Message from Sharat Digumarti: Updated Seller Non Performance Policy

[sapana@ebay.com]

Hello everyone…over past few months we have been making various changes on the site to improve the buyer and seller experience to make eBay the most preferred online shopping destination for shoppers.

While improving functionality on the site is critical, a big part of the buyer experience is in our sellers’ hands. We recently launched Detailed Seller Ratings (DSRs) to give buyers more information about the kind of service they can expect from a seller and help differentiate sellers who deliver a great buyer experience from those who do not. While the vast majority of eBay sellers deliver consistently positive experiences to buyers, a very small minority -- just 1% -- of sellers currently cause fully 35% of bad buying experiences. This small minority not only damage their own reputations, but also indirectly damage all of the good sellers who benefit from a strong and vital eBay marketplace. To address this problem, we have begun enforcing our Seller Non-Performance policy in stricter ways than in the past by considering a seller’s buyer dissatisfaction rate.

What is the updated Seller Non-Performance Policy?
With the updated policy, all sellers who have more than 5% dissatisfied buyers over the past 90 days will be subject to reduced listing volume or temporary 14-day restrictions in the form of selling sanctions. Sellers with dissatisfaction rates that are 10% or greater will be subject to indefinite restrictions until they improve their buyer dissatisfaction rates to less than 5%. The buyer dissatisfaction will be calculated based on the following:

1. Item not received (INR) disputes
2. Item significantly not as described (SNAD) disputes
3. Negative or neutral feedback.

Why neutral feedback?
Some of you have asked why neutral feedback ratings have become a part of measuring buyer dissatisfaction. Through our quantitative research as well as many conversations with community members, we have found that neutral feedback is most often an expression of deep buyer dissatisfaction. Therefore, leaving it out of the calculation would mask a significant part of the issue. Ultimately, only positive feedback is an indication of satisfied customers.

Will DSR’s (Detailed Seller Ratings) be included to calculate Bad dissatisfaction?
Detailed Seller Ratings are not used in our buyer dissatisfaction calculations currently, however, as we gain experience and data, DSRs look very promising. We expect them to eventually become an additional input in our calculation of buyer dissatisfaction. We will keep you updated on adding DSRs as part of our calculations, and how they will impact a dissatisfaction rate.

Helping sellers improve their satisfaction rates and become successful is goal #1
Please know that our goal in restricting or sanctioning sellers is always to drive sellers to resolve their business challenges, improve their satisfaction rates, and remain in the marketplace as successful sellers. Our communication to impacted sellers spells out specific actions they should take to improve their rates, such as settling any open buyer dispute issues, refunding buyers when appropriate, asking for mutual feedback withdrawal when disputes have been resolved, etc.

Please remember that this new enforcement impacts the bottom 1% of current sellers, who cause 35% of the negative buying experiences on the site. The vast majority our sellers provide great buyer experiences by following these and other best practices:
• They accurately represent the condition, size, and quality of the item directly in the listing.
• They accept payment for an item at the end of a successful sale.
• After payment is received, they promptly ship the item with proper packaging.
• They proactively and professionally communicate with the buyer throughout the transaction.

We believe that the initiative to crack down on bad buyer experience in this way will benefit the whole of eBay India, and especially the 99% of our good sellers. If you have a question around this policy, please feel free to post it here. I will try to revert back on them as soon as possible.

Sincerely,
Sharat Digumarti
Senior Manager, Trust & Safety

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Sharat's behalf:

Hi systeminflow,

As I had mentioned in my earlier post, it is possible that sellers who seemingly have high number of positives can also get restricted. In order to get a better picture of a seller’s recent activity, we identify sellers with declining customer satisfaction rates in a manner that evaluates recent performance. If the dissatisfied buyers from a seller over the past 90 days are more than 5% of the transactions, then I think it is important that the seller starts improving his business practice.

To clarify, eBay does not benefit in any manner whatsoever from ODR India. The service is offered by a third party and eBay encourages sellers to use it to resolve those disputes that need manual intervention.

