Q & A time for Miriam - gulp!

[coxengines]

Hello Miriam,

After perusing the available info, here are my observations, together with related questions. Perhaps you could so kind and clarify where you can and/or are allowed to do so. Of course, none of this is in any way intended to be confrontational. I am just seeking clarification so that I can adapt my business strategies accordingly.

I noticed that, for sellers, requirements are quite specific, i.e. 4.5, 4.6, 4.8, 5%, 100FB, 30 days, 12 months, etc. It is good to have hard #’s with which we can work.

However, when it comes to buyers, specifics are not the norm. Instead, I read “holding buyers accountable”, “more accountable”, “increase our monitoring”, “buyers behaving very badly”, “will be held more accountable”, all of which are statements without concrete parameters.

Question: Can we know how many reports over a specific time (or % of transactions) will trigger sanctions and what will they be?

Question: What constitutes “behaving very badly”?

Question: What is an “established track record” in concrete #’s?


Except in the case of fraudulent sellers, the cause of INR’s are (almost) always because an item is lost in the mail or a buyer (fraudulently) claims non-receipt (a piece-of-cake to do with “light” and “small” packets). Unfortunately, some buyers file INR’s early to protect themselves. A buyer can file a dispute in less time than it takes for the item to arrive (Italy as a crass example).

Question: If the “issue” is resolved voluntarily, i.e. the seller voluntarily refunds, does this buyer still count towards the “dissatisfied” score?


“New seller requirements”

Question: Do I understand correctly that EVERY new seller will be required to:

1. Offer PayPal or merchant credit card
2. Will have their funds held by PP in accordance with the new rules

Until they have reached at least 100 FB or have been an eBay member for at least 6 months, or they have 20 DSR’s (if under 4.5) in 12 months, whatever occurs LATEST?


“Protection from chargebacks for Power Sellers”

Question: Could you explain in more detail? Specifically “merchandise not received”. Does that mean that INR’s are automatically covered?

Question: If the answer to the above is “yes”, does it make any difference to the score whether the seller refunds out of his/her own pocket or if the “eBay seller protection” is invoked?


“Repeat FB credit”

Question: Will this be retroactive and, if so, how far back?


“Starting in February”

Question: Is there a specific date?


“Starting in March”

Question: Is there a specific date?


“Starting in May”

Question: Is there a specific date?


“Starting this July”

Question: Is there a specific date?


“Excessive shipping”

Question: How does eBay plan to calculate “excessive shipping”, i.e. what are the parameters/benchmarks?


“We will remove negative and neutral FB when a buyer does not respond to the UPI”

Question: What happens when the buyer responds “whatever” just to be able to leave FB, even though he/she will never pay?


“When the listings end in different weeks”

Question: Which is the first day of an “eBay week”?


Wow! Quite a few questions, eh? And all that for one apple LOL!

Anyhow, Miriam, thanks in advance for clarifying what you can as I am sure that many of these question are being posed by other sellers and buyers.

Xena

[recped]

Xena

I can answer quite a few of these....should I? or do you want me to wait to give Miriam a chance to reply?

[coxengines]

Recped,

Please feel free.

But you don't get an apple LOL!

Xena

[recped]

No apple...no answers!

However, when it comes to buyers, specifics are not the norm. Instead, I read “holding buyers accountable”, “more accountable”, “increase our monitoring”, “buyers behaving very badly”, “will be held more accountable”, all of which are statements without concrete parameters.

Probably because the parameters are in a state of flux, I'm guessing but I expect it will be similar to how they will calculate bad behaviour by sellers (ie: behavior that puts you in the bottom 5 - 10% of buyers).



Except in the case of fraudulent sellers, the cause of INR’s are (almost) always because an item is lost in the mail or a buyer (fraudulently) claims non-receipt (a piece-of-cake to do with “light” and “small” packets). Unfortunately, some buyers file INR’s early to protect themselves. A buyer can file a dispute in less time than it takes for the item to arrive (Italy as a crass example).

Question: If the “issue” is resolved voluntarily, i.e. the seller voluntarily refunds, does this buyer still count towards the “dissatisfied” score?

Only the last 30 days of activity are used so old claims regardless of how they are resolved will roll off by themselves after 30 days.

