In the meantime, the SYI form is working correctly, so that’s one option for sellers anxious to get on with listing.

With Shop Inventory format ending on eBay.com at the end of March, and all fixed price listings appearing in core search results it’s an ideal time for sellers to experiment with auctions. From experience they not only get guaranteed visibility when the item is about to end, but can also increase sales on similar or related fixed price items.

There aren’t likely to be many more cheap or free listing days in the future. For casual sellers auction listings on eBay.com will be free, and business sellers will cease worrying about insertion fees as they have in the UK

Unlike it’s predecessor eBay Live!, which was billed as the biggest eBay event of the year, eBay On Location is aimed at small business and part-time eBay sellers to help them kick start and grow their eBay businesses.

If you’re already an established eBay Top Rated PowerSeller, you might want to bend the ear of some eBay employees, but I don’t see it as a “must attend” event if you’re already well versed in the art of eBaying. However if you’re starting out then it’s a great opportunity to get to grips with selling formats, eBay shops, ramping up sales and customer service.

The San Jose event will be the one not to miss, purely because eBay are bound to do something special for their 15th anniversary, but if you’re tempted by any of the other venues I’d plump for Chicago – simply because it’s a beautiful city and you can write the trip off as a business expense

For a paltry $45 ($35 if you book early) if you live close to a venue it looks well worth the money. If you don’t live close to one of the eBay On Location events then travel to either Chicago or San Jose.

Wouldn’t it be cool, I thought to myself, if Best Match was clever enough to see that I hadn’t specified a season, even though tWW has seven, and to figure out that what I’m *probably* looking for, then, is the complete complete set, rather than any one season, and show me those first.

And then, coincidentally, Adam Nash wrote a post about the same thing. If you don’t know Adam, he used to work for eBay, and he is exceptionally smart, so when his colleague Ikai unfavourably compared the prices of Deep Space 9 DVD sets available on eBay and Amazon, he set out to figure out why eBay looked like such a bad deal.

Here’s what he found (republished with permission).

personal payments to and from India and transfers to local banks in India have been suspended while we work with our business partners and other stakeholders to address questions they have about the service. During this time, customers can still make commercial payments to India but merchants cannot withdraw funds in Rupees to local Indian banks.

In addition (though not mentioned in the official communiqué), PayPal has apparently reversed all personal payments made to Indian accounts between 1st and 5th February. Payments for services too are being reversed, though an email sent out from PayPal support says that if payments were made for goods, they should be made again using the “Goods” tab and providing a shipping address, and they will be honoured.

Some users are speculating that this is being done by PayPal to stop fee-free personal payments – though PayPal’s own statement suggests it’s something more legalistic than that. More information if we get it.

Mingling amongst the likes of Schuh, Sole Trader, Calvin Klein, Woolworths, House of Fraser and more big names, I started to feel out of my depth but then I thought why should I, it would be great to learn what these guys are learning as I bet I can implement any changes quicker than them and that’s the good thing about being an independent company.

There was some interesting information from IMRG:
• Online growth in December 2009 was up 17%
• 41% of consumers plan to spend more online next Christmas
• Christmas day sales £132m: up 29% on 2008. Fewer customers but higher basket spend
• Strong growth sectors in 2009 were Clothing, Footwear & Accessories
• Overall conversion rates were down in 2009 due to customers researching more, which to me indicates more research needs to be done by companies as well
• An odd & interesting bit of information is that across the board online-only stores saw a decrease of 7.6% in December versus multi channel retailers who were up 13%. This was an indication that high street retailers are getting their act together with connecting their online business & bricks & mortar stores
• Interesting eBay fact that in December across all eBay countries 1.5million items were purchase on a mobile phone!

Communities for websites were also a big part of the summit with many discussions and presentations on the use of social media, reviews and how best to interact with customers. Did you know if all the registered users on Facebook lived in a country it would be the fourth largest country in the world!!!

There were some interesting presentations that talked about successful campaigns such as Art of the Trench by Burberry, this was good to see a top design brand connecting with customers though communities such as facebook & it also created an awful lot of press over the site. ASOS were also mentioned a great deal for the use of their own community, Facebook and Twitter, which is always good to follow.

