news

한어Русский языкEnglishFrançaisIndonesianSanskrit日本語DeutschPortuguêsΕλληνικάespañolItalianoSuomalainenLatina

Just recently, Taobao officially implemented a new regulation.It is called the strictest new regulation in history.

As soon as this regulation came out, a large number of businesses appeared online, shouting that they would close their stores and run away.

The scale of this is no less than when they announced support for refunds only.

In order to figure out what happened, I went through the details carefully. It turned out that the main reason was that one of the rules was changed.Regulations regarding merchants’ passive handling of after-sales applications.

If this rule is really strictly enforced, then the buyer can just go after the customer service and make money out of the seller's pocket.

Simply put, in the past, only stores had a large number of widespread non-response and non-reply situations. After buyers complained, merchants had to compensate buyers at the rate of 20 yuan per order.

But now, from 8:00 to 23:00 every day, if the customer service is online,But not inReply to the buyer's message within 3 minutes. Once the buyer complains, the seller may need to compensate the other party 20 yuan.

It's written in black and white, concise and easy to understand.

Moreover, it is important to note that this regulation is not only aimed atAfter-sales service，The same applies to general consultations.

For example, let's say I'm going to buy some vegetable specialties online to try, and then I ask the customer service:

Boss, how much do you sell these beans for?

As a result, the boss didn't see the message because there were too many messages. Three minutes passed and he still hadn't replied to me. At this time, the bad reviewer can complain to the seller and ask him to compensate me.

This means that the transaction has not yet been completed, the seller has not made a penny, but has to pay 20 yuan in compensation.

Moreover, Pinduoduo, which is famous for protecting its buyers, only cuts sellers’ prices by 3 yuan. . .

Screenshot of the penalty for Pinduoduo’s slow response

A keyboard merchant who has been running a shop for more than ten years complained to the negative reviewer that regardless of whether they can meet the strict indicators, the rules of Taobao itself areLeaving a loophole as wide as the Mariana Trench for the wool party。

Once dozens or even hundreds of people send messages to a store at the same time, even if the customer service has three heads and six arms, it is difficult to reply within 3 minutes. Just a WeChat group of 200 people can ruin a small business.

Therefore, everyone is worried that once the rules change, a new type of "malicious refund only" will emerge.

Many businesses even joked with the bad reviewers that they wanted to change their careers.

In addition, the new rules not only require a reply within 3 minutes, but also cancel theSellers’ rating system for buyers(Yes, it turns out that sellers can give buyers good or bad reviews), of course the merchants were not happy about this.

Perhaps it’s because the merchants protested too loudly.

So, when I read the details of this article these two days,I found that Taobao has secretly removed the hard indicator of 180 seconds.

What’s more funny is that when some merchants consulted the waiter, the other party saidTaobao’s automatic reply is also considered an effective reply. . .

But even so, the merchants don't seem to buy it. Because the time is not clearly written,Then the platform has pure right of interpretation.

After all, when Taobao first started to implement the refund-only policy, it also said that it would combine big data to make judgments. As a result, some refund-only organizations targeting Taobao appeared on the Internet, and they kept saying"Book it"。

After reading this, you may already be filled with indignation and ready to criticize Taobao.

Wait a minute, don’t think that only Taobao is so ruthless. In fact, if you take a quick look, you will find that other platforms like Xiaohongshu and Douyin also have similar 3-minute reply rate assessments.

And this iron fist of fine for late reply also hit the head of the person who gave the bad review hard two days ago.

Last week, not all of our company went abroad for team-building. The huge team that went abroad also included our e-commerce partners. We also stated the situation in the store.

As a result, after a few days of playing, the little shop was deducted 100 yuan by Xiaohongshu.

When I opened the background messages, I found several more penalties. Just for the violation of [weekly response rate], we were fined 50 yuan.

I checked the backend and found out that Xiaohongshu evaluates buyers’ responses every week, and also requires responses within 3 minutes.

However, unlike Taobao, Xiaohongshu gives merchants two options.

A response rate assessment for small merchants with less than 200 orders per week.

They don't have to reply within 3 minutes, as long as they guarantee at leastreply85% of buyers’ conversation messagesIf it is not completed, a fine of 50 will be imposed.

This assessment will be conducted regardless of whether the customer service is online or not.So when we were swimming in the sea in Phuket, we were heavily charged.

