Update: Addressing new level system questions and feedback

[Kesha]

On 2/15/2024 at 1:53 PM, vegvarieszter said:

About the effective communication score: 

How can it be, that in one of my gig it says strong positive impact, in the other on : room for growth and in the next one: negative impact. I am communicating always professional, polite and effective - in all of my gigs, I do not make any difference between them. Who and how can evaluate this anyway?

This is insane... 😱

Hi @vegvarieszter! I can understand the frustration this have caused. Keep in mind that the success score for each gig analyses the gig performance differently. Buyer satisfaction changes between gig to gig, which may trigger different evaluation for the same key area. I have notified your CSM about reaching out to you to help provide more help and clarity. Best of luck to you!

[emmatopping]

1 hour ago, Kesha said:

@alanletsgo Yes, requesting to extend the delivery date can impact your score. I would recommend that when setting your original deadline, you do the best you can to account for potential delays including revisions and unexpected obstacles. 

With all due respect @Kesha this lacks any comprehension from Fiverr about the reasons why sellers ask for extensions and is totally biased towards buyers. 
The ONLY reason I ever ask for an extension is if the buyer has not provided enough information or goes AWO (check my support request for proof of this). The ONLY reason buyers ever ask me for an extension is because they are a producer and they are awaiting feedback from their client. Therefore they request an extension to prevent the order timing out. Often they return with a message that all is good and the order can be closed without further revisions. How on God’s earth is this something for which I should be penalised?

Fiverr I implore you to stop the mental anguish this is creating and show a duty of care to your sellers as well as your buyers. 

[visualstudios]

2 minutes ago, Kesha said:

Unfortunately, I won’t be able to get into the specifics of how the algorithm of the new level system works. We do encourage sellers to complete orders in a conflict-free manner, and use the partial refund option as the last resort before a possible cancellation.

That's an extremely long way to say "yes".

[carminesannino]

25 minutes ago, Kesha said:

Hi @vegvarieszter! I can understand the frustration this have caused. Keep in mind that the success score for each gig analyses the gig performance differently. Buyer satisfaction changes between gig to gig, which may trigger different evaluation for the same key area. I have notified your CSM about reaching out to you to help provide more help and clarity. Best of luck to you!

Hi @Kesha,  I hope this message finds you well. I have a question regarding my upcoming meeting with my manager on March 14. Could she assess my situation in advance or be informed, or should I wait until the scheduled date for our first meeting? Thank you in advance.

Edited February 16 by carminesannino

[Alex.M]

5 minutes ago, visualstudios said:

That's an extremely long way to say "yes".

you can give partial refunds... you can mutually cancel orders ... but you are still punished for it, what is the purpose of those features then? Fiverr should remove them completely, why be allowed to give partial refunds if it hurts your account? Why would it be allowed to even cancel orders if it hurts your account? Is there anything else that you can actually do on Fiverr without getting in any kind of trouble? Can we breathe while we deliver something or would that harm our account as well? 

[visualstudios]

Just now, Alex.M said:

Is there anything else that you can actually do on Fiverr without getting in any kind of trouble?

Yes - refuse clients. Which is what these new rules will force people to do more and more. Any minuscule red flag? Refuse. Client is not incredibly impressed with your work and your prices? Refuse. Client doesn't understand the platform? Refuse. Client is in any way less than 100% nice? Refuse. It is the only way.

 

[sunshine15]

3 minutes ago, Kesha said:

Unfortunately, I won’t be able to get into the specifics of how the algorithm of the new level system works. We do encourage sellers to complete orders in a conflict-free manner, and use the partial refund option as the last resort before a possible cancellation.

So essentially, we have to keep a nearly perfect score to stay Top Rated Sellers yet we can't be told how this score is calculated and what influences it other than generic advice that we're all already well aware of from our experience as a TRS. Makes perfect sense. 

Does anyone behind the scenes even know how this algorithm works with the exception of a few people in charge at Fiverr? Seems that way with all of the back and forth, contradictory replies and information, and copy/paste e-mails from Customer Support. Just another roll out where people who depend on Fiverr for their livelihood have to figure it out as we go since Fiverr never provides direct answers.

