Understanding Service Metrics

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At eBay everything revolves around the kind of service and experience you as a seller give to your buyers. As buyers, we all expect to receive the best services when we are shopping online. Then, why should it be different for a buyer who is purchasing from you? 

Keeping this in mind, eBay does its best to provide the required support to you which is needed to give great service to your buyers. We provide sellers with service metrics and peer benchmarks so that they can see how they are performing compared to other sellers who sell similar items.

At eBay everything revolves around the kind of service and experience you as a seller give to your buyers. As buyers, we all expect to receive the best services when we are shopping online. Then, why should it be different for a buyer who is purchasing from you? 

Keeping this in mind, eBay does its best to provide the required support to you which is needed to give great service to your buyers. We provide sellers with service metrics and peer benchmarks so that they can see how they are performing compared to other sellers who sell similar items.

What are Service Metrics and Peer Benchmarks?

Service Metrics provide you with data on the percentage of your transactions that result in ‘Item Not As Described’ return requests and ‘Item Not Received’ requests from buyers. Peer benchmarks are an indicator of how you are doing in these areas compared to other sellers who sell similar items.

Where can you see your Service Metrics?

You can monitor your service metrics and peer benchmarks on your service metrics dashboard in Seller Hub.

  • Click on “Performance Tab” in Seller Hub
  • Under “Performance Tab”, click on “Service Metrics”

Consequences if You are Not Performing as Well as your Peers

Sellers who have an evaluation rate as “Very High” (meaning a very high percentage of transactions result in ‘Item Not As Described’ return requests and ‘Item Not Received’ requests) might be subject to increased final value fees or time automatically added to delivery estimates.

How Often does eBay Calculate these Metrics?

Service Metrics are evaluated on the 20th of each month.

  • Sellers with 400 or more transactions during the last 3 months: You’re evaluated on your transactions over that three-month period.
  • Sellers with fewer than 400 transactions during the last 3 months: You’re evaluated on your transactions over the previous 12-month period

What are Service Metrics and Peer Benchmarks?

Service Metrics provide you with data on the percentage of your transactions that result in ‘Item Not As Described’ return requests and ‘Item Not Received’ requests from buyers. Peer benchmarks are an indicator of how you are doing in these areas compared to other sellers who sell similar items.

Where can you see your Service Metrics?

You can monitor your service metrics and peer benchmarks on your service metrics dashboard in Seller Hub.

  • Click on “Performance Tab” in Seller Hub
  • Under “Performance Tab”, click on “Service Metrics”

Consequences if You are Not Performing as Well as your Peers

Sellers who have an evaluation rate as “Very High” (meaning a very high percentage of transactions result in ‘Item Not As Described’ return requests and ‘Item Not Received’ requests) might be subject to increased final value fees or time automatically added to delivery estimates.

How Often does eBay Calculate these Metrics?

Service Metrics are evaluated on the 20th of each month.

  • Sellers with 400 or more transactions during the last 3 months: You’re evaluated on your transactions over that three-month period.
  • Sellers with fewer than 400 transactions during the last 3 months: You’re evaluated on your transactions over the previous 12-month period

Service Metrics Policy Overview

Service Metrics Policy Overview

When a buyer makes a purchase on eBay, it is with a clear expectation that the item should arrive within the given timeframe and it should be exactly the way it was described in the listing. Therefore, it is important that you are creating accurate listings with complete and clear descriptions, adding pictures that are of the real product, shipping items within the specified time and in the most secure manner such that it reaches the buyer in appropriate condition. This results in the buyers being satisfied with the transaction they had with you on eBay.  

Return requests for ‘Items Not As Described’, and ‘Item Not Received’ requests from buyers can be both time consuming and costly for sellers to resolve. We provide service metrics as a tool for sellers and staying familiar with your metrics and benchmarks can help you keep these types of requests to a minimum.

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When a buyer makes a purchase on eBay, it is with a clear expectation that the item should arrive within the given timeframe and it should be exactly the way it was described in the listing. Therefore, it is important that you are creating accurate listings with complete and clear descriptions, adding pictures that are of the real product, shipping items within the specified time and in the most secure manner such that it reaches the buyer in appropriate condition. This results in the buyers being satisfied with the transaction they had with you on eBay.  

Return requests for ‘Items Not As Described’, and ‘Item Not Received’ requests from buyers can be both time consuming and costly for sellers to resolve. We provide service metrics as a tool for sellers and staying familiar with your metrics and benchmarks can help you keep these types of requests to a minimum.

Read our articles on: 

How to help buyers with Items Not Received – Read More 

Items that Arrived Damaged or Not As Described – Read More

What do Service Metrics include?

