Star seller - message error

[Ecopenguin]

Hi,

I was on track for star seller and a buyer (which I believe is an elderly lady) had sent half a message which I think they thought was a review and feedback, therefore did not finish the message.

As follows ... have just received my flask and I'm very pleased with the design and the service was .

I am asking for advice as this is now showing on my Star seller ratings as I have not met the criteria for replying to a message which is frustrating.

I did reach out with the following response, Thank you for your message, just checking everything was ok as I only seem to have half the message? I hope you were happy with everything?
Kind regards.

To which I received the following:

Yes everything was fine.
Excellent service,was delivered
On time. Many thanks.

To which I replied: That’s great, thank you for your support and lovely feedback. It’s really appreciated. Kind regards.

So my question is .. is there anything that can be done about to reinstate my nearly star seller ratings Many thanks for your help and support.

[NanaLetha]

Did you reply to the message before 24 hours?

[BagmakerSupply]

@Ecopenguin: Probably 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 if you want Star Seller.

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".

If the unanswered message is not a Help Request, at least for the time being, it appears that marking an unanswered message 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. Note that subsequent messages from that account may go directly to the SPAM folder.

[Ecopenguin]

Thank you for your reply and advice. Much appreciated.

[TonsOfPaper · Accepted solution]

Hello @Ecopenguin,

The Message response rate counts initial messages in new threads from all Etsy members, both buyers and other sellers. You may want to create a Saved Reply in order to quickly and easily answer messages from other Sellers. Using a Saved Reply within 24 hours will count as answering the message. 

If the message you received is not a spam message, it requires a response within 24 hours. If it is a spam message you can mark it as such and it won't count towards your score. Marking a message as spam will remove it from your inbox.

While we're unable to retroactively remove this message from your score, I do understand your concern, and really appreciate you sharing your experience with us. We've gathered your feedback and will be sure to share it with the appropriate teams. 

Thank you very much!

[Ecopenguin]

Thank you for response, I hope that this is something that can be resolved for many other Etsy users too.