This forum is flooded with high quality, Fiverr sellers who follow the rules of the platform AND bring in the majority of the revenue for this platform. This does nothing but intentionally push high quality sellers away, give them a bad taste of Fiverr and start looking for alternatives to take their business elsewhere. I don't see any spammy $5 sellers on here commenting and that's who Fiverr will be left with--sellers who don't care.

 

[ahunyady]

4 minutes ago, visualstudios said:

Yes - refuse clients. Which is what these new rules will force people to do more and more. Any minuscule red flag? Refuse. Client is not incredibly impressed with your work and your prices? Refuse. Client doesn't understand the platform? Refuse. Client is in any way less than 100% nice? Refuse. It is the only way.

 

The catch-22: “you can’t block a bad buyer until they first complete an order with you” (or pray they say something spammy to justify reporting them).

Edited February 16 by ahunyady

[visualstudios]

Just now, ahunyady said:

The catch-22: “you can’t block a bad buyer until they first complete an order with you”.

You don't need to. You can just refuse to work with them. I've been turning down buyers left and right lately.

Edited February 16 by visualstudios

[katakatica]

9 minutes ago, emmatopping said:

The ONLY reason I ever ask for an extension is if the buyer has not provided enough information or goes AWO (check my support request for proof of this). The ONLY

I have a gig with a long-term client sitting at about 1 month after the original delivery date (with extensions) because they had issues with the project and needed to change the scope. Since the are a return client (and I don't like cancellations because I realized that they might affect us BEFORE the score was made visible, I said I'm OK to wait. 

I have several other clients who, instead of me delivering, prefer to extend the order if they need more time to review things (not ure why, but-). I... don't know how I feel?

Obviously if this 'can' is only in situations if we need more time (which technically 'was' encouraged by Fiverr, I can accept it (still not entirely, because you never know what happens) but if it's in other cases as well... 

I genuinely GENUINELY hope that Fiverr will hear at least a little bit of what we're saying because otherwise iit's just going to hurt more and more. (us, mostly, and buyers in the long run as well because mentally exhausted sellers will eventually produce imperfect work.)

[emmatopping]

1 minute ago, visualstudios said:

Yes - refuse clients. Which is what these new rules will force people to do more and more. Any minuscule red flag? Refuse. Client is not incredibly impressed with your work and your prices? Refuse. Client doesn't understand the platform? Refuse. Client is in any way less than 100% nice? Refuse. It is the only way.

 

The pressure sellers are under to a) answer messages at lightning speed any time of day or night, b) reduce already below market standard costs for fear of getting dinged for ‘value for money’, and c) working all the hours God sends to ensure we don’t dare ask for an extension (even though we may not actually have enough information from the client to do a good enough job, resulting in poor private feedback that we have no knowledge or sight of) could all surely be tantamount to some kind breach of employment law, should of course we be employed, which we are not. 

[visualstudios]

1 minute ago, emmatopping said:

a) answer messages at lightning speed any time of day or night,

I don't feel this. I have 24 hours to answer messages. 

[virgoca]

1 minute ago, visualstudios said:

I don't feel this. I have 24 hours to answer messages. 

 

1 minute ago, visualstudios said:

I don't feel this. I have 24 hours to answer messages. 

But if you don’t answer within the first hour your average response time begins to drop down which turns away some clients, and seeing how Fiverr is evolving we may as well assume it’ll eventually also affect in some metric. Besides, god forbids you are sick, or have a death in your family, or anything that stops you from checking in on Fiverr for a day. My grandmother died in 2023 and I had to turn away from my phone for a little over a day, and my response rate went down, and cs could not care less for that. Because that’s how much they care for us sellers.

[lenasemenkova]

3 minutes ago, ahunyady said:

The catch-22: “you can’t block a bad buyer until they first complete an order with you” (or pray they say something spammy to justify reporting them).

Fiverr has quietly removed the option to block bad buyers if they never messaged you via the inbox (as bad buyers often do). I tried recently, but there is no way.

[visualstudios]

1 minute ago, virgoca said:

turns away some clients

Well, that's great. I want to turn away those clients.

Given the way the system works, the mentality of "I want to get as many clients as possible" is extremely dangerous. You only want the good, patient, right ones.

