Star Seller not received due to Etsy error

[AlmateShop]

Hello, dear Support,

I worked hard for a few months and had a Star Seller badge, but in September I didn't get approved because I didn't respond to one message in time. Since I don't get many messages, one message was enough for the % to be below the acceptable rate.
To elaborate, I made a purchase on Etsy, through the buyers app. The seller sent me a thank you automated message, which I viewed and did not reply to. I thought I shouldn't reply to an automated message where there is no question, much less from the seller. I thought it had nothing to do with my seller account. I wrote to the chat on Etsy and was told that Star Seller metric, his stats affect both App, as a seller and as a buyer. If I knew that, I would have written to an automated message from the seller, something like thank you.
I would be happy to have my Star Seller active in September as all other stats are fine. All other metrics are top notch. Only one viewed but unanswered message from a seller in August and not from my client.
Please if it is still possible fix this.

[Adorabilities]

It's not possible to change anything for this month's badge.

There are dozens of posts about this very issue every month, so you are, by far, not alone in missing the "all messages" rule. Hopefully you'll get enough messages in the next month to bump you back up to 95%.

[AlmateShop]

I just wanted to say that I have a 100% response rate I follow this very closely. But in August there was one missed reply from the seller which I thought did not require a reply as the message was without a question and strangely it is related to the buyer's account and the stats are the same.
Surely by your words I should think I am not alone with my question and that should make me feel better? But what if this is an Etsy bug and why shouldn't it be fixed? Why should I have to wait until next month if Etsy is not working correctly?

[OrnamentBoutique]

Etsy is working correctly. You did not earn star seller because you did not reply to that message. The star seller rules state -all- first messages must be responded to in 24 hours. Etsy has no way of determining why the message was sent (in your case a thank you for your purchase) so they all must be responded to. 

[Adorabilities]

Yes, you should feel better that you are not alone. Many of us have missed out on the badge due to misunderstanding the rules at the beginning of the program (or if a seller is new and opened shop after the program was implemented.) It should only happen once though, now that you've learned that every single message has to be answered (or spammed, if appropriate.)

Another situation that may catch sellers off guard is that messages/orders made within the last few days of the month may not count for that month's statistics.

[mommawhazelsquilts · Accepted solution]

It's not a bug and you may have to wait more than a month - it takes 19 replied to messages to offset that 1 not replied to, so unless you get a lot of messages it may take the next 3 months.

For months now, there has been a blue banner over every message that needs a reply.

That banner is hard to miss.

[VintageRescueSquad]

It's not a bug at all. Etsy has always told us that all first messages (whether to you as a buyer or as a seller) count. 

Go back and read the requirements, and you'll see it is not a bug nor a glitch.

[BagmakerSupply · Accepted solution]

@AlmateShop  : "Hello, dear Support" Even if Etsy Support or the Help Pages sent you here this is a seller peer to peer forum, and should not be considered a way to contact Etsy, if that is your hope (although Etsy does sometimes read and reply to posts).

"I didn't respond to one message in time." That would not be an Etsy error. Almost everyone on this forum can sympathize with you but as it says right on your Star Seller page, you need to reply to the FIRST message of EVERY NEW INCOMING THREAD within 24 hours. It does not matter who sent it, the subject matter, if it is a duplicate or blank or anything else. If it is SPAM then it should be marked as such.

"The seller sent me a thank you automated message" There is no official or legal way for sellers to automate sending messages through Etsy.

While this is controversial, at least for the time being it appears that marking an unanswered message thread as SPAM (even after the 24 hour deadline has passed) will cause your reply percentage to change in a day or two if the original message was within the current star seller period. But be aware that doing so may cause you to miss other messages from that account as they may be sent directly to your SPAM folder.

[AlmateShop]

Thank you, for the detailed answer. Now I will know more about it.

[cutebutton · Accepted solution]

This is not an error or glitch.  Here is the information etsy has provided from the beginning of the star seller program laying out the requirements for responding to messages.  I am copy and pasting this from etsy. 

What messages count towards the message response rate?

Your message response rate is based on just the first message in a conversation, not ongoing conversations. This means you just need to respond to the first message within 24 hours. This applies to messages both from buyer and seller accounts. Messages from Etsy staff do not count toward your response rate, and neither do messages that you mark as spam. You can also now find a breakdown of your message response rate score by downloading a CSV.

If you want to read ALL the info in more detail here is the link where I got this info from

Star Seller | How it works and how to earn your badge (etsy.com)

Etsy will not change your star seller status for September but what you can do is go back and mark this message as spam and it will update your stats so that the for the next evaluation period it will now show as marked as spam and not count against you.

[AlmateShop]

Thank you, for the detailed reply. Very useful information.

[FallenAngelBrass]

Many sellers have separate buying and selling accounts.  This is one option if you'd like to prevent your buying activity from being included in your shop's star seller data. 

[cutebutton]

Also I should mention this.  Be VERY careful if you get a help request for several reasons.

first help requests open up a new message thread regardless if you have an ongoing conversation with the person.  So ALWAYS reply something to those even if you have replied in another thread.

Also people get tripped up because they get the help request and then if they are going to refund or something they reply on the order instead of in the actual help request message and the message on the order doesn't count as a response.

Pretty much if you get a help request make sure to respond within the help request message thread HAHA. This is the part of messaging that I think maybe etsy hasn't made quite as clear as they could.