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Frequently asked questions: Other updates
Seller incentives for offering Free Shipping More relevant search results to drive more sales Revising your listings Other announcements for Canadian sellers Seller incentives for offering Free Shipping Rewards for Free Shipping What specific benefits do I get when I offer free shipping this holiday season?
You qualify for doubling the PowerSeller fee discounts if you:
Find more information on the PowerSeller Final Value Fee discounts. When and how will I start seeing the double PowerSeller Final Value Fee discounts for free shipping? If you qualify for the double PowerSeller Final Value Fee discounts, you will see them on your monthly invoice applied to the Final Value Fees for your previous month's sales. The first time you receive your discounts, here's how it will work:
The double discounts are for new listings only. How does free shipping improve my exposure? Free shipping is one of the factors used in Best Match to help your listing appear higher in search results. More relevant search results to drive more sales Surfacing the best inventory in Best Match What's changing about how Best Match search results are sorted? In Best Match results, the items within each listing format (e.g. Auction-style and Fixed Price) will be sorted based on different criteria - the most relevant criteria for the format - and then intermingled. Store Inventory items will continue to be displayed at the bottom of search results. Why are items of different formats sorted differently in Best Match? The criteria to determine what is a relevant item is different for Fixed Price and Auction-style listings. For example, time remaining is not relevant for Fixed Price items but is important for Auction-style listings about to end. For these reasons and more, exposure for these two formats is based on different criteria. What's most important in Best Match search results for Fixed Price? Searches on eBay.com: For Fixed Price listings, item relevance and DSRs will continue to be important factors in Best Match, but instead of Time Ending Soonest, the focus will be more on cost, shipping and recent sales history (favouring items that are selling the fastest). The best way to improve your recent sales history is to take advantage of the new 30-day duration and Good ‘Til Cancelled (GTC) automatic renewal option. See Best Practices for more tips on improving exposure for your Fixed Price listings. Searches on eBay.ca: For Fixed Price listings, item relevance and DSRs will continue to be important factors in Best Match, but instead of Time Ending Soonest, the focus will be more on item location, cost, and shipping. See Best Practices for tips on improving exposure for your Fixed Price listings. How will the new "recent sales" factor in Best Match search results impact smaller sellers or sellers who list fewer items in many categories or unique items you can only find on eBay? Searches on eBay.com: Relevancy, price and DSRs continue to be important in Best Match search results. Also, the weight given to recent sales as a factor in Fixed Price search results will vary from one category to another as appropriate. For more details and tips on how to take best advantage of these changes and optimize exposure for your listings, see Best Practices. Searches on eBay.ca: At this time, eBay.ca is not implementing the "recent sales" factor in Best Match search results. We will be examining the results from eBay.com and may decide later to turn this factor on for eBay.ca. What's different about how Auction-style listings are sorted in Best Match? For Auction-style listings, item relevance, DSRs and time ending soonest will continue to be the most important factors in Best Match search results. Searches on eBay.ca also place added importance on item location. Revising your listings Tips, bulk editing tools, and more How will sellers be able to revise their listings to meet the new requirements? Sellers will be able to revise listings in three ways using eBay's tools:
If you've already specified a Return Policy and handling time in your listings, those listings will meet the new requirement and nothing more needs to be done. However, when the requirement goes into effect, there will be a way for you to specify a more granular return policy, or you can keep you existing policy "as is." What about existing Good 'Til Cancelled (GTC) and Selling Manager Pro templates? We recommend that you revise your Good 'Til Cancelled (GTC) listings and Selling Manager Pro templates as soon as possible, so they are not blocked when the requirements go live. This can be done one listing at a time with Sell Your Item (SYI) or in bulk using the Bulk Edit tool or Turbo Lister as noted above. If you don't revise your items or templates and they are not compliant with our policies, they will either not renew on the next renewal cycle (for GTC items) or their automation rules will fail (for Selling Manager Pro templates) until you correct the issue. What about revising Multi-Quantity Store Inventory Format items that have a sale? At this time, you can add a shipping service or lower your shipping costs for multi-quantity Good 'Til Cancelled listings with a sale. We will be enabling sellers to add a return policy and handling time to these listings in early September, so sellers who have these items in their Stores should wait until early September to begin making updates (so they can do them all at once.) What will happen if my listing is blocked? You'll need to make changes if your listings can't be relisted or renewed. You have three ways to revise ended/blocked listings:
After mid-October, you'll be able to use Bulk Relist in Selling Manager to correct multiple factors in your listings in one session. Before then, you have two options:
The new item conditions are Brand New, Like New, Very Good, Good, and Acceptable. Why would I want to use the new item conditions? The new conditions help you provide buyers with more accurate information on your item, which can help your detailed seller rating (DSR) for "item as described." What if I don't use the new item conditions? Will my listings be blocked? Your listings won't be blocked but will be mapped to new conditions when you list, revise, or renew. "New" items will map to "Brand New" and "Used." Unspecified items will be mapped to "Acceptable." Which categories will use the new conditions?
