Why does ebay make it difficult to contact sellers?

[plushroo]

I'm trying to contact an ebay seller about the where a bouts of an item I purchased, but ebay keeps taking me back to the list of questions page. I don't know if they have modified it or what, but I thought there was an option that let you send a message if you couldn't find the answer you were looking for. I was just going to check to see if the item had been shipped and for tracking since today was the last arrival day estimated by ebay. There is no tracking to check to see what's up. It was paid on the 25th and coming from PA to NC. I'm not really freaking out yet since I know mail can be slow, but the fact I can't seem to ask a question because of ebay's wonderful system. Any advice appreciated. Thanks!

Edit: Digging through the sellers feedback and found some negatives where others complained of slow shipping/not receiving items over the years. Worst case I just open a claim, but I wanted to message the seller first and at least give them a chance to answer.

[bluerose9978]

I believe you just go to send message and the option is other if you don't want to open a case. However, you can open a case now since some time has passed and just wait extra long to close it if it hasn't arrived by the time you're allowed to close the case.

I had this happen to me recently and it had been two weeks and no package and no tracking and the seller had showed shipped the day I paid. They had showed opted for 2-day priority so 2 weeks was a little long. I checked their feedback and noticed they had a few negatives that said their packages had never arrived and they had no tracking and no communication. I tried contacting the seller and got nothing so I had to open a case.

I guess there are those people out there. My thought is someone made them an offer or they wanted more than the auction sold for.

[True]

I was wondering this too? I know you can message a seller, but for some reason I couldnt find the auction number and had no other way of linking it? idk it took me a bit of hunting around to find it, and then it was through like a Q&A support sort of deal

[Haruna]

Ebay can be tricky messaging sellers -- once I tried to message the seller and accidentally opened a case, if memory serves, because of something I clicked -- probably 'item not received'. I just wanted to ask about it, not open a case If the usual methods aren't working, you can try going to the seller's profile and sending them a general message, including your auction number and a description of the auction so they know who you are.

[hathorcat]

It has certainly got harder over the years

Sometimes the best option is to contact them through their profile page and use the url link to the auction page in the message. So footery!