Message reply rate

[TacoDogDesign]

I've been stuck at 86% for as long as I can remember. I've made a point to reply to every message as soon as I can for months and I haven't seen the number budge. The explanation says it's supposed to update every 24 hours, so it's not waiting until the end of the month. I can't figure it out but it's holding me back from being a star seller and it's disappointing. Any ideas?

[BootifulLabels]

You need to have replied within 24 hours to EVERY new message received (not replies on ongoing messages) over the three months of the rating period.  If you get nuisance messages or spam, you don't need to answer them, but you cannot ignore them, you have to mark them as spam so they won't count.  The badges are awarded at the start of each month based on data from the previous 3 months.  If you feel Etsy has erred in their calculations you can contact them to see if it can be fixed, but even so, it will not change your status until the next month's calculations a are due.  You can download the messaging CSV under the previous period tab, it should show you exactly which messages Etsy is counting as not answered in time. 

[CraftyCornishMaids]

The badges displayed on the shop front are calculated once a month, and are there for the whole month.

The badges that are displayed in your shop now, are based on the calculation on 1st April - and that info is in PREVIOUS review period, and is not updated after 1st April. You can download the CSV's to see which ones etsy thinks you were late on

The next ones shown on your shop front, will be based on the calculation done on 1st May.
If you look at - CURRENT review period -, it will have a running total of what you are working towards for 1st May, it is updated all the time, however as you have 48 hours for the customer service stat for messages, etsy doesn't look at them until the 48 hours is up, to give you the full time to reply.
This also means, the last 2 days of messages for each month, are counted in the next months numbers

[mommawhazelsquilts]

Unless your "as soon as I can" is 24 hours or less, your rating is not likely to go up.

How long is "as I can remember"?  Numbers change at the end of each month.  If you had no missed messages in Jan. Feb. and March, you should have the April SSB unless they are other numbers coming into play.

[BagmakerSupply]

@TacoDogDesign: Keep in mind that the Star Seller metric is NOT all new messages but only the first message of all new incoming threads, and that the first message of EVERY new incoming thread must be replied to (or marked as spam) within 24 hours.

As suggested, you need to check the applicable CSV file available on your Customer Service page (previous period for April 1st Star). When you look at the file remember that that the dates / times are in UTC (not your time zone), only the first message of a new incoming thread is included (all that counts for Star Seller), and usually a new incoming thread is not included until after the 24 hour reply window has passed regardless of when you replied. Star Seller stats (and the CSV file) are updated only once per day so there may be an additional day's delay. There is also a link to the actual message thread so you can verify if the data is correct or not.