CANCELED ORDER REVIEWS: The Flaw in Fiverr's Latest Update

[cecilialorsten]

Spent 10 hours on a project, issued a full refund, and still ended up with a 1-star review? Thanks to Fiverr's new update, this is your new reality. 💕💕

We sellers warned: Don't roll out this update; the platform isn't ready...

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Fiverr’s Update on Cancelled Order Reviews: An Attack on Honest Sellers!

Imagine this scenario:

• I'm a Honest Seller: I pride myself on honesty and integrity.
• My Primary Goal is: To deliver the very best service possible to every client.

When a Client isn't pleased with the service:

• Despite giving it my all, a few clients might remain unsatisfied. It's the nature of the service industry; challenges arise.

The Previous Solution:

• To ensure client satisfaction, I'd offer a full refund without hesitating. Most times, I wouldn't even seek compensation from the platform.

The solution Fiverr wants: 

• Inform the buyer that their order can't be canceled. Assure them of my willingness to invest whatever time and effort is necessary until they're satisfied. This aligns with what I would typically do anyway.

 

But here lies THE MAIN ISSUE:

• Scenario #1 - I didn’t fight back

  • Buyer isn’t happy with the services. I issued a full refund and received 1-4 star review, since I wasn’t able to do the job.

• Scenario #2 - I’m the bully

  • The platform and I pushed the buyer, explaining the order couldn't be canceled. We stressed that the only option was to see it through. This led to a successful completion, but I received a 4-star rating for being forceful. (This episode unfolded a few weeks ago.)

• Scenario #3: - Fiverr's Backstab

  • Even after assuring an unhappy buyer of my commitment to meet their needs, they resisted and persuaded support to cancel the order. Now, since I didn't approved the cancellation, I'm portrayed as the villain and slapped with a 1-star review. (Today's unfortunate event, thanks!)

• Scenario #4 - The Desperate Plea

  • In this system, I find myself constantly pleading. I beseech the buyer for understanding, and now I'm petitioning customer support to reconsider a 1-star rating. (That's on my agenda for today.

 

An Open Plea to Fiverr: This goes beyond a mere oversight. It's a systemic flaw harming your platform's core – the genuine sellers. While protecting buyers is important, where's our shield? Fiverr, you've historically upheld the values of justice and equity. Now, it's crucial to review this change and support the authentic sellers who've bolstered your platform's reputation.

 

At present, the paths I see lead to undue punishment. I urge Fiverr to collaborate with us in charting a fairer course. We're doing our absolute best.

[donnovan86]

On 9/15/2023 at 9:15 PM, cecilialorsten said:

Spent 10 hours on a project, issued a full refund, and still ended up with a 1-star review?

That's the thing, a lot of sellers curate their reviews and give a full refund to avoid bad reviews. That's why most sellers have a 4.8-5 star rating. It also makes difficult for buyers to figure out what seller is a good option, since everyone has the same ratings.

Also, many buyers requested this because sellers were taking advantage of the system, protected themselves, but left buyers with bad work and lost time, deadlines they could not meet, etc. The thing is, Fiverr wants you to get the money and not refund. It makes sense because the platform gets a cut, you get paid, and you get that review anyway if you cancel. 

[wayne_mt]

Thanks for posting your experience. Sorry that this, happened to you.

[cecilialorsten]

2 minutes ago, wayne_mt said:

Thanks for posting your experience. Sorry that this, happened to you.

If the system remains unchanged, this will happen to everyone. 

[rawque_gulia]

This is the best update released by Fiverr. Sellers think that giving 100% refunds is the right solution for buyers, really? What about the time they've lost? Maybe they were on a tight deadline and now that the project is delayed, they are losing money in their business. Can you also compensate for that loss? And not to mention, they will again have to waste their time in finding and hiring someone else and repeat the same order cycle again to get the work done.

As you mentioned in the title: "Flaw in Fiverr's latest update". There is no flaw in this update---the real flaw was:- seller taking any project, not doing satisfactory work, returning the money and running away without any penalty. Fiverr has fixed a loophole where sellers were taking advantage of the system.

[visualstudios]

On 9/15/2023 at 7:15 PM, cecilialorsten said:

Imagine this scenario:

• I'm a Honest Seller: I pride myself on honesty and integrity.
• My Primary Goal is: To deliver the very best service possible to every client.

When a Client isn't pleased with the service:

• Despite giving it my all, a few clients might remain unsatisfied. It's the nature of the service industry; challenges arise.

The Previous Solution:

• To ensure client satisfaction, I'd offer a full refund without hesitating. Most times, I wouldn't even seek compensation from the platform.

The solution Fiverr wants: 

• Inform the buyer that their order can't be canceled. Assure them of my willingness to invest whatever time and effort is necessary until they're satisfied. This aligns with what I would typically do anyway.

If you're a serious seller, why would you work 10 hours for free? If you did what was agreed, it's the client's problem, not yours. You worked, you should get paid. Your "solution" is no solution - it's totally buyer centric and doesn't protect a serious seller in any way.

Edited September 16, 2023 by visualstudios

[yourbrandingpal]

Do consider posting this as a suggestion in the Fiverr Site Suggestions section, or maybe create a poll? Again in the Fiverr Site Suggestions section? But yes, I've seen the public rating (the rating that shows up on the profile page, not the gig page) go down for one of the sellers as a result of a 1-star rating from a cancelled order. Personally, considering there's OCR, I don't see the need for Fiverr to implement this as well. 

