Buyer Protection cases penalize eBay sellers even if resolved happily or false in the first place
(The Whine Seller Blog)

eBay sent out a seller update out earlier today and most of it was “Yes, yes. Fine, fine.” Then I got to this part:

New seller standard: Buyer Protection cases counted along with low DSRs. You’re on the right track!

Opening a case with the eBay or PayPal Buyer Protection program is a clear indication of buyer dissatisfaction, especially when the buyer tries and is unable to resolve an issue directly with the seller. That’s why, starting in September, “item not received” and “item not as described” cases will be considered along with low DSRs to evaluate and reward seller performance.

The “You’re on the right track” bit is because I currently meet this requirement.

Um…. I’ve been selling on eBay for many years now and I have had lots of buyers start “Item not received” or “Item not as described cases”. But here’s the thing, eBay. Of all of those, only five were actually buyers whose item didn’t arrive or wasn’t as described or who had a problem at all for that matter.

All the others. Let me repeat, ALL THE OTHERS were buyer who opened the case because, as they told me, “They weren’t sure how else to email the seller to ask a question.”

So if this is going to count toward my freaking DSRs, are you going to make it clearer what the process is for? Better yet, is there going to be a way for buyer and seller to amicably close the case if it was started under newbie confusion?

Read the ENTIRE article here.

After reading recent comments left on other blogs about the ebay fee changes, sadly, I agree… ebay is no longer ebay… but it is beginning to be typical ebay. They continue to try to get rid of hobby & small sellers. They have walked away from their roots. Could be good… could be bad. It’s not the ebay we have all enjoyed dealing with over the past decade or so. eBay isn’t eBay anymore.

We are a low-volume seller on Ebay – and we do NOT like these changes, BUT no other site has the traffic counts and exposure that eBay does. We have learned as others “…you either learn to adjust or you die. You learn to take the changes and adjust your business to them…or you quit and move on. It will never be the same as it was in the “good old days”. Those days are long past.

We do have some repeat buyers, but our customers do not spend all their time on eBay either – who has the time to do that anymore? Even if they go online much more often than ‘twice a year’ they do their search, find the format they like, and then the best deal. It doesn’t always matter if they’ve bought from you before. It is hard to build affinity when buyers are fickle. We are in an economy that requires them to be as frugal as possible. “How many nickels can I spend to list a $3 item that might take forever to sell? The answer looks like 60 to break even, but it’s really not. That $3 item listing is an ad, a portal to my other 4,500 listings, so the actual answer is I can afford to pay that nickel until the end of time as long as everything else is moving.” We have tried penny auctions, anything less than a dollar auctions, and while you end up giving some things away, it does bring lookers into your store and many times higher priced items are purchased. But it is a constant struggle, just like any other business competing for customers. Many sellers, like us, will tell you most of their sales are ‘one-time-only’, with a small portion of repeat buyers.

At a time when we as sellers are watching our pennies just as close or closer that the buyers, eBay has a major change in fees again. “Is that gaming the system? yeah. I guess… so what. They just gamed me out of an extra $40/mth. It’s called “business”.” When eBay does it, it’s just business – it’s not personal.” Well, when we add more to our costs to recoup, we get slammed on our DSRs, and it’s our business and it’s personal. Which brings me to another pet peeve of mine… I don’t think buyers should even get the chance to rate through DSR on shipping charges when shipping charges are spelled out in the auction. If they don’t like the shipping price listed, they have the option of buying from thousands of other sellers. I always spell out shipping charges and get really irked when I get bad feedback on my shipping charges when they bought the item for the lowest price on eBay including the shipping charge! Why doesn’t eBay educate their sellers in that respect, instead of just letting someone rip up the seller? (If most buyers ever had to actually ship an item, they would see what it really does cost) Just my rant for the day.

Some other comments were:

“Add all store stock into core, plus the hundred free 99 cent ‘special’ items gleaned at the finest yard sales and search will be a total debacle. The last search crash was just a dress rehearsal!”

“The more or less expensive question is deceptive since I will pay slightly more – but get core exposure. I pay extra for core exposure now – and everything else goes into store inventory. On 3/30 everything will be in core – which means it’s a value proposition. I pay a little more, but get a lot more for my money. Which is more expensive – $50 with almost everything hidden in stores, or $60 with everything in core?”

“(another) serious move is also coming. The enforcement of DSR percentages. This will allow ebay to suspend you easier based on arbitrary feedback left for you with no chance to appeal it. With no power to leave truthful feedback to buyers we are ALWAYS at risk to being victims of flaky negatives. When you do this for a living, a 30 day suspension can really hurt. Ebay has created monsters out of buyers making them want Fedex service for the price of Media Mail. I am seriously thinking of leaving after 14 years on the treadmill. The stores were just starting to kick in allowing us to once again sell some of the lower priced items that we could not afford to list otherwise. (Often these items pay the rent!) Ebay always takes away the punch bowl just when the party gets lively.”

It will be interesting again, to say the least… and yes, we’ll stay on for now… although we will expand to other sales sites as well.

If you read many Ebay seller boards, many sellers feel the following way about eBay’s feedback and DSR systems.

Buyers don’t pay Ebay a cent to buy an item. Sellers spend tons of money monthly, and have very little to no control over who purchases from them and how they treat us as sellers. Most are honest buyers, but of course, a few “bad apples” abuse the current system to try and get free products and the seller is left to deal with the crazies or live with ‘bad feedback and dsrs’.

The biggest aggravation of Ebay is Feedback and DSR ratios. A real turn off is the fact that Ebay has forgotten who pays them!! We, as SELLERS, are their customers, who pay eBay money in the form of fees and subscriptions, and thus account for their revenue. Ebay, it seems, considers the buyers as their customers and sellers as middle men.

Here are 3 things I think eBay might be getting right on their new rollout of changes:
(The following are excerpts from eBay’s site/messages to sellers)
1. Update your listings in a snap
In late September, you’ll be able to edit most fields and the descriptions of up to 200 Fixed Price and Store Inventory Format listings simultaneously. Records of all sales before your edits will still be available to you for future viewing.

2. Get it resolved quicker
eBay is improving the resolution process for both item not received and item not as described disputes and moving it to eBay from PayPal. The new process will cover disputes for transactions paid through any payment method–not just PayPal. The resolution process has also been streamlined to resolve disputes faster. In addition, eBay’s and PayPal’s user agreements were updated recently for the new process.

3. Manage buyer emails easier
Spend less time answering emails and more time focusing on delivering great service. eBay is making it faster and easier for you to respond to buyer questions and manage your emails with buyers. You’ll be able to reply to buyer emails in your email or in My Messages, see the entire thread from the first communication, customize post-transaction emails, ensure emails you send aren’t duplicating emails sent by eBay and more.

4. New way to look at DSRs Underlying all these changes is a shift in the way we look at detailed seller ratings (DSRs). Our research shows that low DSRs are a more accurate measure of the quality of buyer experiences provided by sellers on eBay. That’s why we are evolving the way we measure quality, focusing more on how many low DSRs—1s and 2s—a seller receives than on a seller’s DSR averages.
(This one’s a maybe, we’ll watch and see)

Check out the complete list of changes here:
Seller update: September 2009

Until next time…