How I look at communities is you can really use it to sell, sell, sell: it’s a place to connect with your customers more, an extension of your customer service if you will. Facebook and Twitter can give your online business a personal feel which is what online retail is sometimes lacking.

There were also discussions on bloggers, and in fact we had the chance to meet a panel of them. It was interesting to learn that the public are trusting bloggers’ and reviewers’ opinions more & more. That’s why if you have a website it is essential to add reviews to your products.

Images were also a massive part of discussions including a presentation from one of the creators of Adobe 7, these are the guys that offer the software for imaging and video to most of the top sites in the US and UK. In a survey offered by them, customers ranked importance of images as

• Quality of image 94%
• Alternative images 88%
• Zoom 85%

At the end of the day no matter how much content you offer a customer the image is key to selling an item. Make it clear, offer alternative views and increasing in popularity is showing the items in context, i.e. on a model. Video is really helping with this too, with clothing shown on catwalks. Some top sites for images are:

www.jcpennys.com
www.asos.com
www.mywardrobe.com
www.converse.com

An interesting US site called www.blackcountry.com. These guys have added the ability for customers to upload their own images of camping equipment. The company adds the standard product pic then customers can upload their own giving better views of the product but also real customer opinions and reviews too!

It would be easy to dismiss all of this and say ‘We haven’t the money or the time’ but for any business – large or small, on eBay or just a website – elements of this are vital to your growth. Even if you spend an hour a week improving the quality of your images it is a start, but if you are looking to really grow then spend time and a little money on creating a community around your site. We started really working on this in November and the signs are very, very good on increasing turnover!

I know it’s February already, but I’ve just got my hands on The Independent UK Guide to eBay 2010. The Guide has been around for a few years now – I was made aware of it when they first reviewed TameBay in the 2008 edition. It’s an odd sort of publication: it looks like a magazine, both in size and in layout, but definitely has a bookish price tag.

The Guide bills itself as “The Essential Guide to Buying and Selling | How to make SERIOUS money on eBay” (that latter seems a bit familiar, doesn’t it). And I don’t know what’s happened to it over the last 12 months, but where before it felt patchy, unfinished, almost as though it were written by someone who’d never used eBay but knew how to write a how-to book, this year it’s turned into something a lot more useful.

Mostly this is a guide for sellers, aimed probably at those who’ve sold a couple of personal items but want to sell more, or who are considering going pro. The two longest chapters are “Introductory Selling” and “Advanced Selling”, which cover all the basics, with extensive sections on what can go wrong and how to deal with it, and auction management for people who look at their ever-filling inbox and freak out. There are numerous case studies on sellers who are “already doing it” – from running an eBay business alongside your B&M shop, to (intriguingly) a seller who’s quitting online retail and advises others to do the same.

There’s more. There’s the inevitable “how to buy on eBay” chapter, which in a “how to sell” book is almost entirely pointless: I’ll forgive this one because it jumps on my own favourite bandwagon, asking why eBay has no proper shopping cart. There’s a chapter on PayPal and alternative payment methods, and another on eBay competitors which runs through the basics of selling on Amazon and PlayTrade. There’s a useful “Reviews Directory” of eBay-related software which even experienced sellers might find worth a look.

The magazine format has one huge thing to recommend it: colour pictures. And there are a lot, mainly in the form of screenshots which walk you through how to set up an eBay shop or take a decent photograph, or even how to list on Amazon marketplace.

If you’re a seller newish to eBay, this is worth getting: it pretty much covers the basics, it’s reasonably entertaining and the format is easy to dip in and out of, especially as it’s peppered with “memorable auction” boxes highlighting some of the more unusual listings in eBay’s history, and website reviews, suggesting places you can get further help and information (including – disclosure – TameBay). If you’re a seller who’s already running a full-time business and knows what they’re doing, on the other hand, there’s very little here you don’t already know – and anything you need to check, you’d be better doing online where the information is bang up to date.

And if you want to see what the IUKG2e2010 said about us, here’s their review.

Why the Amazon affiliate link, not eBay? Because the only copy listed on eBay UK at time of writing is coming from Malaysia. And because the Amazon affiliate program makes linking it, with piccie and price, so simple. EPN, are you taking note?