[luisfernava]

On 9/15/2023 at 2:15 PM, cecilialorsten said:

Spent 10 hours on a project, issued a full refund, and still ended up with a 1-star review? Thanks to Fiverr's new update, this is your new reality. 💕💕

We sellers warned: Don't roll out this update; the platform isn't ready...

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Fiverr’s Update on Cancelled Order Reviews: An Attack on Honest Sellers!

Sadly this happened to me a few days ago, in my case it was scenario #1: I didn't fight back and offered a refund hoping to minimize the client's "dissatisfaction". But it was not about the money or the quality of my work, the client just wanted to put a stain on my reputation.

Experience has taught me something about people who leave their opinions on this platform, there are either supporters or haters, you might also see them in the comments section of any YouTube video.
One of the many differences between these two kinds of people is that a supporter often has no time for leaving a comment or a review, but a hater is just trying to make the life of everyone else miserable and spends his time making sure everyone hears what he has to say.
Fiverr has just opened a door for all this hatred to flow over this community of sellers.

Has anyone on Fiverr wondered why a seller like me has only 800+ reviews when my account has over 1.3K successful orders? The answer is that all my "supporters" don't always leave a review. "Haters" on the other hand, will ALWAYS leave a review.

I've been working on Fiverr for more than 7 years and I've never had a bad review because I put the experience and satisfaction of my clients over my own commodity. If a client is not satisfied with my work I always provide a solution, even if the solution is canceling an order of hundreds of dollars so my client can have his money back. I actually have done that a few times in my career, I never complained about the time I spent on those projects or the nights I stayed up so I could deliver on time. I put my time and efforts aside so my clients can have their money back.

7 years of my life dedicated to this platform, It hasn't been easy getting all those 5-star reviews. And now it's getting even more complicated with this new system that allows a "bad-tempered buyer having a bad day" to be able to vent out his frustration over a seller who was trying to do his best, leaving a stain that not only affects our business but makes us question everything we do here.

Perhaps Fiverr REALLY doesn't want us to cancel orders at all, looks like those micro-transactions mean a lot of money to the company, maybe they mean more than the integrity of the community.

This is so sad.

[cecilialorsten]

These comments from forum grandmasters, ninjas, and godzillas proves to me that the platform is primarily focused on short-term solutions...

[cecilialorsten]

This was the reason I asked people who are defending the update to image a scenario where the seller is honest and doing their best to provide the best possible experience for the buyer.

 

The platform lets bad sellers in, who then start doing bad things. Later, the platform goes after them but forgets about the good sellers. I've seen this happen for a long time.

[cecilialorsten]

I was thinking, and please correct me if I'm wrong.

In 2-3 months, sellers will come to the conclusion that it's wiser to immediately cancel an order if a client shows any signs of dissatisfaction.

Persisting and potentially consuming more of clients time will raise the chances of receiving a worse review.

This will likely lead to many more cancellations on the platform than ever before.

But the person who initiated the update is too proud I guess....

Edited September 21, 2023 by cecilialorsten
typo

[luisfernava]

On 9/18/2023 at 1:20 PM, cecilialorsten said:

people who are defending the update

Is it just me or do anyone else thinks this forum has some weird users that spent too much time replaying to our posts just to say we are wrong and that Fiverr is perfect as it is? Sometimes I think those people are being paid to say nice things about the platform, like it's soo obvious.

A few days ago I mentioned my negative experience in the Suggestions section, and a user just replied to my post with such a biased opinion about the platform.

There's no way real sellers can have the time these people spent on this forum writing articles-sized comments praising a platform that is clearly broken while also mocking the bad experience of others.

[luisfernava]

6 hours ago, cecilialorsten said:

I was thinking, and please correct me if I'm wrong.

In 2-3 months, sellers will come to the conclusion that it's wiser to immediately cancel an order if a client shows any signs of dissatisfaction.

Persisting and potentially consuming more of clients time will raise the chances of receiving a worse review.

This will likely lead to many more cancellations on the platform than ever before.

But the person who initiated the update is too proud I guess....

---

Since canceling an order affects the seller's Gig Listings (discoverability of a gig) I don't think sellers should request a cancelation. I think the type of service might also determine with viability of that option.

In my opinion, showing dissatisfaction isn't a bad signal yet. However, if the buyer starts behaving disrespectfully and develops bad manners, then that's a huge red flag.

I'm a video editor, I see two different behaviors in clients depending on the service they choose. For example:

Podcast Video Editing: This is a service that creates long-term relationships with clients.

Create an Intro Video: This is a one-time service. When I deliver the intro I don't see the client anymore.

This is why when the client wants me to be his "Podcast Editor" they tend to be more friendly because they want a long-term editor to work on each of their episodes. However, when I get clients that just want me to create a intro they just want the job done and say goodbye, this is why some services are better for creating a client portfolio than others.

There's also the option of suggesting buyers to send a message before ordering, that way you can chat with them and know if they have a good attitude before going for the order.

After I had the bad experience with the "canceled order review" I changed how my gig works (the one for creating an intro video), new clients no longer can order this service without contacting me first. Note: this is an option only available for Seller Plus members. I recommend enabling this option only to those gigs that tend to attract one-time buyers, at least until the situation with the Canceled-Order Reviews is fixed.

Stay strong ✊