eBay Support Not Up To Speed On New International Program
As eBay continues to roll out their new eBay International Shipping program, they promise to make international shipping as easy as domestic - but buyers and sellers are both finding when things don't go as they should, support may be difficult to come by.
In one example, a buyer was double charged for VAT and could not reach support to get assistance.
I have been in EIS 2 months & have had numerous sales with no problems, until yesterday. Lovely buyer says she was double charged VAT tax b/c "you forgot to put the VOEC number" on the pkg confirming that she'd already paid VAT. She also sends a Customs form as proof.
I called a Conceirge CSR, who said, what I already knew, that this is not something I can do anything to help her with & she must contact eBay CSRs. I explain that to the buyer & tell her that with EIS eBay handles the packaging, the Customs forms, the collection of tax, etc. & that that money never even comes into my hands, so I can't refund her, I don't even have that money.
This AM I wake up to 9 messages of screen shots from her, all showing that CS is closed & she has tried multiple ways, but all the screen shots show dead ends to reaching a CSR in any way shape or form. This is not surprising, as she is halfway across the world. Luckily, she does seem to speak English, as her notes are very understandable.
My question is two-fold, 1 - how do I get this buyer help? It looks like she may be telling the truth & even if she could reach Customer Service, I have no confidence she will even get someone who knows what EIS is. How do I get her help on an intricate detailed problem that will require someone who knows EIS very well?
My 2nd question is on a broader scale - EIS has a lot of safeguards built in for the seller, which is great, but how are buyers/sellers to get help when those safeguards need to be invoked? My buyer can't even reach a CSR due to them not being open during her daytime (at least that appears to be the problem) & also, many of these buyers may not be able to speak English well? Has anything been put in place to assist with these cases?...
...Based on the 9 messages she sent me with screenshots on all, contacting CS from another country is not working, at least when she tried to do it, I do not want to send her on another wild goose chase.
I may need to ultimately send her to FB or Twitter, which I am loathe to do as FB is not a safe website on a variety of levels. I'm hoping that someone paged will chime in here soon. In the meantime, I have let her know that I'm doing everyhting I can to get her help & that I need some time.
The sad part of this is she was a great buyer & it appears to me, that she may be telling the truth & she deserves to get help, not repeated dead ends.
An eBay community rep advised to have the buyer reach out to support through eBay's social media channels.
Thanks for working so hard to get your buyer help. Ultimately, she will have to reach out to our agents, as they have a process in place to help with that refund.
Since she is running into issues over the phone, I'd recommend our Facebook or Twitter agents as they are very knowledgeable regarding the EIS program and processes. Your concerns regarding the safety of social media is valid, however, we have a strong security system in place to provide safety measures for our members.
The seller did get some good news, as the posting in the community prompted an EIS staff member to step in to help.
While it's great this situation was resolved, I must agree with the seller about concerns for what may happen in future situations where normal customer support is not available or in some cases not trained well enough in the new program to help.
Just so you know, the country in question is a very advanced Eurpoean country & I have 9 messages worth of screen shots showing that she is unable to get through to C/S, by following any Help menus. She tried 4-5 different ways, all winding up in dead ends up to & including a red message saying "We are not able to process your request right now", which is ambiguous, but I'm guessing means they are closed. She tried for 2 straight days!
But there is some good news, as my posting resulted in someone from the EIS shipping team reaching out to me by email & letting me know that they would be contacting my Buyer directly to resolve the issue, so I am VERY MUCH appreciative of that & have informed my buyer.
If this does not occur or my buyer's have issues in the future, I guess I'll have to have them reach out via Facebook or Twitter. While I understand that eBay's site is "safe", with all due respect, there is nothing eBay can do to make Facebook "safe", as the FB site itself is the problem.
Regardless, I appreciate everyone's help & I do appreciate the Rep who reached out to me & is going to reach out to my buyer!
I also have to agree that sending users to Facebook for support is not ideal, for a variety of reasons, and it would appear eBay's legal department agrees.
Liz Morton ~ Founder
Per the eBay International Shipping FAQ, sellers are supposed to be protected from Item Not Received cases.
What protections does eBay International Shipping offer?
There are a number of benefits to using eBay International Shipping, including protections through eBay Money Back Guarantee cases:
- If an item is lost or damaged during international shipping, you will not be found at fault if your buyer opens an eBay Money Back Guarantee case.
- Your seller performance standards and Service Metrics won’t be affected by late deliveries or eBay Money Back Guarantee cases attributed to international shipping.
- Any negative or neutral feedback from item handling during international transit will be removed from your account.
- We’ll handle international returns on your behalf, including Not as Described claims.
However, some sellers are not receiving those protections.
I recently sold a product through the global shipping program... normally I strictly do not ship international but for the first time I used the new version of the "sell an item" listing system on my browser instead of my phone and I guess it defaulted to allowing the Global Shipping Program and I didn't even notice until someone purchased the item and it happened to be a global shipping program customer... I was tempted to cancel the order (wish I had) but I read up on the program it SPECIFICALLY STATES that as long as the item makes it to the Global Shipping Program ship center that even if the customer doesn't receive the item then they will get a refund at NO COST TO ME.