To qualify for the 99p offer you’ll need to register at Parcel2Go.com and use the Parcel2Go eBay upload tool which links to eBay. This enables you to upload delivery information from your eBay ended items and imports it into Parcel2Go ready for you to select the 99p offer and book a collection date which can be from Tuesday onwards.

The service offered at 99p is HDNL Standard 24 – 72 hour delivery, which normally costs £5.99 + VAT. Although the offer is for bookings made on Monday only, you can arrange a collection date for any day during the week. There’s no limit on the number of parcels you can send using the offer, but it’s strictly a jiffy bag or box service, letters will not be accepted.

This has to be the best delivery promotion I’ve ever seen, 99p is an unbeatable price and if you want to take advantage I’d recommend you register with Parcel2Go and get your eBay account linked ready for Monday morning.

Disclosure: Parcel2Go advertise with TameBay

We regret to inform you that SpoonFeeder will cease business operations immediately. Although some parts of the system may remain operational for a very short time, we cannot guarantee how long.

We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience our sudden shutdown may cause.

I’m 95% certain it’s not a spoof: I’ve received it on both the email addresses I had registered with Spoonfeeder, and an awful lot of other eBay sellers have also received it. If, of course, there’s a follow-up email from another listing software provider, I might reconsider that thought.

At time of writing, there doesn’t seem to be any further information on Spoonfeeder’s website, and listings using their hosting still appear to be working. How long that might last is anyone’s guess: it’s a reminder, if we needed another one, to host your images somewhere that stays under your control.

More info if we get it.

Update: email confirmed genuine. Sorry to see Spoonfeeder go: they were a life-saver for me.

The auction prizes have been donated by door-to-door delivery company myHermes, to raise money for Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity through eBay for Charity and run until Sunday 14th February. Mika Hakkinen, who is a brand ambassador for myHermes said “I am a father of two myself and appreciate the importance of the work which Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity does for sick children. I sincerely hope that we will be able to raise a lot of funds”.

So if you’re a budding racing driver or simply fancy tearing round the track at Mercedes-Benz World in a 6.2 litre V8 Mercedes AMG with a Formula 1 legend at the wheel get bidding now. You might have to outbid Sue though, she’s a big fan of Mika and wanted to write this post but it would have been too XXX rated

All of the auctions also include a 3 course lunch with Mika, as well as an off-road driver training session with a Mercedes-Benz driving specialist. The driving sessions will take place on the 24th February, just 10 days after the auctions finish at Mercedes-Benz world in Surrey. If you’re planning to bid make sure you give yourself the day off work!

Disclosure: myHermes advertise with TameBay

TameBay chum Whirly had just such an email this morning. He duly mailed his buyer to say that the echeque wasn’t due to clear until 10th to 12th February. But, came back the reply from the buyer, PayPal have told me it’ll clear on the 9th, and I need my item for the 12th.

But the messaging gets worse: PayPal’s website states that echeques can take 6-9 working days to clear – meaning that Whirly’s customer’s echeque wouldn’t clear until somewhere between the 12th and the 17th. How’s anyone supposed to make an informed decision when the information is so inconsistent? Someone needs to learn to count.

We’ve been here before. PayPal are supposed to have cleaned up the messaging around echeques, making sure that buyers understand exactly what they’re doing, and that they should really update the card they have on file before payment, so that echeques don’t happen.

However much PayPal try to “improve communications”, the simple fact is that buyers don’t understand what an echeque is. Why should they? Who wants to learn the ins and outs of the British banking system just to make one simple payment? It’s time something radical was done.

This shouldn’t be down to sellers. We’re not party to what cards the buyer has on file with PayPal. We can’t see electronic transfers between buyers’ banks and PayPal. We’re guessing, in the dark, and it makes us look terrible. It’s time PayPal stopped making us do this. If it wishes to continue to offer echeques to buyers as a payment method, then *it* should fund the risk. Take the echeque – give the seller the money. And if, in the “rare” instance, it bounces, PayPal should be chasing the buyer for payment. Think how much that would improve the buyer experience. Think how much it would improve the *seller* experience.

And if PayPal isn’t willing to do that, then it’s admitting that echeques are dodgy, and it shouldn’t be asking sellers to deal with them.

