If you were listening to last weeks town hall (October 21st, 2009) link about an hour into the program you probably heard my phone call to the town hall.

In cased you missed it I called in about two issues:

The first issue was in regards to articles I have read/seen about some limited test eBay has preformed n feedback where the feedback questions may be completely overhauled.  I did not get a firm answer on if there will be change and if so what kind of change will be made to feedback - however I was told by Brian Burke that eBay is running these limited tests and is continuing to evaluate the feedback system.  The tests being run on feedback are very limited with the goal for sellers to receive more information to help them become better sellers and so eBay can better identify the top sellers on the site.

The second issue I brought up was in regards to a telephone customer support issue I had with eBay this past August. 

In case you missed the call here are the facts:

On August 8th I was having a potential problem with a buyer and I wanted to know what my options, as a seller are to best protect me and my feedback.  eBay had already switched from live chat to a toll free number for support so that evening around 7:30 I called the toll free number and entered in the pin provided to me from the eBay site.  I waited on hold for 90 minutes and then was disconnected without ever speaking to a rep.  I immediately called back and waited about 60 additional minutes - still no rep- I finally gave up.

Todd Lutwak and Lorrie Norrington apologized all over themselves for this issue.  Lorie stated that eBay is re shaping their reps (who previously provided customer service via live chat) to provide customer service via the phones.  Norrington went on to say that eBay has went from having a very small percentage of the reps on the phones to a growing number of reps answering phone calls with the goal of having 100% of the reps answering the phones..  Initially some of the reps were trained to only offer support via chat or email and must be trained on providing telephone customer support.

I received a phone call from eBay Friday afternoon.   During the phone call I proved additional information that I did not give out during the town hall (but is in this blog entry such as date and time of incident,. the number I called, etc.).  Again eBay did apologize for the problem.  I was informed during the time the incident occurred eBay was closing it's Vancouver support center and there were problems with switching the calls to the right reps - or to reps at all. 

I also was told that eBay does not want anyone to be on hold for more than 10 minutes to get a rep.  I was given the impression that in the futue (if not being done already) that when you click onto help or support on eBay, if the wait time is more than 10 minutes you should be re directed to chat support.

I was curious as to if eBay was going to do away with "Live chat" entirely as I know of a few eBay sellers who are hearing impaired and live chat is the only way they can talk to support.  I was given the impression that live chat will not fully go away.