eBay UK Pushes Faster Shipping Times With New Delivery Speed Search Filters
eBay is encouraging UK sellers to offer shorter handling time and faster shipping methods to appear in new Delivery Speed search filters now available to buyers.
The new filters were announced in the eBay UK community forum today, touted as a solution to "simplify the shopping experience" and "support your sales."
uk-newsebay
We’re excited to announce the launch of our new delivery speed filters on eBay UK, available on desktop and mobile. This feature is designed to simplify the shopping experience by allowing buyers to easily find listings that offer fast delivery options.
By enabling buyers to filter their searches based on delivery speed, we hope to increase the visibility of listings that offer fast delivery options, while also helping to support conversion rates.
How to ensure your listings are visible when the delivery speed filter is applied
To ensure your listings appear in search results, your items will need to offer 1-3 day delivery.
To achieve this, the combination of your handling time and delivery service must equal up to 3 working days. For example if your handling time is 1 day, choose a delivery service that delivers in 1-2 days.
Updating your handling time or delivery service can be made directly via your postage business policies within the Seller Hub.
Handling and shipping times have been a perennial problem for eBay as consumer expectations have been set by Amazon which can achieve fast delivery speeds due to their robust fulfillment network.
Unfortunately, eBay has to lean on sellers to provide a competitive experience, with very little support or benefit to doing so.
In the UK in particular, the issue of longer handling and shipping times is also largely self-inflicted as estimated delivery dates have historically been seen to be very inaccurate - resulting in sellers often adding additional days to their handling time in order to try to avoid providing unrealistic promises that ultimately disappoint buyers.
And because sellers bear the brunt of that disappoint through returns and claims, negative feedback and seller standard policies that can end up adding additional fees, I can't blame sellers for using the few tools in their control like handling times to try to mitigate those possible negative consequences.
The problem is so persistent that if you pick a weekly UK community chat thread at random, there's a high probability there will be at least one question about it - for example:
community-teamebay
You're probably sick of hearing about EDDs by now, but how can it be correct that 2nd class, 1st class and RM24 Tracked all have the same EDD range?
If the 'dynamic' estimates are working as intended, then maybe the intention is wrong. What incentive is there for a seller to offer postage upgrades if the customer sees no benefit?
Also, you're quoting Saturday for next day delivery for something ordered on a Tuesday. Plus RM charge extra for Saturday special delivery so Saturdays should not even be included in this.
When is eBay going to admit that the whole thing is just broken?
If eBay is worried about buyers not seeing fast enough shipping estimates, the first thing they should do is to fix the many long-standing issues making current estimates inaccurate and/or revamp their policies so sellers feel more confident and trust they will not be unfairly held responsible and bear the costs for those long-standing issues.
This type of search filter is not new for eBay, in fact the US site has had something similar for quite some time, going back to 2018 attempts to offer now discontinued "guaranteed delivery" to "simplified shipping badges" in 2021 - though currently it gives a little more leeway at 2-4 business days instead of 1-3.
The new 1-3 day shipping filter for the UK could be an attempt to throw a bone to business sellers who are more likely to be able to offer faster handling and shipping compared to private sellers.
eBay UK has been increasingly differentiating between private and business sellers since going fee free for private sales in most categories in October, delaying payouts for private sellers, introducing buyer fees on items from private sellers, and restricting availability of certain seller tools only to business sellers.
Liz Morton
Private sellers will also be mandated to use eBay's Simple Delivery managed shipping solution sometime in Q1 2025.
Liz Morton
With Simple Delivery, private sellers will be required to have a 3 day or less handling time.
Beyond that, eBay will determine which economy and express shipping options to show to the buyer, the cost of shipping will be paid to eBay, and eBay will provide a pre-paid label to the seller - the seller has zero control over what options are available and how quickly they will be delivered.
Currently, eBay Simple Delivery does not offer any option for sellers to have items picked up from them - instead, they will have to make their way to whatever drop off location eBay has decided is "convenient", raising concerns amongst many sellers that eBay has ignoring important disability and accessibility concerns.
All of that makes it much less likely that private sellers will appear in this 1-3 day Delivery Speed filter, which means conversely it will likely benefit business sellers more.
What do you think of eBay's Delivery Speed search filters? Let us know in the comments below!