What do Service Metrics include?

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  • How often you receive return requests for “Items Not As Described”
  • How often you receive buyer requests for “Items Not Received”
  • Peer Benchmarks: comparisons of those rates to similar sellers
  • Insights into why your buyers are making these requests
  • Tips to help reduce rates of these requests

How often you receive return requests for “Items Not As Described”

How often you receive buyer requests for “Items Not Received”

Peer Benchmarks: comparisons of those rates to similar sellers

Insights into why your buyers are making these requests

Tips to help reduce rates of these requests

Calculating Item Not Received & Item Not As Described Rate under Service Metrics

Item Not Received

Your “Item Not Received” rate is the percentage of your transactions in which:

  • buyers requested information about an item that was already expected to have arrived, or
  • tracking shows the item as delivered but the buyer has not received it.

Item Not As Described

Your ‘Item Not As Described’ rate is the percentage of your transactions where buyers requested returns for the following reasons:

  • Doesn’t work or is defective
  • Doesn’t match description or photos
  • Wrong item is sent
  • Missing parts or pieces
  • Arrived damaged
  • Doesn’t seem authentic

Calculating Item Not Received & Item Not As Described Rate under Service Metrics

Item Not Received

Your “Item Not Received” rate is the percentage of your transactions in which:

  • buyers requested information about an item that was already expected to have arrived, or
  • tracking shows the item as delivered but the buyer has not received it.

Item Not As Described

Your ‘Item Not As Described’ rate is the percentage of your transactions where buyers requested returns for the following reasons:

  • Doesn’t work or is defective
  • Doesn’t match description or photos
  • Wrong item is sent
  • Missing parts or pieces
  • Arrived damaged
  • Doesn’t seem authentic

Peer Benchmarks

Peer Benchmarks are comparisons of your rates of “Item Not Received” and “Item Not As Described” against the rates of other sellers offering similar products under similar circumstances (e.g. selling price, terms of sale and shipping destination).

What do the Different Rates Mean?

  • Item Not As Described: You’re performing better than most of your peers in making sure that buyers receive the items they’ve ordered, and in setting and meeting their expectations for item condition, careful packaging, and ensuring orders are correct and complete before shipping.
  • Item Not Received: You’re doing better than most of your peers in meeting your handling time commitments, uploading tracking, and shipping as fast or faster than described in your listings.
  • Item Not As Described: You’re performing as well as your peers in ensuring that buyers receive the items they ordered, and in setting and meeting buyer expectations. You might have some returns which could have been prevented.
  • Item Not Received: You’re performing as well as your peers in meeting your delivery commitments.
  • Some sellers may have higher than average rates but too few total returns to be evaluated as High or Very High in the peer benchmarks. In these cases, sellers’ rates are evaluated as Average.
  • Item Not As Described: You’re not performing as well as your peers in making sure that buyers receive the items they ordered as described in the listing, and in setting and meeting buyer expectations.
    • If you are rated Very High in a category, but you had fewer than 10 ‘Item Not As Described’ return requests from unique buyers, or your ‘Item Not As Described’ rate is under 1% in a specific category during the evaluation period, you will not be subject to consequences.
  • Item Not Received: You’re not performing as well as your peers in meeting your delivery commitments.
    • If you are rated Very High for a shipping category, but you had fewer than 10 ‘Item Not Received’ requests from unique buyers, or your ‘Item Not Received’ rate is under 1% in a specific shipping category during the evaluation period, you will not be subject to consequences.
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Consequences of Very High rates

If you are evaluated as Very High, the following consequences may apply to your listings on the eBay sites and in the categories or shipping categories where the Very High evaluation applies:

  • Item Not As Described: An additional 5% final value fee will apply to listings in the categories where you are currently evaluated as Very High

Note: This additional 5 percentage points fee is calculated on the total amount of the sale, including shipping. Final value fee discounts, including Top Rated Seller discounts, do not apply to this additional fee. See our selling fees article for more information on how final value fees are calculated.

  • Item Not Received: Time automatically added to buyer-facing delivery estimates for the shipping categories where you are currently evaluated as Very High.

Consequences will not be applied once your rating improves, and you are no longer evaluated as Very High.

Note: Your Seller Performance Standards rating is not impacted by your ‘Item Not As Described’ or ‘Item Not Received’ evaluation rate. 

Note: Your Seller Performance Standards rating is not impacted by your ‘Item Not As Described’ or ‘Item Not Received’ evaluation rate. 

Service Metrics are provided for your listings on the following eBay sites

eBay.com

cafr.eBay.ca

eBay.com.au

eBay.de

eBay.ca

eBay.co.uk

eBay.fr

eBay.it

eBay.es