The other type is merchants with weekly orders and sessions greater than 200. These larger stores need to doReplied within 3 minutes.

During the business hours from 9:00 to 22:59 every day, customer service must reply to users within 3 minutes in 80% of the conversations.

If the standard is not met, 5 general violation points will be deducted.

Don't think that it's just a deduction of points, but no fine.Once you accumulate 25 points, you will be fined 2,000 yuan. The fines will increase as time goes by.

When it comes to Tik Tok, the rules are roughly the same.

If the response rate does not meet the standard, you will be deducted points and given a warning. If you deduct too many points, you will be fined.12 points is 500 dollars.and,Average response time was also reduced to 90 seconds.

Douyin has also improved the new regulations on this basis.

If during business hours, there is a buyer's after-sales inquiry message, and the merchant fails to respond within 3 minutes, the platform will make a decision on the order according to the situation.Refund only, or return refund processing，The shipping costs and losses are borne by the merchant。

If there is no response within 10 minutes, the merchant can only offer return and refund or cover the shipping costs.The buyer must also be compensated 5% of the actual payment amount of the order., each order is not less than 5 yuan, and the maximum is 30 yuan.

How can I get a stranger to spend 30 yuan on me with just one sentence?

A business owner calculated for me that if they want to meet the assessment standards of these two platforms, they need at least three customer service representatives, two responsible for responding to calls during the morning and evening shifts on weekdays, and one responsible for the weekends.

After a round of comparison, you suddenly feel that Taobao’s rules are not so abnormal. . .

I think the reason why Taobao's changes have triggered such a large-scale discussion is probably because this old e-commerce platform is too big and affects too many merchants.

In 2022 alone, there were 5.12 million new Taobao merchants, and more than 1.7 million stores that had been in operation for more than 10 years.

Many of the merchants that I have contacted have been in business for 10 years. However, as competition on e-commerce platforms has become increasingly fierce in the past two years, many of the sellers I have interviewed have closed their stores.

A merchant named H opened a Taobao store when he was in high school. He initially sold VPS server rentals, and later switched to selling 3C products.

In the previous five or six years, he had never been fined by the platform.

But now, he has almost given up his shop which he has run for nearly 10 years. He found a class two months ago and told me that the income is much higher than running a shop.

In the past two years, he has watched the major platforms grow step by step.

Take Taobao for example. Some time ago, they expanded the scope of categories that can be returned within seven days without any reason. Some beauty products and food were also included in the scope of the mandatory support [seven-day return] service.

After the change, there was a wave of store closures on Taobao selling beauty and personal care products.

Not only that, the categories that require delivery within 48 hours are also constantly expanding.

In H's store, the card reader must be shipped within 48 hours. If there is a delay in delivery, the buyer needs to be compensated for the product.1% of the actual transaction amount(Not less than 3 yuan, and not more than 30 yuan)。

Just two days ago, Taotian began to charge a basic software service fee of 0.6% for "successful transactions" orders.

Of course, these are not decisions made by Taobao alone. Like the basic technical service fees, other platforms have already enforced them.

Taobao is just a microcosm of the changes in e-commerce platforms.

A merchant also told me that Taobao is pretty good. It has now launched a [Shop Closing] function, which allows shops to set a closed and offline status.

When closed, the platform will not evaluate the reception and refund time, and the response rate will also be suspended.This function seems to be only available on Taobao at present.

Two days ago, they also announced the addition of “experience points” and relaxed the “refund only” policy for stores with high experience points. They also cancelled the annual fee for Tmall merchants.

But these minor changes are just a drop in the bucket compared to the tightening on the merchant side.

More importantly, it is still unclear whether some of the platform’s tough measures can really benefit us consumers.

However, what we can see with our own eyes is that major e-commerce platforms are constantly whipping merchants, making it difficult for many people to breathe.

After repeated waves of store closures, small and medium-sized sellers who have nowhere to go may really flee collectively to Xianyu and Kuaituantuan.

After all, compared with mainstream e-commerce, second-hand and group buying platforms with low costs and loose regulations appear to be much freer.

Written by：star

edit: Jiang Jiang & Noodles

Art editor: Huan Yan

Image, source：

Taobao platform rules, Douyin e-commerce learning center, Xiaohongshu e-commerce learning center