eBay holiday settings are not up to scratch

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It’s the holiday season again, and like every year since I started trading on eBay I’m hearing complaints about eBay Holiday settings. Holiday settings hid fixed price listings and should prevent buyers finding them and purchasing but they just don’t work as well as they should.

It should be simple, when you go on holiday you put your holiday settings on with a personal message to buyers to let them know that they will be a delay with their order but it doesn’t happen like that. My friend Shazina Wallington of Invite Designs has just called me along with a great suggestion for eBay.

Shazina has just come back from holiday and is in the middle of dealing with irate eBay customers who didn’t notice or chose to ignore her eBay holiday settings. On her website however she’s continued to accept sales without a single complaint over the delay to goods being delivered.

The big difference is when she turns on holiday settings on her website before completing their order the buyer has to tick a check box confirming they understand it will be a few days before their items are despatched. Rather than relying on the buyer to notice the holiday settings message they have to physically confirm that they’ve seen them.

If eBay added a confirmation box that buyers had to tick to confirm that they are aware the seller is on holiday it could save many sellers headaches when they return from their summer break. In the mean time the only safe advice is not to rely on holiday settings on eBay but to cancel your listings and relaunch them on your return.

30 Responses

  1. That’s an excellent idea.
    Unfortunately, excellent ideas and eBay just don’t seem to go together too well.

  2. Good idea Shaz.

    We set our Holiday setting on in late April & again in early May. NOT for a Holiday, But for aour very prolonged stock take section.

    All emails out were remindered of the situation (a 3-4 day delay over 1 week, then the same again 1 1/2 weeks later).

    Our 1-2s DSR for dispatch went through the roof.

    Just not good enough…..

  3. I sold over 50 items while my holiday settings were on and all my listings supposed to be hidden. It used to be that they had to be watching the item or have bought from it before to find it while holiday settings were on – but many of these were completely new buyers – lord knows how they found them. Fortunately I noticed and set up an automatic “thanks for your payment – you DID see the holiday message” email with a refund offer if they wished to just buy elsewhere. It did not make for a restful three weeks off as I felt I needed to keep my checking my email and messages ;-(

    Compared to the river where you hit the button – wait and few hours later that’s it – Done and gone and off you go on your hols. Why can’t ebay, just for once fix something that actually needs fixing? Instead of sending my buyers feedback reminder emails!

  4. eBay will never implement a simple common sense process such as this.

    In their drive to eliminate as many sellers as possible from qualifying for the highest discounts, eBay encourages buyers to give sellers negative feedback and low DSR scores.

    Simple, intuitive and intelligent solutions to support sellers are simply not in eBay’s playbook by design.

  5. I’ve never really understood why, as a business, you would want to put it on “holiday”.

    Surely the whole point of ecommerce is 24/7.

    If I visited a website and it said it was “on holiday” I would be hitting the back button never to return, very unprofessional IMO.

    I’m not a big fan of these one man band type “businesses”…waits for abuse

  6. Hi
    Yes, I cancel and relist too, but of course you lose all your sales history for the item and have to start from scratch again!
    Brian

  7. Brilliant idea and so darn sensible no wonder ebay havnt thought of it.
    Just back from holiday myself and found myself emailing buyers to make sure they noticed ‘we are away message’ which is frustrating as we only take a week off a year.We really value our week away and buyers told me they didnt see it grrrrr
    amfm

  8. we always have a problem with this why is the holiday notice so small i can see why the customers dont see it,it must be deliberate unless they do employ some very stupid people

  9. Re; Sellers, selling large quantities of items in a BIN format are the only that get me most, they don’t have any returns problems, etc.

    SHOULD HAVE SAID: Private sellers…

  10. Source of that statistic?

    Human Nature! I was being kind at 90% it will be closer to 99.9% you cant tell me that the private seller or any seller on ebay pay all the tax they should ,in fact I doubt there is any one on the planet that pays all the tax they should, if they think they can get away with it

  11. A friend of mine has traded(the same products) as 2 seperate companies under the VAT threshold at one point as well. However, one was limited, one was sole trader ….

    very very risky!!cause how can you seperate it!!this belongs to me this to the company! what happens when the company goes bust…the liquidator will be knocking on your door all of sudden its not limited anymore you will be knee deep in the brown stuff..yeahh but this is personal no the company had the same product are you lying and so it goes on and on on…better be honest and declare the tax – saving is probably minute and not worth the agro..but its up to your friend I guess lol

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