Photo credit: © Grzegorz Kula | Dreamstime.com

One of the key changes is the ability to drill down into local areas. For example rather than searching “London” for a flat, you can drill down into the specific part of London you wish to live in.

If you prefer to start with a localised search you can now either enter your full or partial Post Code, or by typing in your area name. Previously there was a drop down with a fixed set of major cities, but now if you live in Shoreditch, and want to find an item close by, you can simply type “Shoreditch” into the location search.

I live 25 miles from Reading and Oxford – my two nearest Gumtree sites, so the ability to search the RG18 Post Code where I live is brilliant. Instead of having to search either Gumtree Reading or Gumtree Oxford I can now search my local area. I have to say that for the long term success of Gumtree outside London Post Code search is key.

A common complaint was that pricing wasn’t visible from the Gumtree search results page – you had to click into an ad to discover it was out of your price range. An extra column has been added to the search results to display pricing. Also to help buyers and sellers the category structure has been tweaked.

Finally Gumtree have been fiddling around with their code to make pages load faster. Even with broadband I’m incredibly impatient when surfing the web and getting results faster is a sure fire winner in my book.

If you’ve not checked out the Gumtree beta site it’s well worth a browse, especially if you’re based in the City.

The deal for a dozen red roses for my dear old mum on Valentines day would have been perfect, but because she lives on the Isle of Wight (not “Isle of White” as per the listing!) I’m not allowed to buy them. The seller is offering free delivery, but is being selective as to where they’ll deliver and are excluding huge chunks of the UK with a list of over 200 prohibited Post Codes.

I know many sellers have battled this dilemma for years, some couriers charge different rates for delivery to the far flung reaches of the UK, but is it really fair to discriminate against buyers based on where they live? Why would a seller want to ban 100s of 1000s of potential customers?

There are a number of solutions – work out your average cost to deliver across all UK Post Codes and charge that – over the course of a year it’ll average out. Choose a different courier – Yes that might be a radical solution but why wouldn’t you want to deliver to everyone that wants to buy from you?

So as a seller, how do you handle deliveries where the courier may surcharge for certain areas? Do you bump the price to some of your customer? Do you average your delivery charges over the course of a year? Do you use a different carrier for some deliveries or do you simply swallow the difference and absorb it?

As for the Weekly Deal on eBay – I’m surprised eBay let it through. Why would eBay promote a listing that a ton of their customers aren’t allowed to buy? It’s hardly what I’d call a good buying experience to have your order canceled, especially when it’s themed around flowers and Valentines Day. I’d recommend boycotting the listing, visiting Arena Flowers via PayPal offers and giving them your custom instead.

Those in favour of the proposals argue that b&m stores make a significant investment in the brands they’re selling – for example, in staff training and in-store promotional materials – and that allowing ecommerce businesses to piggy-back on this is unfair.

Not so, says Mr Greeley. With customers increasingly using the internet to research all purchases, whether online or off, you might argue the high street’s piggy-backing on the internet. And why shouldn’t retailers with lower overheads pass those savings on to consumers? I’m with Mr Greeley – I don’t think that giving an orange-painted saleswoman a bottle of perfume to shoosh on me as I go into Debenhams represents much investment in a brand, and if I can buy that cheaper or just more conveniently on the net, I will. In any case, I haven’t seen much evidence of trained staff in any of the shops I’ve been in recently: they’re all too busy hangning up banners saying “have you visited our website?”

Mr Greeley concludes

Manufacturers should remain free to determine their own distribution strategies and to choose their retail partners, but only on the basis of objective and non-discriminatory criteria. European policy makers, including the commission, should adopt rules that are neutral to business models and which do not permit arbitrary discrimination against pure-play retailers.

But as many small business owners could tell him, that’s an incredibly optimistic view of wholesale. The harsh reality is that many manufacturers already *do* discriminate who they supply to on the basis of where they’re going to sell it. “Not online” is not so widespread as it once was, but “not on eBay” is still common. And even if you stop discrimination, you can’t really stop it: orders go missing, things are mysteriously out of stock, or you get put on hold forever.