“New seller requirements”

Question: Do I understand correctly that EVERY new seller will be required to:

1. Offer PayPal or merchant credit card
2. Will have their funds held by PP in accordance with the new rules

Until they have reached at least 100 FB or have been an eBay member for at least 6 months, or they have 20 DSR’s (if under 4.5) in 12 months, whatever occurs LATEST?

For #1 yes, for #2 more complicated but primarily only if you sell in the "high-risk" categories.

“Protection from chargebacks for Power Sellers”

Question: Could you explain in more detail? Specifically “merchandise not received”. Does that mean that INR’s are automatically covered?

Question: If the answer to the above is “yes”, does it make any difference to the score whether the seller refunds out of his/her own pocket or if the “eBay seller protection” is invoked?

INR's are covered but you still need the same proof of delivery that you have always needed. For the great majority of International shipments this means no change from current policies since d/c is not obtained/available for the majority of International shipments. The real bonus in this policy change is that credit card chargebacks can be won without the need for a confirmed address but you still need proof of delivery.

“Repeat FB credit”

Question: Will this be retroactive and, if so, how far back?


Not sure, I think this is only going forward, I belive it's the removal of feedback from NARU'd members that will be removed retroactively. I thought I saw a clarification on this point but I can't find it now.


“Starting in February”

Question: Is there a specific date?

I believe on all of these the specific dates are TBA, I've heard that the PayPal International changes are effective today (Feb.14) but I can't confirm. I also understand that you need to opt-in to this extra protection for Powersellers. If you check your PayPal account there is a policy update scheduled for March 8th but the details have not yet been posted.


“Excessive shipping”

Question: How does eBay plan to calculate “excessive shipping”, i.e. what are the parameters/benchmarks?

I doubt anybody knows the complete answer, it's a very complicated issue. Sometimes it is simple and obvious but many times it's not. The last time there was a crackdown on excessive shipping there was a lot of "collateral damage".

“We will remove negative and neutral FB when a buyer does not respond to the UPI”

Question: What happens when the buyer responds “whatever” just to be able to leave FB, even though he/she will never pay?

Any response is a response, the only real change here is that if they don't respond the feedback comment (if any) will be entirely removed instead of the rating only being removed.

“When the listings end in different weeks”

Question: Which is the first day of an “eBay week”?

I saw it specified somewhere but I can't find it now, think it's Monday to Sunday but it could be Sunday to Saturday.

Hopefully Miriam will come back to correct any mistakes and fill in the missing answers.

[recped]

Miriam, another question for you.

Regarding the new DSR qualification standard for Powerseller eligibility.

# New requirement effective July 2008: have maintained a rating of 4.5 or higher for the past 12 months in all four detailed seller ratings (DSRs)

On the US Powerseller board there is considerable confusion on this (and no one like you to answer). If a seller slips below 4.5 in one (or more I suppose) star categories for a short period, say less than 2 months will they lose Powerseller status and if so when will they be eligible again?

Would they have to wait until 12 months had past since they went below 4.5 or is the 4.5 number some sort of average or aggregate score based on the previous 12 months.

[miriam@ebay.com]

Good morning xenalook and recped,

I have a lot of meetings this morning, but shall be around this afternoon to answer the questions here. Looks like recped is trying to put me out of a job. 😉

See you this afternoon!

Cheers,

Miriam

[coxengines]

Thanks for your answers, recped.

Hopefully, Miriam did not get the "pink-slip" because of this;-)

Xena

[miriam@ebay.com]

Hi everyone,

"Pink-slip" ... good one, xenalook! Let me jump right into your questions, although I think recped did a pretty good job of answering.

On the buyer accountability specifications, I don't believe the parameters will be released publicly. This falls in line with the decision to deal with bad buyer behavior (such as UPIs) in a private setting, rather than a public forum.

Your question about INRs that get amicably resolved is an excellent one - don't know the answer but will see if I can find out.

On safer payments, sellers will be required to offer a safer payment option if they meet any of these conditions:

- have more than 5% dissatisfied buyers in the last 30 days
- have a feedback score of less than 100
- are listing items in the following higher risk categories (and sub-categories): gift certificates, video games, cell phones, computers and consumer electronics

So yes, a new seller will be required to offer a safer payment method (PayPal or merchant credit card) until they no longer meet the above criteria.