We recently improved our bulk editing tools to make it easier to update the shipping details on all of your listings at the same time. Functionality is now available in Selling Manager and Turbo Lister. Selling Manager: To relist your items and add shipping details if you have Selling Manager:
Other announcements for Canadian sellers Limits on shipping charges in some categories on eBay.com eBay.ca will not have a limit on shipping charges for listings made on eBay.ca. However, Canadian sellers listing on eBay.com are required to adhere to eBay.com shipping limits. Sellers on eBay.ca should also learn about the shipping charge limits on eBay.com and take them into account when pricing shipping in order to stay as competitive as possible. The following FAQs regarding limits on shipping charges are applicable if you are listing on eBay.com. What are maximum shipping charges? In Books, DVDs & Movies, Music, and Video Games categories, eBay.com will be enforcing limits on what can be charged for shipping and handling. All sellers who list on eBay.com must adhere to these limits. For specific maximum charges by category, see Maximum Shipping Costs. The maximum shipping charge will apply to the first flat rate US shipping service added when any seller is listing on eBay.com, regardless of item location. Sellers using calculated shipping, or listing on sites other than eBay.com, are not subject to the maximum shipping costs. However, any items appearing on eBay.com in these categories with shipping above the maximum shipping cost may be disadvantaged in Best Match and Total Cost search results on eBay.com. Do the maximum shipping costs include handling costs? Yes. Handling costs are included in the maximum amounts. Why is eBay.com setting limits on shipping charges lower than my actual costs to ship? eBay.com based the maximum shipping & handling charges on recent US transaction data of what sellers from the US and other countries are charging and what US buyers have said is reasonable. We know that what US buyers consider to be reasonable will be less than sellers' actual costs in most cases for Canadian sellers. However, we believe that by offering US buyers at least one shipping option that they deem reasonable, Canadian sellers may increase their overall sales and conversion. What can I do if the maximum shipping costs do not cover my expenses for packaging and shipping? On occasion, total shipping costs can exceed the maximum as in listings for heavy or oversized items or multiple quantity purchases. International sellers (including Canadians) listing on eBay.com will be particularly impacted in this way. In these cases, the following tips can help:
Yes. If you are listing your item on eBay.com, maximum shipping costs will apply for sales to the US, regardless of the location of your item. Sellers listing on eBay.ca and making their item available to the US should take note of the maximum shipping costs on eBay.com for search placement and competitive purposes. Will this apply to other categories in the future? Currently, there are no other categories scheduled. Consistent with any other major changes we've made to our policies, we will let our sellers know well in advance to adjust their listings. Cheques and money orders no longer allowed on eBay.com Accepted Payments Policy changes apply to listings on eBay.com and to listings on eBay.ca that are available to the US. Please read the following FAQs to understand exactly how this new eBay.com policy will impact you. What's changing with payments on eBay? Beginning in late October 2008, cheques and money orders will no longer be allowed as payment methods on eBay.com. All listings appearing on eBay.com must accept one of the following payment methods:
Are there any categories excluded from these payment requirements? Vehicles (Motors), Capital Equipment (Business & Industrial), Mature Audiences and Real Estate will be excluded from the new payment requirements. Specifically, the following categories eBay.com will be excluded:
eBay.ca is not changing its Accepted Payments Policy at this time. If you list your items on eBay.ca, you can still continue to offer cheques and money orders as a payment method. However, unless you offer one of eBay.com's approved payment methods, your item will NOT show up on eBay.com. If you offer at least one of the approved payment methods AND cheques and money orders, your item will appear on eBay.com, but US buyers will only be shown the approved payment methods. If you list your items directly on eBay.com, you will be required to follow the US Accepted Payments Policy and offer only the approved payment methods allowed on eBay.com. Will eBay.ca also eliminate cheques and money orders? If so when? Yes, eBay.ca is planning to eliminate cheques and money orders, and allow only approved payments. We expect this will happen in 2009. Will my item still show up on eBay.com if I offer cheques and money orders on my eBay.ca listings? If you list on eBay.ca and offer ONLY cheques and money orders, your item will appear on eBay.ca as before. However, you will no longer be able to make your item available to the US unless you add an approved payment method. If you list on eBay.ca and offer at least one of eBay.com's approved payment methods AND cheques and money orders, your item will appear on eBay.com, but US buyers will only be shown the approved payment methods. (Please note that in order for your item to be viewed on eBay.com, you must also indicate that you ship to the US.) If you list directly on eBay.com, you will need to remove any reference to the prohibited payment methods from your item descriptions. We recommend you do the same on eBay.ca, and indicate you accept these payment methods in the "Decide how you'd like to be paid" section of the Sell Your Item form only. What about Google Checkout, Checkout by Amazon or Amazon Flexible Payment Services? Will these payment methods be offered? No. The electronic