Regards,
Sharat

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Sharat's behalf:

Hi dukander,

Following examples might be helpful for you:

Example
After putting his extensive collection of Nehru stamps for sale on eBay, a seller named Mahesh decided he wanted to keep his stamps after all, despite having winning bidders. As a result, he received 5 negative and 2 neutral feedbacks.
His overall feedback had previously been 185, with 98.5% positive. However, over the last 90 days, he received feedback from 58 buyers, 51 of which were positive, 2 were neutral, and 5 were negative. As a result, his negative and neutral feedback, over the past 90 days, caused his overall feedback rating to drop to 88% [(5 negatives + 2 neutral) / (5 negatives + 2 neutral + 51 positives)].
This raised Mahesh’s buyer dissatisfaction rate above 10%, well above the allowable amount, and put Mahesh in serious violation of the Seller Non-Performance policy. Mahesh should expect that action will be taken on his account (possibly including a complete restriction on selling privileges) and that he will receive a communication fully explaining to him the details of that action.

Good Communication is key
PowerSeller Pinky runs a small business on eBay. Recently her only employee left, moving to another city. It took Pinky several weeks to find a suitable replacement. In the meantime, she had difficultly shipping her products in a timely manner and didn’t communicate the issues to her buyers. While the buyers eventually received their products, many left negative and neutral feedback.
Pinky has been selling since 2002 and her total feedback was 7781 with a 99% positive. Over the last 90 days her sales were Rs.14,000. However, over the last 90 days she’d received feedback from 775 buyers, 735 of which were positive, 25 were neutral, and 15 were negative. As result, over the past 90 days, her overall feedback percentage fell to 94.8% [(15 negatives + 25 neutral) / (15 negatives + 25 neutral + 735 positives)].
Since Pinky’s buyer dissatisfaction rate exceeds 5%, Pinky is in violation of the SNP policy. Pinky should expect that action will be taken on her account possibly including a limitation of selling privileges for a period of time), and that she will receive a communication fully explaining to her the details of that action.

Accurate descriptions help set buyer expectations
Salma is an occasional seller on eBay. Last month, one of her old friends gave her a pair of pants, a sweater and a blouse to sell. While Salma took pictures to add to her listing, she failed to point out in her description that there were small holes in the clothes. When she learnt about her buyer’s dissatisfaction, she did offer a full refund for the items, she still received negative feedback from two buyers and a neutral from another.
Salma has been selling since 2005. Her total feedback score was previously 250 with 98% positive. However, over the last 90 days she has received 41 total feedbacks, including 2 negatives and 1 neutral. As result, over the past 90 days, her overall feedback percentage declined to 93.7% [(2 negatives + 1 neutral) / (2 negatives + 1neutral + 38 positives)].
Since Salma’s buyer dissatisfaction rate exceeds 5%, she is in violation of the Seller Non-Performance policy. Salma should expect that action will be taken on her account (possibly including a limitation of selling privileges for a period of time), and that she will receive a communication fully explaining to her the details of that action.

[amitava123gems]

Dear Sapana Ji,
Your SNP guidelines are very clear.I have no such problems.I urgently request your T&S team to remove the restrictions imposed on my selling of matchbox labels.This is my topmost performing item.I dont want to argue.This is just a request of an oldman.
Thanx in advance,
Truly,
Amitava

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Sharat's behalf:

Hi Nishant (exprsss),

Thanks for your post and understanding!

I agree with you that awareness and adoption of feedback amongst buyers is a key for long term success for both sellers and for eBay. This is a topic in which I take a personal interest. Over the past six months we have started paying special attention towards this area. We have taken 2-3 initiatives in this are and have seen encouraging results in increase in feedback adoption.
1. Introduction of Detailed Seller Ratings – before launching detailed seller rating, we had done a survey with buyers which told us that more buyers are likely to leave feedback with detailed seller ratings than otherwise. The same has been validated over the last six months since launch of detailed seller ratings in India. The number of buyers who now leave feedback is significantly higher than earlier.
2. Increase awareness via promotion – The cricket mania promotion that was done during the world cup saw a significant increase in adoption of feedback. It not only raised awareness on importance of feedback, more users have started leaving feedback even after the promotion ended.

Having said the above, I believe we still have a long way to go and one of my key priorities for next few months will be to explore more ways to increase awareness and adoption of feedback.

On the question on offering various shipping modes to the buyers, I think it is a great idea to give buyers so many options. In fact the current options allows you to offer various shipment modes to buyers (express vs. regular etc). However, the challenge will be to maintain a balance between making the buyer’s experience simple while providing advanced options. Conventional wisdom says that simplicity is always preferred. However, the above are my views and I have forwarded your suggestion to the team for further evaluation.

Regards,
Sharat

[sapana@ebay.com]

Hi amitava (amitava123gems),

I think it is important for a seller to get credits for repeat buyers, since these buyers are the ones who the seller has given the best service to. The team that is looking at enhancing feedback is actively considering this option. Once we have more information on this, I shall surely share it with you and our other community members.

