A year ago eBay changed the way it rated Sellers. Instead of the previously established performance measurements, the marketplace began using a factor called the transaction defect rate (TDR). Unfortunately, reviewing the individual items that made up a TDR was difficult for sellers. To give sellers better insight into what defects are impacting their seller reputation and what to do about correcting them, eBay has unveiled their new Transaction Defect Report.
A poor TDR score will affect a seller’s status and their prominence in item search results. Referring to the Transaction Detail Report to monitor eBay’s evaluation of performance is a good way to spot seller practices or individual listings that may be damaging a seller’s reputation and impacting sales.
In earlier days, sellers had to wade through eBay-generated spreadsheets or emails and manually discover the connections between defects and listings. The new online report is part of the Seller Dashboard and allows sellers to quickly see which transactions had defects. Now available for the first time, sellers will also be able to clearly identify defects eBay has removed from their accounts.
eBay refreshes the data in the report daily. A seller can always determine their current status and quickly initiate measures to correct defects, challenge them, or prevent them from happening again. Clicking on an item name on the defect report brings up the relevant listing, making it easy to determine if an unclear item description or image is misleading customers and contributing to returns.
To find the Transaction Defect Report, sellers should navigate to their Seller Dashboard. Click on the transaction defect percentage listed under the “Your performance to date” section. The link to the new Transaction Detail Report appears near the bottom of the resulting screen. Sellers can sort and filter their reports in several ways. They can group data by defect types or a number of other data points. Hovering over some of the items in the report displays further details about a particular defect.
For more information about using the new eBay Transaction Detail Report, see these examples and video.
For a historical perspective, sellers can download a customized report or the full Transaction Defect Report. A snapshot of defect status at a point in time can be useful for spotting trends or tracking the effects of their improvement efforts. Reports are not downloaded automatically but eBay saves a copy of downloaded reports in each seller’s account.
