discrepancy between watchers and offers that can be sent

[beachandbarn]

Hi,

I have noticed on quite a few items that there is a difference between the number of watchers on an item and the number of potential buyers I can send an offer to.

For instances, I have 30 watchers on an item but when I click the 'send offer' option on the dashboard for that item it will only show 1 potential buyer I can send an offer to.

We've asked eBay's helpdesk and are yet to receive a response on this but I'm curious whether more sellers have noticed a similar discrepancy on their items.

[papermoon.lady]

Under my buying settings in my account "offers to buyers" can be disabled. Maybe your potential buyers disabled this option.

[beachandbarn]

Thanks for your reply. Yes, that could be the reason for it.

[davewil1964]

Can't help sorry.

My prices are my prices, except for volume discounts. I don't do ambit BINs.

[beachandbarn]

I received a response from eBay:

"The escalation team have checked and found that there is nothing wrong with your account and you have already sent an Offer to the Watchers last March 3rd, 2023 thus you can only send an offer to the recent Watcher for which you were unable to sent the offer to all the watchers."

I asked them if this meant you can only send one offer to watcher and no more, they responded:

"Here let me inform you that whenever a seller is sending an offer to any watcher, they only will have 3 options, either to respond, make counter offer or to decline that particular offer. They will have 24-48 hours within which they will have to respond to any of the above mentioned options. If they miss that timeline, the sellers will not be able to send them an offer again. So technically yes, sellers can send an offer for a particular item to any watcher only once, but can send offers for different items to same watchers."

Something I wasn't aware of.

[papermoon.lady]

I had once read that actually sellers can send more than an offer to the same buyer for the same item, but not the same offer (the same amount).

I am a bit busy right now, but I will try to find where I read it later.

[papermoon.lady]

I cannot find it right now, and rules change all the time.

I do remember that maybe 2-3 years ago I was sent an offer for an item, and a couple of days later I received another offer.

Maybe things have changed now. 

As sellers don't see to whom they send offers, they would have to send a new offer for a different amount to all watchers, which might not be so practical anyway.

[beachandbarn]

Thank you for taking the time to look into this.

I feel like I have received multiple offers for an item I was watching myself so it confused me that as a seller I would not be able to do the same. Maybe the offers have been for different amounts. I'll keep an eye on it if that is the case. 

I'll try sending out an offer to watchers for a different amount as well, see what happens.