A Little Rant About eBay’s Detailed Seller Ratings
December 18, 2007Last week we wrote about ChannelAdvisor’s new tool that allows you to easily and quickly see what your, and your competitor’s, eBay Detailed Seller Ratings stats are. This got us thinking a bit about the (fairly) newly introduced eBay Detailed Seller Ratings (DSRs), so we thought we would give you our take on them.
eBay has been on a kick to improve the buying experience for those that want to spend some money purchasing goods on their site. There is nothing wrong with this. Without buyers, sellers like us would have nothing to do and no food to put on the table.
One of the initiatives that eBay came out with is referred to as Feedback 2.0. As explained in our previous post, during the feedback process, buyers can now rank sellers on these four categories:
- Item as described
- Communication
- Shipping time
- Shipping and handling charges
Here is our quick take on the four above categories:
- Item as described. Did you have a good item description, and was it accurate?
- Communication. Do you actually answer emails promptly and professionally?
- Shipping Time. Are you a quick shipper, or do you sit on your customer’s paid items for days?
- Shipping and handling charges. Do you charge a fair and reasonable amount to get the item to your customer, or are you trying to make a large profit from your shipping charges? We will expound on this further down in this post.
We understand why eBay started to use these DSRs. Any additional information that allows a buyer to make a more informed decision about whether or not they want to deal with a specific seller is always welcome. Making it easier on the buyer will make it better for the seller, in theory. Happier buyers should equal more customers for the typical eBay seller.
We have no problem with the concept of DSRs. It is the fact that they are imperfect that gives us reason for pause. Let us explain.
We pride ourselves on giving very high quality, detailed and professional item descriptions. Compared to the one liner that is so prevalent on eBay, ours are the next great American novel. Yet, we only have a 4.9 out of 5.0 rating in the category of item as described.
We also pride ourselves on our communication ability. We answer emails incredibly quickly (within the hour – most are immediate). We can actually form complete sentences and ideas and are quite professional in our communication (unlike most buyers we have dealt with). Yet again we are 4.9 out of 5.0 in communication.
We ship the same day or next day at the latest (except Sundays). We consider this to be very good, quick service. Again, we are 4.9 out of 5.0 in shipping time. This is a bit more understandable as the average buyer may not look at the actual postmark date, but instead just base it on how long it took to actually get the package.
eBay specifically states the following on their Detailed Seller Ratings page: “When rating sellers on shipping time, rate the seller on the time it took them to mail the item, not the time it took you to receive the item. You shouldn’t hold sellers responsible for delays in mail services, international custom delays or for the time it took for your payment to clear.”
Of course, how many buyers will actually read this page? They will base the shipping time on transit time, not the time it took the seller to get the package to the shipping agency. So, 4.9 out of 5.0 isn’t that bad after all! 
This brings us to the fourth and final category, which also happens to bring us the most irritation – shipping and handling charges. This is the area that we suspect most eBay sellers to be hit the hardest, unless they are offering free or ridiculously low shipping charges.
We see the problem as a distinctly different mindset between an eBay seller and an eBay buyer. Most eBay sellers are business people. This means they understand the real cost to ship an item. Not only do you have the actual shipping/postal charge, but you also have the cost of shipping supplies and the labor involved to properly pack the order. Most small eBay sellers also have to deliver their orders to the Post Office or other delivery service. It costs both time and money to do this.
However, most eBay buyers just see the bottom line of the shipping and handling charge. They don’t understand that there is much more involved with shipping a package than just paying the postage. There are many other costs that come into play. Most eBay buyers just don’t understand this, or choose to ignore these very real business costs. Never mind that the following is on eBay’s DSR page:
“When rating the seller on shipping and handling charges, remember that sellers may charge actual packaging materials costs and a reasonable handling fee to cover the seller’s time and direct costs associated with shipping. For international transactions, you may also be responsible for duties, taxes and customs clearance fees as requested by country laws.”
Therefore, when an eBay buyer is rating you in the DSR category of shipping and handling charges, they will most likely ding you if you are passing on the true costs of shipping (as you rightfully should be).
Granted, there are plenty of eBay sellers that will very generously pad their handling charges. They will sell you a cell phone for $1 and charge you $50 to ship it. We aren’t talking about these kinds of sellers with the inflated handling charges. We are talking about the honest eBay sellers who are merely trying to pass on their actual costs to the consumer.
We would love to offer free shipping on our products to eliminate this problem. However, eBay is a fiercely competitive marketplace and most sellers don’t have enough of a profit margin to be able to do this.
We hope we have given you a slightly different perspective on eBay’s new Detailed Seller Ratings. Just be aware of the potential for getting lower ratings than what you feel you deserve because of the imperfect system that you are faced with.
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In early 2007, eBay introduced Feedback 2.0 which allows buyers to rate sellers on four categories (Detailed Seller Ratings) when they are leaving feedback. These categories are as follows:
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My Problem is that the words are wrong. I think everyone prides themselves on “Reasonable Shipping and Handling Charges” but “Reasonable” is only a 3 out of 5. So, if everyone thinks my charges are reasonable, I’d get what, a 3 to 3.5 on that scale? That’s crazy.
Bart,
Yes, we do agree that there is too much room for interpretation in what people are asked to rate. However, as Gary points out below, there will never be a perfect scoring system.
We do like what you say about reasonable. You are spot on! However, if you are being rated purely based on your shipping charges being reasonable, then, assuming you do have reasonable charges, you should get a 5 out of 5.
In other words, you are not being ranked from 1 to 5 with 1 being horrible shipping charges and 5 being excellent shipping charges. You are only being asked if your charges were reasonable.
The problem lies in what people consider to be reasonable. What is reasonable to one might be outrageous to another, and you would be rated based on this.
Again, too much room for interpretation.
I’m certain that as sellers most of us feel we provide the best service possible for our customers and should have DSRs of 5 across the board. Unfortunately, we do not live in a perfect world, and ultimately have no control over how buyers will rate our products and services.
Amazon has used a simplified version of the 1-5 seller rating system for years and it’s not at all uncommon to see rating such as:
“4 – lightening fast shipping, absolutely pristine book, great seller. I’d buy from again in a heartbeat.”
The simple fact is that there are people who are never going to give a rating of ‘5′ no matter how well we do. Factor in the possibility that an hour before a buyer leaves us feedback they may have had a fight with their spouse or children, the garbage truck may have just run over their dog, or any number of other things that affect their mood at the time that we have no control over, and I think that over time ratings of 4.8 and 4.9 will rise to the top.
Another factor that comes into play is that the use of DSR is still relatively new, meaning it only takes one ‘3′ or ‘4′ to significantly affect our rating. As time passes, these occasional blips will have less and less affect on our overall ratings.
One bright spot is that we have been given some warning of how DSRs are likely to impact our businesses in the near future. As sellers, I’m sure we can each think of a few small changes we can implement now, that may improve our customer’s perception of our services and, hopefully, cause most of the to bump their ratings from a ‘4′ to a ‘5′ in each category.
Hey Gary,
You are so correct when you discuss how outside factors can affect a buyers mood, and thus, what rating they give you.
Hopefully, once all sellers have thousands of ratings, then their true rating will come to the surface. With DSRs being so new, they can be, as you stated, swayed by a few poor ratings.
We understand why eBay is doing this. They have to do something to make the marketplace appear to be more trustworthy. Hopefully they will do the right thing with all of the DSR information they are gathering. And hopefully the use of this information will only affect those that it should and not harm the honest sellers.
Only time will tell…