I'm sure I'm not the only one who's getting to the end of their patience....

[mkb_sausage_mkb]

So, I'll put them in order of frustration, and see if anyone else feels the same!

1) "Simple Delivery" - how the heck can it be called "Simple" delivery - the only thing that's simple is the person who came up with the idea.  Before I could work out what I was sending and check the weight and size and pick the label accordingly - now I'm forced to select something that just doesn't work for many items i'm sending.

I cannot believe that the "community" wanted a different way of doing it, the old adage works here, if it ain't broke don't (try and) fix it !

2) "Dispatched" - Why oh why does the system say Dispatched when you've either generated or printed the label at home?  Surely that should happen when the post office has scanned it etc??  When it happens on a Sunday you're kinda like.. whaaaaaa??? it's still sat in my dining room!  

3) Messages - Why can't we delete a message that we've sent, especially if we sent it erroneously to the wrong person??  It happened to me yesterday and I just couldn't delete it - suffice to say the recipient message me this morning and said "oh, I don't think this is for us"  Fortunately it was nothing that was even remotely sensitive !

Come on Ebay, you do so many things right, but there are also many other things you could do that would keep your customers happy - I just hope you read all of these and change what needs changing.

Ultimately it's the postage fiasco that drives me mad, and I've decided I will be quitting at the end of the month if it's not made easier - heck, you can always give us a button for Simple Delivery and one for us to choose like we used to - give us the choice 🙂 

[the-online-oasis]

Hi there,

I completely feel your pain. 

Well, where do I start?  I guess its all to do with this thing  called AI .....eBay is not the only online platform to "employ " this new "magic tool" to save money on human admin staff.  Okay, we will wait and see if the next eBay annual revenue figure looks better than the year before - that's all it matters really.

I guess eBay is not really interested in private sellers, I suppose they rather have them vacate or move from their platform.  EBay's biggest rival is Amazon albeit without warehouses,  therefore the need for third parties to fill that gap e.g. engaging private/business sellers on their platform.  Nothing wrong with that - but the climate has to be right.  Since eBay has morphed into a big business enterprise their stakeholders are under pressure to increase performance. 

I am a retired woman for the last 10 years ( I'm so glad) but my son tells me that I'm quite "clued on"  ...... anyway,  I always liked to know about world and business affairs and thanks to my IT skills I think I know what's going on out there.  Don't despair because history tells us that any system has a "shelf life".  Companies like leaders and politicians come and go - humans change things not robots.

[pegr-834437]

The answer to 3 is pretty simple, if you could delete things you could just deny it and then the other person would have to chase up eBay to get proof, whilst sending the wrong person the incorrect message can be annoying, just sending a sorry this was for another buyer is pretty much as simple as clicking delete message.

To 2, every major company that you purchase from will send you a dispatch email before its actually left the warehouse, very few think that dispatch email means it on the back of the Royal Mail lorry or on the Amazon Van, it should really be called we created your label but its not just eBay that say its dispatched its 99% of companies.

To 1, its simple delivery for about 95% of transactions on eBay, for small it could be called simple but more expensive postage but its still simple, for larger or combined postage I agree its not exactly simple but for the mass majority it really is simple postage, you print the label drop it off and then its sorted, any loss or damage in transit is covered by eBay which can save hours waiting on hold or talking to whatever evri chatbot is currently called so send you around in never ending loops till you throw your laptop off the wall in anger.

No idea why I done them 3,2,1. end of the day though they are really doing everything to keep shareholders happy and not customers. It may not work but they also really need to keep an eye on paying customers as that segment are getting very little currently, be it businesses (who pay a lot) or privates paying for promotions.

[goodibags]

I'd add a couple more:

4. Lack of any apparent strategic or joined up thinking. As with reducing the buyer fees on low cost items in a desperate attempt to get these back on the platform (having previously scared them off). BUT with SD in place and most of these items not being exempt they still cost way way too much to send. e.g. A £2 record or comic with a ludicrous £2.70 postage rate.

I know Ebay have indicated that low-cost items are no longer welcome or a priority on here, but then why mess with the buyer fees to suggest they are?

5. No more random charges to sellers, from either spurious additional postage labels deducted from sale proceeds (when the buyer has already paid for one) or charges for simply making changes to a listing.

Admittedly, I haven't seen either of these but both have been reported on this forum in the last few days. It's a bit worrying that such weird 'glitches' are being introduced or are still going on.

Besides that, yes, treating Ebay users as adults would be helpful. And communicating with them when there are major system defects, advising them clearly (a) what they should do (e.g. send post or wait) and (b) how they will be accommodating the issues caused (e.g. item not received claims) further down the line.

[gnosemalf]

I had a glimmer of hope that maybe, just maybe, eBay would bow to pressure from their users and put things back how they were but then I watched a video on YouTube explaining how 'the internet keeps getting worse' and the process could apply to eBay's evolution:

Here's how platforms die:

first they are good to their users;

then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers;

finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves

Then, they die.

(or become a shadow of their former selves)

It may seem inconceivable that eBay, which almost seems to have been around as long as the internet, could die (or become a shadow of its former self) but the video cites PayPal which is now worth about 20% of what it was once worth. One would think that a company of eBay's magnitude would recognise the trajectory and make corrections but maybe they just can't help themselves - or perhaps they really won't know how to pull out of a dive. One can only hope that something better and equally as ubiquitous (lots of smaller sites are not really great for buying and selling) will emerge.

Incidentally, as a kid, the equivalent of eBay, at least in the UK, was Exchange & Mart (or maybe Scientific and Technical). Our house always had the latest issue which my Dad would spend hours poring over. It could have been a pioneer in online selling when the online superhighway arrived but it didn't adapt quick enough. It's still around and has a website but it is mainly for cars. I just took a look at it and when I did a test search, found that there were only 2 CDs for sale and when I drilled down, they were actually bathroom accessories!