payment methods available on eBay provide security and protection and are already used by the vast majority of our buyers and sellers. eBay will offer several other electronic payment options in addition to PayPal, namely ProPay to start, with more electronic payment providers to be added in coming months. Google's and Amazon's products and services compete with eBay on a number of levels, so we are not going to allow them on eBay. Do these changes affect all eBay sites? This directly affects sellers listing on eBay.com and sellers who list on other sites and make their items available to the US. If I already offer one or more of the approved payment methods, what do I have to do to comply and when will I need to make changes to my listings? If you already offer only the approved payment methods to your customers, you're already meeting the new requirements. If you offer one or more of the approved payment methods and methods no longer allowed on eBay.com, you will not see any difference to your listings on eBay.ca. However, if you make your item available to the US, payment methods other than approved payment methods will not be shown on eBay.com listings starting in late October. If you list on eBay.com, you will need to remove any reference to the prohibited payment methods from your item descriptions. (We recommend you do the same on eBay.ca, and indicate you accept these payment methods in the "Decide how you'd like to be paid" section of the Sell Your Item form only.) What if I don't take at least one of these steps by late October 2008? You will not be able to list new items or relist using the same templates on eBay.com. Your current listings will remain on eBay.com until they end. Good 'Til Cancelled listings will be displayed on eBay.com until they come up for relisting at the end of 30 days. If you list on eBay.ca, you will need to offer an eBay.com approved payment method in order for your item to be available to the US. Do I have to remove references to prohibited payment methods from my templates and item descriptions? Yes, you must remove references to prohibited payment methods from your templates and item descriptions when you list on eBay.com. This will not be done automatically. If prohibited payment methods are included in your item description, your listing will be in violation of the new Accepted Payments Policy. For listings on eBay.ca, you do not need to remove payment methods such as cheques and money orders (these will not be shown on eBay.com if you offer your item to US buyers). However, we recommend that you specify that you accept the approved payment methods in the accepted payment fields on the Sell Your Item form and not in your item description. What is the deadline for removing references to prohibited payment methods from my templates and item descriptions for listings on eBay.com? We encourage you to remove any references as you update your listings and listing templates between now and October 2008. We know that this is a busy time of year for sellers, so we will wait until January 15, 2009 before we begin insisting on the removal of prohibited payment methods from item descriptions. What payment methods can a buyer choose when paying on pickup? Buyers may choose whatever payment method seller and buyer agree to when they pay on pickup, including cheques, money orders, and cash. We encourage sellers to specify in their listing description what payment methods are acceptable if a buyer pays on pickup. Also note that sellers may not select "pay on pickup" as a sole payment option in their listing. At least one of the approved electronic payment methods must always be an option for buyers. What should I do if a US buyer demands to pay with cheques or money orders? We know that some buyers will still want to pay with cheques and money orders, even after this policy change goes into effect. When this happens, explain to your buyers the benefits that come with electronic payments:
We know this may happen occasionally. However, we will not allow abuse of the new policy and will be watching for sellers who accept a significant amount of prohibited payments from US buyers. Remember, you can refuse to accept these payment methods. If the US buyer doesn't pay, you can file an Unpaid Item dispute. US buyers who insist on paying with these prohibited payment methods in a Unpaid Item dispute will lose the claim and will not be allowed to leave negative Feedback. What happens to my Feedback if a winning US bidder refuses to pay using the payment methods specified in my listing? If the US buyer refuses to pay using the payment methods specified in your listing, file an Unpaid Item dispute. If the buyer fails to respond to eBay's requests for more information through the Unpaid Item dispute process, provides an inadequate response such as nonsense words, or insists upon paying with an unapproved payment method, any negative or neutral Feedback left by the buyer will be removed. What if a US buyer threatens negative Feedback to demand payment by a method not specified in my listing? You should immediately report the buyer to eBay. If there is clear evidence of undue pressure, eBay will take action. If a buyer shows a pattern of malicious behaviour, eBay will most likely suspend the buyer and any negative or neutral Feedback the buyer left for any sellers will be removed. What will happen if I ask a US buyer to use a prohibited payment method? Requesting prohibited payment methods from your US customers either by email or in your item description is a violation of the new Accepted Payments Policy. Violation of this policy may result in:
