Hello Shiran.M! I was just about to contact the Support Team about this new feature. I don't mean to rant about it, I just need someone to take note about the potential risk this measure represents for us sellers.
We all work for the 5 star rating, of course. Nobody wants to offer a mediocre service and get mediocre reviews! We give our very best, we cater to our buyer's every requirement, we bend over backwards to make them happy, and even then we can never know up until the order is finished whether their reviews will reflect that. Believe me, some people will go on and on about how they're super happy with you and your work throughout the order, only to leave a 3 or 4 star review just because "I was having a bad day" or "the experience has been excellent but if I leave you 5 stars you'll think there isn't room for improvement". Yes, these are taken from real life.
Like I said, we put all our effort into give our very best, that's why ew avoid cancellations like it's the pest -getting orders cancelled means: a) all the time and energy put into that order will not get compensated, b) the buyer gets the deliverables anyway and can use them for free, c) we get less exposure of our gigs in the upcoming months, d) we get less orders, therefore we make less money.
Cancellations endanger our performance and our income directly. We'll try everything to please an unpleasable buyer before getting the order cancelled, but if they still want to cancel, if they're going to walk away with our money and our work, at least they can't leave a bad review. I mean, that person would've obviously left a bad review because they were unsatisfied -in my experience the main cause for buyer insatisfaction is the buyer not knowing what they want, therefore not liking anything I present them, even if done according to their exact requests. And the more I work to please them, the more I risk to be working for nothing after all if they decide to cancel anyway.
So now I'm wondering -what's the point of having buyers rating/reviewing cancelled orders? Does anyone think sellers deserve even more "punishment" after getting orders cancelled? And more importantly -how will UNRESPONSIVENESS be measured? And what will happen when the one not responding is the buyer themselves?
(I don't know about you but I can already see lots of new fake profiles being created only to troll 5-star buyers, make them work for free, walk away with their work and leave 1-star reviews to ruin them. A fast and effective way to get rid of competitors, right?)
Anyway, I needed to let somebody on Fiverr know about the huge negative impact this measure would have on us sellers, of which you surely are aware since you're decreasing the rating score threshold of as much as half a star. Can anything be done to prevent this from becoming a reality?
Thank you!
Anabella