So I figured what the heck... I went ahead and filled the order, printed the label THROUGH THE EBAY LABEL SYSTEM and shipped the product to the shipping center... tracking shows it makes its way to the shipping center and be delivered... the tracking stops there.
However now the buyer is claiming they did not receive the item and ebay IMMEDIATELY found in their favor and debit my account by over $200, my account is now negative. I am absolutely flabbergasted by this and will never ever ever ship anything international through ebay ever again. I have appealed the decision and I even still have the USPS drop off receipt where I dropped off the package not to mention the tracking backs me up... but somehow I still feel like I am probably screwed.
The seller tried live chat and phone support options, but didn't get any real assistance.
Just got finished using the live chat, they were of no help whatsoever and said I have to wait for the appeals team to read my original appeal message and they would respond within 48 to 72 hours... of course by then the payments system will have charged my bank account, drove it into a negative balance and thus incurring overdraft fees.
Not only was live chat useless, but she just randomly ended the chat in the middle of the conversation. I am officially done selling on ebay... they just lost a 19 year seller (joined in 2004). Find a new selling platform, ebay is no longer worth the problems...
... After I finished with her, I immediately called support too... the phone support agent was much more professional and seemed to have a better understanding of the issue and agreed with me that this should not have happened. He forward my details to the international shipping claims team... unfortunately they still have a response window of 48-72 hours...
so it looks like a charge to my bank account is inevitable which will incur overdraft fees and leave me without funds I need to survive on for the next couple weeks (my store is not a business, I use to sell my own personal property when I need money). If the charge hits my bank I will be contesting the charge with the bank as well... I simply will not let this stand... this is such a headache!
Again, only after an eBay community rep was tagged and escalated the issue did it get properly resolved.
Just got an email saying my appeal was found in my favor and a refund of $212.44 was put back into my payments account bringing my balance to $0.0! So finally resolved!! Such an anxiety inducing headache, but I am glad this is over (at least for now).
Definitely be wary of using this new EIS program guys... seems like it has some serious kinks to work out. Thank you all for your help and input, I really really appreciate it!
There also seem to be many issues with categories and items being excluded from eBay International Shipping that should not be, which is negatively impacting sellers' businesses as it is preventing international sales which were previously able to go through under the old Global Shipping Program.
Is anyone else having issues with "new" items being sold through EIS in the ebay motors category?
I have roughly 2,300 listings all in the ebay motors category. The more I look through my listings the more I find that are not showing EIS on the "shipping, returns & payment" tab in the listing. I have called into ebay numerous times over the past month and they have opened several tickets and the problem is still not resolved. No one at ebay can give me a definitive answer as to what is causing the problem.
Previously used the Global shipping program for the following category
Home & Garden-Non-Alcoholic Drinks-Coffee-Coffee Pods
and sold something out of the country at least every day but then ebay decided to opt us in to the new international shipping program & take us out of global shipping, but this category for some reason all of my listings show i do not ship out of the country.
its not a restricted category or restricted items all the county's i used to sell to im getting customers asking why i dont ship there anymore. called ebay 15 + times have to start all over every time & keep getting told its a glitch & will be fixed in 24-48 hours - but we all know its ebay & its never done.
anyone else having an issue with select categories on ebay not correct when it comes to international shipping ? or know who to contact that really understands at ebay & can help fix ?
Yep....i was told to email the eIS support team after I raised this issue almost 3 weeks ago. The same beauty categories are still not allowing this while others are. I have an item in a "broken" category in the wrong beauty category (accidental) but that item can use eIS due to the category. So, this is not a factor of "not allowed items". This is a category issue.
I did email eIS support team 2 days ago. The response? I was told to DELETE all my shipping policies even though the eIS support person said my policies where fine. Why does my shipping policy in category x allow this while the same policy does not? I was on GSP. The messaging from eBay was I needed to DO NOTHING for the transition. Now, I'm to delete all my shipping policies and start over? How is that logical?
I have made 3 calls to concierge support, chatted via Facebook messaging and also emailed eIS support. I see no evidence that the technical team has been roped in on this ongoing issue that is impacting different categories across eBay (not all just some).
I was opted in to EIS yesterday and removed from GSP. This morning I now have neither GSP or EIS. I have notified support but have no idea when this will be fixed. My listings will not display internationally and the .com site shows I cannot ship even to Canada. I have a buyer in Canada who notified me of this early today. Please look at this issue.
These stories are coming from savvy, experienced sellers who know how to get the attention of community reps to escalate issues - but how many potential instances are there of sellers who aren't active in the community hitting dead ends with regular support that we just haven't heard about?
The new eBay International Shipping program has many complexities and puts eBay directly in the middle of the process, intermediating shipping, customs, returns and much more.
It is absolutely imperative for eBay to provide a clear and easily accessible path for buyers and sellers both in the US and internationally to directly access support reps who are highly trained and empowered to assist with issues with this program.
Have you experienced problems or issues with getting support for the new eBay International Shipping program? Let us know in the comments below!
