Yikes, Below Standard Rating!

[oatmeal]

So I've been a PowerSeller and Top Rated Seller for the last few months, but this category,
"Cases closed without seller resolution" is 0.34% (3 out of 881). The cut off line for Top Rated is 0.30%
So I'm just 0.04% off!

What I don't understand is all my other categories are Top Rated percentiles but this category "cases closed without seller resolution" is 0.04 % over so now I'm below standard? Isn't that over the top/harsh?

So naturally, I'm worried what could happen to me due to this rating. Obviously, I want to get it back to under 0.30 from 0.34%

I guess the general rule of thumb is you should pretty much just automatically give a refund as soon as a case is opened for risk of losing the case and just 1 unresolved case can lead to below standard ratings and suspenesion/bans/penalties! That is VERY HARSH.

So this leads me to another question. Which I will ask in a brand new topic since it's a different topic.

 

[toml3030]

What I don't understand is all my other categories are Top Rated percentiles but this category "cases closed without seller resolution" is 0.04 % over so now I'm below standard? Isn't that over the top/harsh?

IMO, no, because it's not that hard not to keep below the defect %.

I guess the general rule of thumb is you should pretty much just automatically give a refund as soon as a case is opened for risk of losing the case and just 1 unresolved case can lead to below standard ratings and suspenesion/bans/penalties!

No, you tell the customer that you'll be happy to 100% refund upon the receipt of the returns.You give money back within 1 week after return has been received and you will almost never get a "cases closed without seller resolution" defect. In vast majority of cases it should never even have to get to the point where eBay gets involved to force a refund.

 

[oatmeal]

881 transactions, 3 ended with ebay having to step in and decide the case. I don't understand how only 3 boobies out of 881 tries is a bad thing as ebay makes it out to be (below standard). That's a 99.65% success rate. I don't care if you are in the business of surgery, student at school, or corporate company, a 99.65% rate of success is not below standard. Would I love to be 100%, of course. It's really mind-boggling how a 99.65% success rate is rated as "below standard" to ebay, and now we get punished for it.

If companies like Apple, Samsung, Microsoft or any other giant corp, were judged by these standards, they'd all have been suspended/banned years ago. Fortunately for them, they don't operate under the rules of Ebay. I would guess that most successful major companies are operating at about 90-95% success rate which to ebay standard would get you suspended.


Hence why I came to the conclusion that it seems the only way to remain at 100% is to literally just refund every single opened case whether the customer is right or wrong, ebay sellers just can't afford 1 unresolved case even.

 

[toml3030]

881 transactions, 3 ended with ebay having to step in and decide the case. I don't understand how only 3 boobies out of 881 tries is a bad thing as ebay makes it out to be (below standard).

eBay used to count all problems as defects. They changed the rules to be MUCH MUCH more lenient to sellers where even if you mess up, a prompt refund solves most problems. What more do you want?

If companies like Apple, Samsung, Microsoft or any other giant corp, were judged by these standards,

You have no right to make money on eBay. Moaning and complaining about eBay policies are like yelling at the rain for being wet or at the sun for it being hot. It is just the way is. Millions of sellers have no problem making money with the eBay rules and regulations way they are set up now. If you can't deal with it, it's not their problem, it's yours.

 

[oatmeal]

eBay used to count all problems as defects. They changed the rules to be MUCH MUCH more lenient to sellers where even if you mess up, a prompt refund solves most problems. What more do you want?



You have no right to make money on eBay. Moaning and complaining about eBay policies are like yelling at the rain for being wet or at the sun for it being hot. It is just the way is. Millions of sellers have no problem making money with the eBay rules and regulations way they are set up now. If you can't deal with it, it's not their problem, it's yours.

Yes, I know simply giving them a refund will close a case and end it with no worries. But in my case, I really believed I was going to win the case because my tracking had shown it arrived in the country and the buyer claiming they never received anything after 1 month of that update is very fishy to me. That's why I keep saying, maybe as sellers, we better just refund them no matter what, even if it means taking a loss because as I said, you can't really afford even just 1 unresolved case closed by ebay because TSR must be 99.65% or higher. What more do I want you say? How about lowering that 99.65% to about 99%!! Geez, give us sellers a little bit of leeway. 99.64% is not good enough??? 99.64 is below standard and 99.65 is TOP RATED. They are really splitting hairs here! At least 1% should be the margin of error, not .35% , especially for small volume sellers.

Relax Tom, do you work for ebay? People can criticize ebay if they want. You can't tell people not to complain about ebay's policies. That's like you telling everyone who complains about America to just get out and live in another country then.

You are only seeing one side of the coin because maybe that's where you stand. You do realize there are thousands upon thousands of other sellers who were Top Rated, made millions, sold thousands, and they also have written complaints and blogs/articles about how Ebay treats sellers. Try googling it up and see all the criticisms against Ebay's policies.

Ebay's policies are not perfect and far from it. They have all kinds of problems, and fair criticism is necessary in life to make improvements.

 

[oatmeal]

I just wanted to give another update. I saw in my seller performance rating that actually my next evaluation in January, I'll be back as Top Rated.
I checked the details and it looks like they only keep the records for the past 6 months! My current evaluation was from Sept to Dec and I ended up at 0.61% in my defect rating (due to 3 unresolved closed cases by ebay) but next month's evaluation shows only 0.20% (1 unresolved closed case) for Oct to Jan. So, does this mean that after 6 months, defects are off the books or at least not part of the evaluation anymore? This is good news? I was thinking they stay on forever. Please correct me if I am wrong.

 

[Old Dog]

Defects go away as well as neg feedback.
Neg feedbacks go away after 1 year as feedback can only be seen for the last 12 months and percentage is calculated as such. Depending on how much you sell depends on the defect rating.
According to ebay policy: "Sellers with 400 or more transactions over the past 3 months are evaluated based on the past 3 months and sellers with fewer than 400 transactions are evaluated based on the past 12 months."
So apparently you either have more than 400 transactions in the past 3 months and any previous defects will not be counted. Or it will have been over 12 months since one or more of the defects was applied and on your your next evaluation they won't be considered.
Defects are what you want to avoid at all cost. Of course everyone wants 100% feedback but there will always be an asshole that will neg you every now and then.
You gotta kiss the buyers ass when there is a glitch to keep your feedback up. But you gotta follow Ebay policy to keep your defects up regardless of whether or not the buyer is intentionally trying to scam you.
On items not received you will win if tracking shows delivered to their zip code. On returns for item not described, you will lose 99.9% of the time regardless of what actually transpired.
Thats just how Ebay works and you gotta deal with it as it comes and adjust as you go.