If a client goes away because I don't reply in an hour, that's a client I don't want to have. That's a client that is shopping around, looking for the bargain, or is entitled and needs attention now. I don't want those.

Edited February 16 by visualstudios

[Alex.M]

1 minute ago, lenasemenkova said:

Fiverr has quietly removed the option to block bad buyers if they never messaged you via the inbox (as bad buyers often do). I tried recently, but there is no way.

fun fact... I just received a message from a buyer that I blocked 2 years ago... why ?!?!!? 

[virgoca]

Just now, Alex.M said:

fun fact... I just received a message from a buyer that I blocked 2 years ago... why ?!?!!? 

Has happened to me twice 🙂

[Kesha]

17 hours ago, nadiappp said:

My overall success score is 0 - probably because I have too few sales on my gig, whose score is 8. I assume they could not take into account client satisfaction (private reviews) only because of low volume. So sellers with a low sales volume, even if they have a perfect gig score of 10, will be demoted to level 0.

Hi! Remember the Success Score is an internal metric that can only be viewed by you. Levels are how you rank in the public marketplace. There could be several reasons for a Level 0 in the new system. including not meeting either of the following requirements: 

• 5 orders from at least 3 unique clients
• $400 in earnings 
• A Success Score of 5+
• A Rating of 4.4+
• 80% Response Rate

 

[Kesha]

13 hours ago, shuvo_va said:

@Kesha

Hello Kesha, Would you please answer the following 2 question?

1. If I delete non-performing gigs with low success scores, will the overall success score go down or up?

2. What is the success score for a newly uploaded gig? Zero (0) or 10?

 

Thank you for you question @shuvo_va! Deleting a gig with a low success score will remove it from the overall score. Just keep in mind that this will also remove all other gig information and history. 

Also, new gigs are not assigned a success rate until you complete several orders.

[riaus_g]

21 minutes ago, lenasemenkova said:

Fiverr has quietly removed the option to block bad buyers if they never messaged you via the inbox (as bad buyers often do). I tried recently, but there is no way.

Also if bad bayers place the direct order.

[Alex.M]

Seems legit to me. 

[Kesha]

10 hours ago, jackmuas said:

This new system is very confusing. They argue that "While your freelancer level is determined by your performance on Fiverr, your participation in the level system is determined by your behavior on the platform", does it mean there is a difference between the "freelance level" and the "level system". For example, you can still be able to move from "Level 1" to "Level 2" but you cannot participate in "level system"? or there are certain benefits that are unique to this "level system" that are not available on the "freelance level"? Come 14th March, will sellers retain the current levels (e.g. Level 2) even if you do not participate on the "level system"?

Hi @jackmuas! To clarify, this just means that if a seller is going against our  terms of service, they will not be able to participate in the level system. Sellers who are not flagged or restricted, will all have updated levels come March 14. 

[carminesannino]

2 minutes ago, Alex.M said:

Seems legit to me. 

I still find it absurd to penalize sellers for a very positive review. In this way, it seems that only 5-star reviews are appreciated, while private negative reviews can still harm the seller’s profile. This system is stressful and doesn’t add quality to the platform but creates fear and discomfort for the seller. They should seriously reconsider this senseless system, or they risk losing competent sellers who will abandon Fiverr.

[emmatopping]

16 minutes ago, Kesha said:

Thank you for you question @shuvo_va! Deleting a gig with a low success score will remove it from the overall score. Just keep in mind that this will also remove all other gig information and history. 

Also, new gigs are not assigned a success rate until you complete several orders.

Also keep in mind that if you ever selected the option to provide paid for consultations, this option will appear as a gig in your metrics and will count towards your overall score. 
Which is surprising, considering the option to provide paid for consultations is just this… an option, not a gig in its own right. 
and even though I’ve deleted this option, it still appears in my metrics. 
CS are currently looking into this for me. 

[Kesha]

10 hours ago, webcut said:

@Kesha Please let me know when the Sucess Score will update? It will update daily or monthly or weekly? Like I get few orders from a gig and receive good feedback. Now when the Success Score will be updated for that gig ?

Hi! There is not a set time in which your success score will change. It can vary based on several key metrics.