eBay have just emailed business sellers announcing new seller evaluation timelines and changes to the evaluation rules for earning the eBay Premium Service badge and discounts.
New eBay seller evaluation timelines
The big change to the eBay seller evaluation timelines is when consequences (good or bad) will apply to your account. At the moment, the consequences of your monthly Seller Performance Evaluation apply to listings from the same month as the evaluation. Starting in July, these consequences will apply to listings the month after the evaluation. The transition to the new timelines will begin on the 20th of June evaluation.
This means that if you achieve eBay Premium Service level on the 20th of June, you will have a minimum of 45 days with reduced fees. Conversely, if you fail to achieve eBay Premium Service level on 20th of June, you will have a minimum of 45 days without reduced fees.
- eBay Premium Service discounts for Top-rated Sellers will be applied to qualifying listings the month after evaluation.
- Below Standard Seller Fees or Service metrics fees will be applied to qualifying listings the month after evaluation.
- Seller Performance Evaluations on the 20th of the month will affect discounts or fees on transactions in the following month.
The impact of these changes will be a one off longer evaluation period. From then on it’s merely shifting the consequences of the evaluation to the full following calendar month. There are slight differences in the transition depending whether your billing date falls at the end of the month or mid month (Full details here).
Changes to eBay Premium Service badge evaluation
After the introduction of separate domestic and international return policies, eBay Premium Service badge and discount evaluation will now be based on seller return policies that align with the country where items are listed and the item location.
- If the item location is in the same country as the listing site, eBay will use the domestic return policy for the eBay Premium Service badge and discount evaluation. You need to offer a minimum of 30-day domestic returns.
- If the item location is not in the same country as the listing site, eBay will use the international return policy for the eBay Premium Service badge and discount evaluation. you need to offer a minimum of 30-day international returns.
(Full details here)
13 Responses
Seller Performance Evaluations on the 20th of the month will affect discounts or fees on transactions in the following month.
Does not say how it will affect fees? What % of discount are they offering and what % of discount do we lose for not complying?
The communication is incomprehensible and moreover the change is unnecessary. What will it achieve besides making the Ebay invoices even more difficult to understand?
Yes Chris but how will it affect the fees?
Seller Performance Evaluations on the 20th of the month will affect discounts or fees on transactions in the following month.
I don’t see this change as necessary … But then I somehow see this change coming into effect in similar times when eBay will stop the support to “protect” sellers metrics due to pandemic. Nice one. Probably extra money to eBay as sellers will have “minimum of 45 days without reduced fees”.
Looks like i am about to transfer my sales business to amazon. Too many changes with Ebay.
I personally thought that these changes make perfect sense. The evaluation is on the 20th of the month and discounts are applied the month after. This is easier than it was before. I always found it a bit odd that the evaluation would take place with defects still coming in.
Whats probably prompted this change is to give ebay time to remove the defects covered by the Corona virus. This is a positive thing. It is typical that this has been interpreted as a negative.
@Elime can you not do both?
Looking at my most recent late delivery rate report, every single late delivery defect from Feb 1st to Apr 30th has been removed automatically by ebay. It’s on 0.00%. A perfect score.
These late deliveries were all items that had been sent either Royal Mail 24 or 48 standard, with delivery confirmation scan. Tracking was uploaded to ebay for all items.
Surely this proves that the idea of ebay shifting goalposts or doing things so they can hold back top rated seller discounts, is just conspiracy theory nonsense.
But if you want to just stick a few stamps on an untracked parcel, swear you’ve done it and feel aggrieved if ebay don’t just take your word for it, then it’s time to get real and improve your game.
I have been a dedicated EBay member for many years but I am going to start purchasing more on other sites. EBay is entirely to complicated now. It’s a company now that is all about profit and does not go that extra mile for its customers and believe me your sellers and buyers are both customers!!!