eBay Royal Mail strike protections

There are a whole raft of Royal Mail strikes coming up (the most recent of which was yesterday, the next is on Tuesday). To protect sellers who see their businesses being decimated, eBay have put steps in place to protect seller metrics and advise on alternative services.

Despite offering Royal Mail strike protections, eBay suggest you dump the postal service and switch to an alternative carrier while the disruption continues. This won’t be possible for those that rely on letters or large letters, but if you post anything over 500gm and definitely anything over 1kg you really are best off with an alternative. Your only question should be will you switch back to Royal Mail after the strikes are over?

If you already use other carriers, continue using them to send your items during this time & ensure you update your forecast volumes. Please also ensure you use the carrier you specified on the listing. If you currently only use Royal Mail to send your items, please consider switching to an alternative carrier during the strike period.

– eBay

Royal Mail strike protections

eBay will automatically protect your performance until Friday 9 December for transactions for:

• Your late delivery rate, which will be removed for transactions with estimated delivery dates until Friday 9 December.
• Your “item not received” count in your Service Metrics dashboard will be automatically removed. eBay will also remove any negative and neutral feedback relating to or arising from late or non delivery during this period.
• As always, eBay request that you upload tracking details when you dispatch an item. This helps to keep your buyers informed, and adding tracking details gives you additional protection.

Top Tips for Managing your Delivery on eBay

Over this period eBay want to ensure that you are supported in delivering a great experience for your buyers:

• eBay are working very closely with carriers to regularly monitor delivery service levels. 
• To mitigate significant delays that arise in the delivery network, time will be added to buyer-facing delivery estimates to manage expectations.
• eBay will notify buyers of potential delays using messaging across their experience to keep them informed and help reduce contacts.

eBay also offers recommendations for best practice:

• Set an accurate dispatch time that you can consistently meet. You do not need to adjust your dispatch time as delays will already be accounted for in buyer facing delivery estimates.
• List with the carrier service you are using where possible, to build trust and ensure the delivery estimates shown to your buyers are accurate.
• You can set your working days using the working day calendar, which applies to all dispatch time settings. The default setting is Monday to Friday, please update this to reflect your business’s working days by clicking here
• We only use the working days you have selected when calculating the delivery estimates shown to your buyer. 
• If you offer same day dispatch, you can also set your cut-off times. The default is set to 2PM, however, you can offer it up to 10:45PM. To update your settings click here.
• The Time Away setting gives you options when planning ahead to take a break from your eBay business should you need to. Click here to learn more or here to switch it on.
• Use a carrier service that provides tracking for items over £20. This gives greater protection to you and reduces requests for “where’s my item?” and “item not received”.
• Please remember to upload your tracking number. This will be done automatically if you have purchased a postage label on our platform.
• You must state the actual carrier name only when uploading tracking.