In the meantime, the SYI form is working correctly, so that’s one option for sellers anxious to get on with listing.

Update as of Friday night: Changes have now finally gone live.

* createDSRSummaryByCategory: Creates a seller’s DSR summary report for sold items based on the categories they were listed in and a date range.

* getDSRSummary: Retrieves a DSR report which had previously been created for specific criteria, such as a list of transactions, period of time, listing category, or shipping details.

This probably doesn’t mean much to most people, and personally I haven’t a clue how one would make use of them. However there are developers out there that already have tools for monitoring DSRs such as Auctiontrax DSR Calculator and ChannelAdvisor’s DSRWatch. These tools were limited to the API functions eBay previously provided and I’m betting that the developers are already furiously coding new applications.

It also gives an indication of the reports that will become available when eBay launch the promised enhancements to the Seller Dashboard. The same summary reports should shortly become available on eBay itself.

From early next year there will be maximum postage rates set for media and mobile phone categories. Richard Ambrose from eBay stated that some of the maximum rates will be below actual cost and for DVDs they will insist sellers offer free post, although upgrade to priority services and overseas postage can still be charged.

Other changes to be announced will include:

Feedback Revision

Feedback Revision will be live on the site in about a weeks time. Sellers will be able to request buyers revise negative or neutral feedback upwards with a limit of 5 revisions per 1000 transactions, which is roughly the rate of negative feedbacks left across the whole site.

Identity Confirmation

eBay have already announced they’ll be protecting seller accounts by checking they are creating listings from the computer they habitually use. This is already turned on in TurboLister but will now roll out site wide by the end of October. If a seller tries to list from an alternative PC they’ll be required to confirm their identity before continuing which will prevent fraudsters from listing on hijacked accounts.

Annonymisation of emails

Similar to Australia eBay will begin to hide email addresses between eBay users until they have transacted. When buyers and sellers communicate eBay will create a temporary email address which can be replied to from email clients such as Outlook or webmail without the requirement to log into the eBay account.

This will be a great assistance for sellers trading on multiple eBay IDs to save time having to log into the relevant account just to answer a simple buyer enquiry.

Postage and Packing maximum charges

eBay will begin to set maximum postage costs from January, begining in the media and mobile phone categories with free post enforced for all DVD listings.

DSR transparency

eBay will increase visibility of DSRs to enable sellers to improve their businesses. Users will begin to see a breakdown of DSRs by category to establish if particular product lines are dragging their overall scores down and enable them to target areas for improvement.

By early 2009 great DSR transparency will appear in the Seller Dashboard, but will be available to developers through the API by the end of the year.

eBay Priorities

eBay are focusing on the three top reasons why buyers stop buying on eBay

1. Losing money on eBay
2. Getting a negative feedback
3. High postage and packaging charges

They have already made progress by banning sellers from leaving negative or neutral feedback for buyers, in 2009 they will be focusing on buyer safety – it’s simply not acceptable for buyers to be able to lose money on the largest ecommerce site in the UK. This is why changes such as anonymous emails and seller identity confirmation are being introduced. If fraudsters are unable to list on the site or contact potential buyers there is no way they can take their money.

Postage and packing charges will be next target area for eBay in order to meet buyer objectives. Although maximum or free postage charges are being introduced in media and mobile phones first, don’t be surprised if they come to your category next.

This means that buyers and sellers will no longer have access to each other’s email addresses prior to a sale. Only once a bidder has won an item will the buyer and seller be able to email each other off eBay.

How this will work is that when an email is sent by a buyer using Ask Seller a Question it will still be delivered to your email inbox, as well as to your My Messages on eBay. When replying to the email it will no longer send it directly to the buyers inbox and you won’t be able to see their private email address. Each message will have a unique identifier and the reply will be sent to them via eBay, using the identifier to redirect the message to their real email address as well as placing a copy in their My Messages.

This is great news as it also means buyers will no longer have the choice of hiding their email address which currently results in the dreaded UseTheYellowButton@ebay.com reply to address. For sellers who routinely use email for replies, rather than clicking through to My Messages, it’s all too easy to hit reply without noticing the email is not the user’s address. Replying to the email gives no warning that the buyer will never actually receive it.

Once anonymised emails are introduced sellers will be able to reply from their normal email program, safe in the knowledge that their answer will end up in the buyer’s My Messages on eBay as well as in their inbox.

Once all eBay communications are via My Messages it’s been announced that sellers will have to remove email addresses from their listings. Where this leaves sellers in the UK who make use of Business Seller Information inserts, which automatically inserts their email address into listings, is unclear – currently the UK Contact Information policy specifically allows for the inclusion of email addresses in listings.

Overall I’ll welcome this change, buyers and sellers will have more reliable communications ensuring all emails are routed through My Messages. Also hopefully my personal quota of eBay spam mail will decline as fraudsters will find it increasingly difficult to obtain email addresses.

There is a new Diamond PowerSeller level in the US. This new level is for sellers with a $500k/mth and 4.8 minimum of all four DSRs.

Diamond PowerSellers will benefit from packages which will include pricing tailored for their business model. Specific requirements will also be included which could include criteria such as free shipping, despatch time or other service levels appropriate to the category.

Feedback withdrawal

eBay are emphasising that sellers should provide products accurately described with great service up front so that non-positive feedback isn’t left. However they recognise that buyers may occasionally leave feedback too early. Lorrie Norrington is expected to announce a limited capability for buyers to withdraw feedback left for sellers in her keynote speech at eBay Live! tomorrow.

DSR requirement lowered for Best Match

It’s expected that the minimum requirement for DSRs received from buyers will be lowered from 10 to 3 ratings. This will benefit high value, low volume sellers who would otherwise be advantaged in search under Best Match, but currently don’t receive enough ratings in a 30 day period to qualify.

API calls for DSR consoles

Brian Burke told us that eBay are planning to introduce API (Application Programming Interface) calls to enable developers to build 3rd party DSR consoles. These API calls will enable more granular information to be provided than is currently available. The type of information could include the percentage of buyers leaving 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 star ratings, and the average star rating for each seperate category the seller trades in.

Better DSR data would enable sellers to target the products or categories where they’re under performing and highlight the areas they excel in. This information is key to assisting sellers to improve their business for the future.