On the other concerns mentioned by you, I have asked the team to look into those matters. We shall get back to you on them separately.

Regards,
Sharat

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Sharat's behalf:
Hi Navneet (snrama),
I understand that as a seller one will always have some genuine concerns around unfair feedback. We possibly cannot eliminate such buyers and have to live with them. We did extensive research before rolling out the policy and ensured that such one off cases will not impact a genuine seller. However, in case such a situation arises the team would intervene to address the concern

Also, I want to clarify that including neutral feedback for calculating buyer dissatisfaction is not new for eBay. It has always been the practice. Assuming the same level of service that a seller is currently providing, if a seller has not received seller non performance warning in past, then it is less likely for the seller to receive a warning in future.

I hope this will alleviate your concern. Thanks for your kind words as well!

Regards,
Sharat

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Sharat's Behalf:


Hi Samit (Indianrailstuff),

As usual it is a pleasure to hear from a buyer. The experience you had mentioned when you received the product but were not very happy with one aspect of the transaction (i.e., communication) and similar such feedback from other buyers led to introduction of detailed seller ratings. Now you can rate a seller positive and yet rate him low on 4 aspects of a transaction (it is called detailed seller ratings). You can see these feedbacks in form of starts on the seller feedback page. We are contemplating to get it more upfront on item listing page itself. The detailed seller ratings are a great tool for a buyer to differentiate a good seller from a bad one.

Also, there is a tool available by which you can see all negative ratings left to a user. Just below the bar of all feedback received / feedback received as a buyer / feedback received as a seller and just above the bar where feedback ratings show; on the extreme right hand side, there is a drop down which says ‘period’. Once you choose the period, you will get a link to see all negative, all positive and all neutral. While it is not the most intuitive way to see a seller’s negative feedback, there is an option in case you wish to use it.

Regards,
Sharat

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Sharat's Behalf:

Hi Ankur (treasurehut-net)
I believe that many sellers’ do not give -ve ratings for the fear of retaliatory FB which also holds true for buyers who don’t give –ve. Some sellers only give ratings after they receive from buyers hence its even more likely that buyers may not give –ve. Many buyers have told us (and so do feedback comments) that the buyer settled for neutral just because he did not want to give a negative. Thus comes the importance of neutral feedback.

Regards,
Sharat

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Sharat's Behalf:

Hi mahavircomputers_in1,

I think I can understand your position wherein as a seller you are worried if a neutral feedback will impact your business. Let me reiterate what I think are the benefits of the new policy:

Reiterating the Improvements:

- We will look at only last 90 days history as many of you have said providing any resolution details/pod etc is very difficult

- We are moving away from direct suspension to restriction which helps in avoiding undesired suspensions.

- Including neutral feedback for calculating buyer dissatisfaction is not new. It has always been the practice. Assuming the same level of service that a seller is currently providing, if a seller has not received seller non performance warning in past, then it is less likely for the seller to receive a warning in future.

Thus, overall the policy aims at providing a chance to sellers with low satisfaction rates to improve their business practice and thus stabilise their business on eBay.

What were the results of test pilot?

- Over the past month we had already piloted this policy and we are very encouraged by the results. Some sellers (mostly with >10% dissatisfaction rates) were asked to improve their buyer satisfaction rates and most of them have already achieved the same by resolving their disputes and ratings. They now stand a greater chance to regain their reputation on eBay and become sellers of good standing. If anything, I believe this policy will give sellers a greater chance towards business security.

I hope the above will alleviate your fears. Please feel fret o post here if you have any further concerns.

Regards,
Sharat

[sapana@ebay.com]

On Sharat's Behalf:

Hi manishadiamonds,

I understand that this one experience has left a bad taste in your mouth; however, I am sure that not all your buyers are bad and unreasonable.

This specific policy aims at improving those 1% sellers who are providing maximum amount of bad experience to the buyers. It is not aimed at sellers who are providing good buyer experience. In fact all sellers who are currently providing good buyer experience shall soon receive a mail on the same.

Also, to clarify, the calculation of bad buyer experience is on total sales in past 90 days and not on total feedback received. So if you have made 100 sales in past 90 days and received 2 disputes, your buyer dissatisfaction will be 2%.

I hope this gives more clarification. Please do not hesitate to write back with more questions if required.

Regards,
Sharat