Have you ever noticed what happens to your sales when you have to cancel an order?

[musicyouneed]

Have you ever noticed what happens to your sales when you have to cancel an order?  I misplaced a CD and had to cancel an order or at least partially as I had 2 of the 3.  Sales dropped off a cliff after I cancelled.  This has happened to me before, I guess the algorithum knocks me out of searches.  So not only do I get a mark against me but my sales are affected.  I am not sure how long I have been knocked out in the past.  I normally have a couple of sales a day and now zilch.  

Has this happened to you, any advice?

[ricarmic]

OOS (Out of Stock) defects are very significant in eBay's eyes so I am not surprised that the searches would disfavour someone who just got one at least for a period of time. 

From the "BOTs" perspective one doesn't know if this is the warning sign that there's a bigger problem with the seller so for customer's sake don't favour the seller as much until it is clear it's a one off or rare event. Buyers would agree with this sentiment, sellers of course wouldn't.

[reallynicestamps]

I had two cancellations by buyers last week and will have three Unpaid* cancellations this week.

Those "buyer driven" cancellations do not seem to have made any impact on my sales.

I suspect the problem is with OOS defects rather than cancellations as such.

How do your May sales compare (number and value) with May 2023? 2022? 2019? (ignoring the 2020-21 pandemic surge as outliers)

*Same buyer for the UIDs.

[ilikehockeyjerseys]

It wouldn't surprise me if the 'Best Match' algorithm favors accounts with limited defects, with that said it could mostly be confirmation bias if you don't have a large sample size of sales to go off of. 

Defects aren't that uncommon. I don't think eBay reasonably expects a seller to never have a defect. That is why the threshold is set at 0.5 percent. It wouldn't surprise me if it does effect the algorithm, but it would surprise me if it effects it to the point that your sales can be completely "turned off". I find that usually when sellers experience that, and you look at their store, it's a pretty clear case of a lower sample size (like less than 1 item sold per day on average) causing confirmation bias. 

As in, they are worried and look for a reason why they went days without a sale, when the reality is that someone who already only sells 1 item every 1.5-2 days on average could easily go a few days without a sale for no reason other than their stock is niche with a low sell through rate.