In some sectors, eBay sellers themselves are entirely to blame for this. In the rush to the bottom to be cheaper than anyone, margin on some products has been cut to, or even below, wholesale price. No manufacturer wants to see that happen, and I can’t exactly blame them for saying “no more”. But there are other ways: insisting on a minimum order quantity that cuts out the people who are playing at shops, for example.

And longer term, I think the issue will resolve itself. Online shopping currently accounts for 10% of all retail sales in the UK – and is predicted to grow from £38bn in 2009 to £42bn in 2010. Online is where it’s at, and no amount of protectionism is going to change that.

Image credit: © Marco Lensi | Dreamstime.com

No, said their CEO Phillip Molloy. There’s been a management buyout of the old company by Phillip and their previous MD, Grenville Whelan. The old company was closed down by an administrator, which is how you close companies, and that’s why people are seeing notices of that company being “in administration”.

The reason for the buyout is about control: Phillip says that they wanted the freedom to invest and develop the business and the old share structure didn’t allow them to do that.

There is no suggestion that the business is anything other than profitable and doing well; any debt or liability held by the old company has been taken over by the new company, which is looking forward to expanding into the USA this year. In addition, existing customers should find the platform more stable as they’ve now moved to Amazon’s web hosting (AWS) to speed things up.

Here’s Frooition’s press release on the same subject. I hope that sets people’s minds at rest.

Disclosure: Frooition used to advertise with TameBay. They no longer do so.

photo credit: PhoebeJ

We’ve heard from numerous sellers over the last few days that they’re having problems accessing their own and other sellers’ About Me pages on eBay UK. On the View Item page, the link to the Me page seems to point back to the same page you’re on; the link at the top of the Shop home page doesn’t work (though AFAIK the one in the sidebar normally does); several of the links from within My eBay don’t seem to work… the list goes on, the problem seems to be intermittent, and of course, there are conspiracy theories.

The About Me page is – still – the one page on eBay where a seller is permitted to link an off-eBay commercial website, and lots of sellers – myself included – have speculated in the past that we’d see it disappear. In the US, a revised links policy saw off-site links banned even from About Me for a while in 2008, but that policy was quickly reversed.

But for now, at least, sellers can rest easy: these non-linking links are a glitch, and James the eBay UK Community Manager has confirmed that eBay will be fixing them. How much of a priority that fix will be remains to be seen: if you’re relying on your About Me page to offer your buyers crucial information re. their eBay purchases, you might want to look at other options for that.

You can now get a quick look at size and other item specifics with a new “quick look” link in search results, which creates a popup window showing a larger picture of the item and its item specifics, all without leaving the search results page. (This is almost identical with the “more options” link which appears under Multi-Variation listings.) And the particularly good news is that sellers don’t need to edit anything at all to make it work: it just does.

So make sure you’re filling out item specifics if you’re selling in CSA – they’re more crucial than they ever were.

Interflora are stumping up free delivery and Thorntons are offering 25% off, along with a number of other retailers offering discounts and freebies.

Down in India eBay are also ramping up for Valentines with an “eBay – Love Yourself” TV campaign. It’s all about loving yourself so much you get on eBay and buy the things you’ve always wanted, although rather annoymously and eBay India appear to have a large majority of sellers who’ve taken gift wrapping advice to heart.

Andrew said that winning was a complete surprise, they didn’t know they’d entered the competition, but everyone that loaded their Parcel2Go account with at least £20.00 during December was entered, and My Green Lighting is a regular customer and already use Parcel2Go daily.

Andrew was naturally delighted to win, and this company benefited on their bottom line from the savings. They already offer competitive delivery charges and saw no need to pass the savings on to customers (I have to say I’d have probably done the same ).

Having experimented with a number of courier companies Andrew plumped for Parcel2Go as “they’re good to deal with, there’s always someone friendly and efficient on the phone and pretty good on price as well”.

(Also as an aside I hear on the grapevine there’s another Parcel2Go promotion in the near future – more details as soon as we can get someone to spill the beans!)

To qualify for the promotion sellers will have to have 12 month detailed seller rating of 4.5 or higher on all four criteria, or be new sellers without a DSR score. Normal insertion fees for fixed price items is 35¢. From March 30th insertion fees will be 50¢, 20¢, 5¢ or 3¢ for no store, a basic store, a featured store or an anchor store respectively.

