I had my star seller badge removed for not replying to a message on 13th December but I did and gave a full refund to someone who had purchased an item in error that day.
marilyn
Many sellers have thought that refunding and adding a note is replying to the message, but it isn’t. You need to refund, add a note if you want, and then go to messages and reply there also.
Did you respond via the message given in a refund? That message system is not connected to the other message system.
You have to reply to the one in messages such as "I will go process your refund right now" or spam the message.
Download a CSV for your message responses and see which stopped you.
@traceofgold1: Did the customer send you message in a new thread? As it says on your Star Seller page, you need to reply to the FIRST message of a NEW THREAD.
Probably almost everyone on this forum can sympathize with you, 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. Those have always been the rules.
Etsy is now putting a blue text warning / advisory (blue banner on desktop, and a blue dot on mobile) on those messages they consider to be a "new message" but should semantically be called a "new thread".
Many sellers have thought that refunding and adding a note is replying to the message, but it isn’t. You need to refund, add a note if you want, and then go to messages and reply there also.
Thank you
Did you respond via the message given in a refund? That message system is not connected to the other message system.
You have to reply to the one in messages such as "I will go process your refund right now" or spam the message.