Offers being accepted then not showing up as sold creating havoc for sellers and buyers

[danra_1073]

I am a very active seller in the hobby/model train space with over 1000 transactions a month processed on Ebay.  Recently, we have noticed that when and offer comes on for an item that we accept, sometimes, and the key word is sometimes... the offer acceptance never processes as an actual order.  It disappears completely and the listing remains active.    Yes, I have reported the issue and opened a Case with Ebay.  No fix as of yet and this seems to be happening 2 - 3 times a day on my account which is frustrating and wasting everyone's time.  

The fix in the meantime is to relist the item at the agreed price and send the purchaser a message with the new listing ID number.  Be sure you DO NOT promote the new listing and use the "Sell Similar" option when doing so as this avoids any promotional fees that might have been applied since Ebay cannot seem to fix the issue, they certainly do not deserve my advertising dollars on the items affected.

All Ebay can tell me is they are working on it and no one seems to really be elevating the issue that is affecting my revenue, likely your revenue and of course the mother-ship.

Anyone else having this issue?  Work-around ideas welcome!  Happy New Year Sellers!  Wishing you all much success in 2024! 

[hartungcards]

Maybe your buyer(s) just aren't paying for the offers you accepted.  Accepted offers aren't sales until the buyer pays, and the item remains active until payment is received.

[toomuchstuffagain35]

This isn't a glitch, it's ebay's new way to 'fix' offers.

[buyselljack2016]

@danra_1073 

Rumor is.....................  intentionally, or unintentionally what is happening is.......................  that to reduce nonpayment issues by automatically showing the item sold when you accept............  what eBay has coded is for it to send it back at the buyer as  "seller has sent an offer". (or something like that) It shows the same amount that you had chosen to accept.

That keeps the listing open for other offers, and BIN until paid.

If buyers that "offer" are not seeing that , perhaps they have messages blocked, or are confused, and do not want to commit 2 times.

[ittybitnot]

No fix as of yet...

@danra_1073 

Don't expect one.  It is a new feature, intended change, and/or enhancement that looks like a glitch.   When you accept an offer from a buyer and you accept, the transaction is renamed into YOU SENT AN OFFER.  On the buyer's end instead of a notice that their "offer was accepted" they get a notice that "YOU HAVE AN OFFER".   Their choice is to pay, decline, or ignore.   There is no longer an 'accept' feature that would allow it to go to the cart and request a total for more than one accepted offer, no more unpaid item strikes for those that don't pay, and if you retain the buyer preferences that previously resulted in auto-billing for the buyer and instant payment to you that is all over, too.   

The listing remains live until somebody pays for it. 

You can "accept" all the offers you want from multiple buyers for the same product/listing.  

[danra_1073]

This is ridiculous.  What the heck is Ebay thinking and how are we supposed to manage our businesses?  The problem I see is that this is inconsistent.  It is not happening with each transaction I accept or negotiate offers on.  And with the listing remaining "Active" it seems someone else on the buying end could disappoint the earlier buyer's offer.  I see this as still being a huge and thorny issue.  It also would seem to put the seller in a bad light by seemingly looking like "Bad Faith" when and offer is accepted but then is later sold to someone else by accident.  What the heck is going on?

[danra_1073]

Interesting theory.  But I have never had, and do not have a problem with items remaining unpaid.  I am selling model trains to 70 year old men and if they do not pay; well, it's likely something else happened to them.  Literally, my unpaid item case rate is less than .005%. Its simply not an issue for my marketplace.  So Ebay is trying to fix a non issue in my book and creating a disgruntled Power Seller in th eprocess.  I am paying them something like $10K this month is total fees and advertising for this new "Feature".  Positively ridiculous.

[jjddmwi]

I was just about to come and post this!  

I just had this happen this morning.  I am the seller... and I accepted a counteroffer.  It isn't showing up anywhere - I didn't get a "your item sold" email... and nothing is in my "awaiting payment" tab.

Did I miss an announcement about this??

Can I opt out?  

I do not like this one bit....

[danra_1073]

I do not have a problem with non paying customers.  I sell model trains to 70 year old men who always pay.  Ebay's new feature/fix is ridiculous and hard to manage in my case as I am dealing with large volumes of transactions each month.

[toomuchstuffagain35]

This was ebay's solution to another issue they caused that no-one liked.

[fern*wood]

Even worse, ebay is telling you they are "working" on it instead of knowing it is by design.

[danra_1073]

Ebay is slitting their own throat.  I can point to hundreds of dollars of promotional fees they missed out on in the last month due to my relisting the item using "Sell Similar" turning off the promotion/advertising rate, and sending the purchaser a new listing number.  Sounds to me like another 6 Sigma Black Belt got ahold of a problem and was told to fix a dashboard metric that did not need to be fixed on the first place.  I can't stand the  corporate world and that is why I sell full time on Ebay.

[toomuchstuffagain35]

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@fern*wood wrote:

Even worse, ebay is telling you they are "working" on it instead of knowing it is by design.

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But that's SOP for ebay CSR. They may not even KNOW they're lying.

[danra_1073]

Hey ITTYBITNOT - I suspect you ar eon the inside and work for Ebay since you don't have any listings up and are not an active seller.

[buyselljack2016]

No announcement. No opt out.