Learn more about how to create a PayPal account and the many benefits of accepting PayPal as payment on eBay. I have an Internet merchant account. How do I accept payments? Will this change in October? To accept direct credit payments from your buyers to your Internet merchant account, simply add credit card as a payment option to your listings. You may also want to offer additional checkout instructions to let the buyer know how to send their credit card information to you. When will direct credit card payments to my Internet merchant account be integrated into eBay Checkout? Sellers with Internet merchant accounts will be able to accept credit card payments directly through eBay Checkout on eBay.com in January 2009. This means that your buyers will be able to directly enter their credit card information securely in eBay Checkout, and their payment will be directly routed to your Internet merchant account. This option will offer a more convenient and secure option for your buyers and greater efficiency for sellers. I don't have an Internet merchant account. Can buyers still pay for my items with a credit card? Yes. Your customers can also pay with their credit cards through PayPal. Or, if they are new to eBay or PayPal and do not yet have an eBay or PayPal account, they can pay with credit card as a guest member of eBay or PayPal. How can I accept payments through ProPay and other electronic payment providers eBay will be adding? You'll need to sign up with these payment providers first to accept payments through them. Starting in September, when you sign up with these payment providers, you'll be sent through eBay's authorization process for third-party service providers. You'll be asked to give permission to the provider so they can process your payments. After your account has been set up, you'll need to add these payment methods to your listing in Sell Your Item (SYI) or another listing tool. Fees and services may vary, so visit their websites for more information about these alternative payment options. New seller standards: Minimum 4.3 on all Detailed Seller Ratings (DSRs) is required to list on eBay.com At this time seller standards will not be required to list on eBay.ca. This change is being evaluated for eBay.ca and we will provide more communication on this subject in the near future. However, if you are listing on eBay.com and other international sites that are adopting seller standards, you will be required to adhere to their minimum DSR requirements. The following FAQs are applicable when listing on sites that are adopting seller standards: What are the minimum DSR requirements to list on eBay.com? Starting November 1, 2008, in order to list on eBay.com, sellers must have a minimum of 4.3 over the past 30 days in all four detailed seller ratings (DSRs): item as described, communication, shipping time, and shipping and handling charges. Sellers with less than 10 DSRs over the past 30 days will be evaluated on their DSRs over the last 12 months. Is this new Seller Standards policy likely to impact a large number of sellers? No. The main purpose of this new policy is to protect the interests and reputation of that large majority from the impact of the few sellers whose customer satisfaction levels are below a reasonable standard. What happens to sellers who do not meet the DSR requirements by November 1, 2008? Sellers who do not meet the requirement will be blocked from listing on eBay.com and eBay Motors Parts & Accessories. What does it mean to be "blocked" from selling? Is this the same as suspension? How long will a seller be blocked? Sellers not meeting the standards will not be allowed to list, but will not be suspended. Sellers will continue to be blocked from listing as long as their DSRs do not meet the 4.3 minimum standard. Blocked sellers may list items again once their DSRs meet or exceed the threshold. This can be accomplished in the following ways:
No, existing listings will not be removed, however, sellers will be blocked from new listings and from relisting, and Good 'til Cancelled listings will not renew on eBay.com. Blocked sellers are encouraged to complete existing listings and earn high DSR scores to meet the minimum standards and regain listing privileges. What happens if I meet the thresholds by November 1, 2008, but fall below the threshold in the future? Will I have an opportunity to improve or appeal? Sellers will immediately be blocked from listing if they fall below the threshold after November 1, 2008. Sellers will not be given warnings and opportunities to improve, but there will be an appeals process. Criteria for appeals will be the same as for the Seller Non-Performance appeals process. How are DSRs evaluated? Are DSRs rounded? DSRs are based on the last 30 days of activity; sellers with less than 10 DSRs in 30 days will be evaluated on the last 12 months. DSRs are rounded, therefore a shipping time DSR of 4.25 meets the 4.3 standard but a shipping time DSR of 4.24 does not meet the standard. What about new sellers or people who sell only occasionally with no DSRs? New sellers and sellers with less than 10 DSR ratings will still be able to list. Please note that occasional sellers who do not have a 30-day DSR will be evaluated using 12-month (instead of 30-day) DSRs. Will sellers from other countries be held to the Seller Standards? Sellers from other countries listing directly on eBay.com and eBay Motors that do not meet our standards will be blocked. Do my DSRs from outside the US count toward these requirement limits? All DSRs are included in the computation of your scores. Will Seller Non-Performance continue to be enforced? Yes. Sellers are expected to maintain a Buyer Satisfaction rating of "Good" in their Seller Dashboard. Any rating below Good puts the seller at risk of violating the Seller Non-Performance Policy, as well loss of PowerSeller status, demotion in search, selling restrictions, and other sanctions. How will sellers be able to monitor their position in their Seller Dashboard? Starting in late August, sellers will be able to monitor both their 30-day and 12-month DSR scores in their Seller Dashboard. How can I improve my DSRs? For tips for improving your DSRs, see the Seller Feedback best practices. |
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