10¢ looks like a pretty good deal in the interim, and will give sellers the opportunity to test core site fixed price listings prior to the new pricing structure coming into effect.

PowerSeller program and new minimum performance standards for all sellers

At the same time as lowering the entrance requirements for PowerSellers there are new minimum performance standards for selling on eBay. From April sellers can receive no more than 1% or total of three low ratings for “Item as described”, and no more than 2% or total of three low ratings for “Communication”, “Dispatch Time” and the “P&P charges” DSRs. Falling below this level will incur sanctions such as demotion in search and selling restrictions.

Selling Practices Policy for all sellers

Along with higher selling standards a Selling Practices policy will be introduced which is summarised as:
* Sellers are responsible for ensuring a smooth and professional transaction with their buyers.
* This includes setting buyers’ expectations by providing accurate and consistent details about items and the terms and conditions of sale.
* Sellers also must offer excellent customer service from the time of purchase to item delivery. This includes reasonable postage & packaging charges, clear statement on dispatch time, prompt and professional communication, and ensuring the item is delivered to the buyer as described.
* Business sellers need to offer a return policy which is included in the listing description
* Sellers are expected to live up to their stated terms through all stages of a transaction.

Mandatory Business Information displayed on listings

All business sellers will have to display their business contact information on their eBay listings by the end of March. This will be compulsory but introduces a number of issues, not least of which is that it’s added to the item description as text and can not be bulk edited. Any changes such as a relocation to new premises, change of phone number or email address and change of VAT status will result in every single one of a sellers active listings being incorrect.

Many sellers, especially those that trade from home, will be concerned about having their contact details displayed for buyers to see. My main concern is that the way the contact information is inserted into listings means that there’s no way to make a single edit which will update every live listing on the site and in the long term that’s simply unworkable. eBay need to fix this and allow sellers to make global changes to their Business Seller Information in eBay preferences to make this program viable.

International Site Visibility reinstated

At last the International Visibility listing upgrade is returning to eBay UK, from the end of March sellers will be able to use a listing enhancement to display fixed price listings on eBay.com and eBay.ca. Currently that’s only available for auctions, although US and Canadian sellers are able to use the listing enhancement to display their items on eBay UK.

I imagine for sellers who previously used the feature will be pretty happy that this is returning for fixed price listings, and will be able to save money and simplify stock management by not duplicating listings on multiple eBay sites.

The end of mandatory free postage

Mandatory free postage has been scrapped and is a thing of the past, and will be replaced by shipping caps. From March postage caps will apply to a number of categories and eBay have published a list of maximum shipping charge for each category. The postage caps only apply to the first domestic postage option for UK sales. Postage caps will not apply to overseas sales.

Mandatory free postage has undoubtedly put pressure on margins and restricted the type of postage service sellers have offered to buyers. This change will enable sellers to once again offer a premium postage option as default instead of being forced to offer the cheapest possible and of course it’s the end of paying eBay’s final value fees for free post.

Ending old Good Til Canceled listings

From the end of March a new process will be introduced to end Good Til Canceled listings which haven’t had a sale for 16 months. These listings will appear in your eBay unsold items and are available to be relisted. I like this move, it gives sellers a prompt to review their items to make sure the title is relevant, that the listing still has pictures and that the price is still competitive. It will also prompt sellers to update item specifics for listings which have been affected by category changes or other updates.

Multi Variation Listings in more categories

Multi Variation Listings will become available in more categories, and from the end of March will appear in some Home and Garden, Sporting Goods and Baby categories.

Watermarking images

There will be enhancements to the way that images in eBay listings are watermarked. In the future instead of eBay’s default camera image a seller will be use their eBay user ID as a watermark. This should mean the end of stolen images from sellers who spend the time to produce quality pictures.

Sellers’ product photos in catalogues

eBay will be improving the quantity and quality of images in product catalogues, and will do so by using photos from sellers’ listings. All sellers will be opted in to the program as default, but are able to opt out if they wish. If your photo is used as a catalogue image a credit to your eBay ID and link to your My World page will be added as a credit.

