Just a quick heads up for anyone with orders awaiting payment – check your buyer hasn’t been NARUed. This morning I went to file a UID on an outstanding order, only to be given my fees back immediately as the buyer’s no longer registered on eBay. There’s nothing to indicate this is the case in SMP. Unregistered buyers used to have a little note by their transaction indicating the change in status, but it seems this is no longer the case.
This particular transaction is on eBay.fr so I’m not sure how widespread the problem is, or whether this is a glitch or eBay deeming the information no longer necessary. But if you’re staring at unpaid sales, it might be worth a check whether the buyers are still registered or not. Those FVFs won’t refund themselves 😉
15 Responses
How many chances are Ebay giving people with unpaid item strikes i,ve had recent dealing with someone called [buyer’s ID removed] on Ebay they got an unpaid item strike from me and judging by the feedback comments they have several others have done the same, at least 50 comments saying not paid ?
Sorry Barry; please don’t post buyer IDs in the comments. It’s for your own protection as well as ours.
In answer to your question – lots more than they used to. “Buyer education” strike reversals are getting more and more common, and I *think* that buyers are getting them more than once too. I’ve said it before and I’ll no doubt say it again: if eBay thought less about their own fees and more about making the site an easy place to trade, and got rid of the whole UID process, none of us would have these problems.
@ # 1
Griff told everybody in his Q&A thread that they give buyers 1 guaranteed reversal but if they don’t pay again after that freebie they almost always suspend them. It has also been stated by someone (I think it was Griff again) that they usually only allow buyers 3 UPIs before suspending them.
Considering that those two statements are contradictory I think that’s your answer.
Of course a cynic may think that ebay do not care wether buyers pay or not as Ebay gets a cut anyway.
not that I am a cynic of course.
NARU buyers don’t show SMP on ebay uk either. We’ve had 2 in the last week.
On the NPB issue Scott Wingo said previously don’t waste your time doing UPID’s but I take the opposite view that if we don’t as sellers all these NPB’s will continue costing us money and as per the first message here people who don’t pay once usually do the same over and over and over and if you don’t file and then issue strikes against them we have no way of getting NPB’s kicked off the site – even if ebay don’t enforce the policy as they should which seems pretty clear they do eventually kick off persistent NPB’s.
Our problem is most of them know how to work the system so all almost always immediately respond to the dispute so they can leave feedback which leaves a seller between a rock and a hard place because in theory you could get suspended for negative feedback then received from someone who didn’t even pay.
I’m with Sue and all the others on the paying and shopping basket issue. What other site anywhere in the World says ‘buy now’ but pay if/when you feel like it but don’t worry the item you’ve bought will be kept for you just in case you do decide to pay. I can only imagine what it’s like for sellers who deal in one-offs. The problem of course is combined postage but perhaps the free postage roll-out is the road towards what we probably all want.
Our SMPro are showing NARU’d Members
https://homepage.ntlworld.com/host/NARU%27d.JPG
To get around NPB’s, if you offer items on BIN’s with Paypal then tick the ‘Immediate Payment Required’ box.
Bye Bye NPB’s & eCheques, although it does cause issues with having to refund discounts with combined postage overpayments (if your offer this)
Toby, thanks for the comment – requiring immediate payment is *one* way around NPBs, but it really doesn’t address the issue if you commonly sell multiple items to single buyers. eBay needs to deal with this properly, not just go “require instant payment” as it currently stands.
I’m sure everyone’s bored with me standing on this particularly soapbox… 😉
@8 Sue: Not at all Sue, it’s STILL a problem and until ebay sort it, it will continue to be one.
Slightly off topic but ebay isn’t the only place where sellers are having to hold onto goods while buyers take their time in sending payment. Has anyone noticed an increase in pending orders on Amazon? I have 6 at the moment, including one from April. Am trying to get a response from Amazon support to ascertain exactly how long I have to keep these goods aside before I can sell them to someone else, so far with no joy.
I don’t offer a layaway service, why am I being forced into operating one?
I didn’t know you *could* buy stuff on Amazon without paying for it 😯
@10 Chris: It’s a bit of a mystery to me. These pending orders are a real pain in the ‘arris as the item is removed from your inventory (and so unavailable to other customers), but if the sale falls through (possibly due to not passing payment process, who knows) it doesn’t get put back into your inventory. I think it’s supposed to, but tests by other Amazon sellers (myself included) confirms the item doesn’t. So the item is in limbo and if it’s your last one 🙄 it’s sods law. 😐
We’ve received orders from Amazon and the customer order date is at least a week prior. When we first noticed this we contacted Amazon Support for some explanation. It was like talking to a brick wall. People whinge about eBay, but it’s Customer Support is fantastic in comparison to Amazon.
Must be great for those that sell one-offs! And people complain about eBay 😀
If eBay wants to be something it wasn’t, then it needs to do it properly … and, if so, then I agree that means having a shopping cart for fixed price items.
#8 @Sue Don’t ever get off that soapbox! 🙂