Payment holds have different criteria which can be divided into two groups - selling in non higher risk categories, and selling in higher risk categories.

Your payments will not be held if you sell in non-higher risk categories and meet all the following requirements:

eBay Tenure - Greater than 6-months
Total Feedback score - More than 100
Dissatisfied Buyers Percent - Less than 5%

Or if you meet all the following requirements:

Detailed Seller Rating - Greater than 4.5
Total Detailed Seller Ratings recieved - More than 20 in the last 12 months

If you sell in the higher risk categories (gift certificates, video games, cell phones, computers or consumer electronics), your payments will not be held if you meet all the following measures:

eBay Tenure - Greater than 6-months
Total Feedback score - More than 100
Dissatisfied Buyers Percent - Less than 5%
Detailed Seller Rating - Greater than 4.5
Total Detailed Seller Ratings received - More than 20 in the last 12 months

So if you're a new seller, you can avoid payment holds if you sell outside the higher risk categories, are listing and selling regularly and and getting consistently solid DSRs as per the guidelines.

Protection from chargebacks - I don't know the answer on this one. I will have to follow up with the US to get more detail on exactly what merchandise not received means.

Repeat Feedback credit is not retroactive - the credit starts this month and counts going forward. We considered making it retroactive, but the complexity of it was so vast that it would have been wildly expensive and impossible to get 100% accurate. (I was bummed about this because I could have gotten my feedback score above 300 with retroactive repeat feedback.)

On specific start dates, we don't have them. Yes, that's to give us a little wiggle room if something goes wrong. 🙂 But it's also because the code will roll out at slightly different times for different countries. So we might get things a few days later than the US, Europe might get it a day after us, etc.

Excessive shipping ... what is the context here? Is it DSRs? I just want to make sure we're on the same page.

Responding to UPIs - this is one area where we're putting more resources. We need people to ensure that buyers who respond with "OK" or "No I won't pay" aren't able to leave feedback.

For the purposes of the repeat feedback credit, eBay defines one week as the period between Monday through Sunday.

Phew ... a lot of questions! I have to run now (unfortunately), but will be back Tuesday. I am one of the lucky ones who actually gets to spend Family Day ... with my family.

Thanks again for all the great questions ... keep 'em coming!

Happy weekend to all,

Miriam

[recped]

Repeat Feedback credit is not retroactive - the credit starts this month and counts going forward. We considered making it retroactive, but the complexity of it was so vast that it would have been wildly expensive and impossible to get 100% accurate. (I was bummed about this because I could have gotten my feedback score above 300 with retroactive repeat feedback.)

You're "bummed"! I could a been an instant shooting star if it was retroactive :_|

[coxengines]

Miriam,

Thank you for taking the time to research and answer my questions.

PP funds hold
So, if I understand correctly, even in the best-case scenario EVERY new seller will get their funds held (21 days or pos. FB) for a minimum of 20 transactions (and those have to average 4.5+).


Excessive shipping
What is eBay's definition of "excessive" in general? A % of the item cost? An absolute value? How would eBay be in a position to figure out shipping costs for an item without knowing dimensions, weight, type of service, packaging materials involved, etc?

I'm sure we are all clear that $100 shipping for an iPod is excessive but what about $20 for a book? Or $8.00 for an item that sells for $2?

"Excessive" is an adverb and therefore a subjective quality. I am really just curious as to when the term "excessive" will be applied and what parameters will be used to achieve this.


Amicable INR resolution
Would be interesting to hear on that one. Sometimes things do get lost in the mail and I either refund or re-ship. What else can one do?

Good sellers will do the right thing; after all, the buyer did not get the merchandise and it is up to the seller to build in the necessary protection or insurance.

It would be nice to hear that such a seller's reputation will not be tarnished because the postal system "dropped the ball".

Perhaps it would be a good idea to have "report such an issue" link. A bona-fide buyer will have nothing to worry about (isolated incident) but the "professional shopper" will have more or many such "incidents" showing on his/her file.

Xena