Summary

There’s not too much in this announcement to disrupt how sellers do business on eBay, but plenty to please them. Concerns are most likely to be around the display of Business Seller Information, eBay’s use of sellers’ images and of course the new minimum seller standards. There’s much welcome news though, such as the end of mandatory free postage and the re-introduction of International Visibility. Overall it looks pretty good news and more a tidying up of the site and standards than a radical overhaul of the way sellers do business.

It’s one of those things that eBay think is a minor inconvenience – but sellers know can make for unhappy buyers, and can easily turn transactions which are hanging in the balance completely to the bad. Let’s hope they fix this one soon.

Now it appears it’s an official eBay program which is actively searching for low DSR scores that appear unfair, and removing them. On a thread on the Business Seller board a seller reports their dashboard displaying “Your seller performance level has been adjusted. Your seller performance level has been adjusted in your favor. Because your low detailed seller ratings (DSRs) were from a small number of buyers and these ratings were inconsistent with your performance history, they did not count in your current evaluation.”

eBay are proactively looking for checking for malicious DSRs to address the “one buyer can take me down” concern that many sellers have. Interestingly eBay told us that “In those cases, the Feedback is not removed – we reduce the impact of the low DSRs from those few buyers so that a single buyer does not have an undue impact on a seller”.

DSRs, especially due to their anonymity, are the hardest form of feedback eBay sellers have ever had to manage. Probably the only thing that comes close is from the very early days of eBay when you could leave feedback for members with whom you hadn’t even transacted.

As sellers are in the main unable even to identify which buyers have left them low DSR scores it’s reassuring that eBay are actively managing feedback on seller’s behalf. It’s even more reassuring to keep hearing from sellers who have benefited from DSR adjustments. If you believe you’ve received some unfairly low DSRs get in touch with support and ask them to take a look at your scores and ask if there is a case for them to be adjusted.

Ady from AVMDVDs was the first person to mention this. He had a buyer from outside the UK who said they were posting a cheque: he said, no, it’s PayPal only. And when he received no payment, he opened a UID. So far, fairly standard stuff. But when he came to close the UID, the system wouldn’t let him – because, it said, the buyer had paid. And the payment date was the date the buyer had completed checkout.

Just a glitch, you’d think – but not so. On contacting eBay Support, Ady was told:

your buyer xxxxxxxx have completed our Checkout process and paid for the DVD they have purchased from you using a postal order ot banker’s draft. Our system recognised that the payment has been made by the buyer and this is the reason why you were unable to close the unpaid item case you have filed against the buyer [sic]

He posted the problem in a thread on the PowerSeller board and it seems he’s not the only one with the problem: at least two other sellers have experienced the same thing.

Ady’s case does seem to have a happy ending as the dispute is now closed – apparently all by itself – and the FVFs refunded. Nonetheless, as he says, “surely we can’t be expected to complain to support everytime we get the same thing happening because the system won’t let it go through”.

PS: Ady, I did try and mail you back but My Messages won’t let me.

Qualification criteria for entry-level Bronze PS status is being dramatically lowered: sellers will have to have

• a minimum of 100 transactions* over 12 months (currently 100 items per month for three months), or
• minimum sales volume of £2000* over 12 months (currently £750 per month for three months)

In addition, there will be new minimum performance standards for all PowerSellers:

• average DSRs of 4.6 on all four criteria (currently 4.0)
• 1 or 2 star ratings for item as described DSR: maximum 1% or 3 total*
• 1 or 2 star ratings for other three DSRs: maximum 2% or 3 total*
• have no policy breaches in the last 90 days
• have no breaches of the Feedback Manipulation, Shill Bidding and Counterfeits policies in the last 180 days
• comply with the Selling Practices Policy

* Only transactions with UK and Irish buyers count for these criteria.

There are FAQs on the changes if you need more information.

What’s really interesting – or will be, if they enforce it – is that Selling Practices Policy. In short, this requires sellers to give buyers their legal rights and to comply with relevant legislation, as well as undertaking some eBay best practice. If eBay put the effort into enforcing this policy (they might start with some Outlets), it will go a very long way towards cleaning up the site. Richmond, over to you…

Now you see me…
If you can’t spot the new content on the PowerSeller portal, don’t panic. Some people have reported they could see it earlier this afternoon but not now; in the absense of an AB post, we might speculate that this one’s been released a little earlier than it should have been ahead of next week’s UK seller release.