. If I don't hear back in 24 hours (I'm not waiting 48 when it clearly might end up taking longer) I'll just end the listing, remove the link and relist.

Such a daft problem. 

[subminman]

I think if you say something like, "drivers and further information is available from the manufacturers web site" you will be OK.  I have done similar with no problems. 

[purechaosx]

Well, the exact sentence I typed was:

"For full details of the camera specs, visit the Panasonic website" and then the web address after.

So it's not too dissimilar to your suggested sentence (about drives etc) but apparently it was still enough for eBay to flag it as a violation. Still haven't heard back about my appeal though.

[xyz307xyz]

The policy is given in message 5. They don't always "find" listings breaking the policy; but now they have found yours, I would be very surprised if they allowed your appeal - it doesn't seem to meet any of the 5 exceptions.

[purechaosx]

Why wouldn't they accept the appeal? It's clear as day I'm not trying to buy or sell outside of eBay.

So we aren't even allowed to link to a manufacturers website to provide more details of the device being sold, because it doesn't conform to any of the 5 exceptions?

Those exceptions sound daft. No reason we shouldn't be allowed to provide details of the product we're selling using the manufacturers own website. 

But the fact they THINK we're attempting to buy or sell outside of eBay is what makes this sound ridiculous. 

[xyz307xyz]

"So we aren't even allowed to link to a manufacturers website to provide more details of the device being sold, because it doesn't conform to any of the 5 exceptions?"

Correct.

I assume it's easier for them to just ban links, than go through each one they would find (if links were allowed) to check what was on the end of the link to see if it was trying to sell something. And then repeat that every week to see if what was on the end of the link had changed.

[*vyolla*]

It's a security issue, that should be pretty obvious.

eBay have to protect their users by not allowing third party links to be included in listing descriptions. A link can be spoofed and lead the person who clicks on it to a fake site that requires them to log into their eBay account again, or to one that may contain malware. 

If there's a need to add information from the brand or items website, simply recommend that the info is available at that named website, you don't need to link to it. You can copy relevant info into the listing description too. 

[subminman]

It is the actual hypertext web link that has caused the problem, leave that out.

[purechaosx]

Since I've sent the appeal, I'm not able to revise or even end the listing from the Resolve screen, as all options are greyed out. I was however, able to revise the listing by going to the listing, then click Revise Listing.

I removed the link, and just said if you want to know the full specs of the camera, Google is your best bet. It still says there's a policy violation and it still won't let me end the sale.

Maybe I have to wait for it to update, or for eBay to deny the appeal. Oh well, I've created a new listing for the camera, without any links to Panasonic, and it's still up, so... yeah.