and now I can breathe a sigh of relief (for now)

I have been checking, checking, checking my seller dashboard to see when my new evaluation takes effect. I just looked and found this

A special protection has been applied to maintain your above-standard status in the United States program because your defect rate has been impacted by new defect types incurred prior to our seller standards announcement in March. This means that, although your current defect rate does not meet our above-standard requirements, you will be protected from below-standard consequences for this evaluation period.


it goes on to say 

When we announced updates to the seller performance standards in March, we wanted to ensure that sellers on a 12 month evaluation were not impacted by consequences of falling below eBay’s minimum standards as a result of the new defect types (as detailed below) that were  acquired prior to the announcement in March.   

 

With the new standards now in effect, sellers on a 12 month evaluation will be protected for the August 20, 2014 evaluation from selling limits or restrictions even though their seller status may be below eBay's minimum standards. We’re extending this protection to sellers when their status was impacted by one or more of the new defects under the new seller performance standards, which were  acquired prior to March 11, 2014.*

 

These new defects include:

·         Opened cases

·         Detailed seller ratings of 3 for item description

·         Returns because the item was not as described

·         Negative or neutral feedback

·         Seller-cancelled transactions

 

Sellers will receive this protection until March 20, 2015, and will be eligible to receive it for each monthly evaluation until March 20, 2015, unless they acquire defects after March 11, 2014  that cause their account to fall Below Standard. 

 

Visit your seller dashboard regularly to stay on top of your performance and status 

 

*Note this special 7-month protection will no longer apply if you have 400 or more transactions over a 3-month period and are subsequently evaluated on a 3-month evaluation .

now, back to my regularly scheduled program . . . .  listing, listing, listing.

Tip Tuesday # 4 Helpful Tools

This is an absolute must have tool for me. I do most of my ebay work out in a metal garage type building. I take my photos there and pack up packages as well as store my items. I do most of my listing from 10pm-2am.  More often then not I would take my photos out in my shop and then discover at 2 am that I had left my camera out in the shop. So I would have to go back out in the dark to get my camera so I could download my photos from either my card or my camera. Then I would have to remember to put the card back into my camera.  I have taken my camera many times to events with kids and family only to discover that I had no card!
Then I heard about this eye fi card. Just put it in your camera like a normal card, take your photos and they are automatically uploaded to your computer! No switching cards involved.
My hubby got mine as a Christmas present for me at Target, but I have also seen them at Walgreens and on Amazon. I have the 4 GB one and I haven't maxed it out yet, and I have about 2000 photos on it.

and now a trip the the ER

Thank you all for your kind words, prayers, thoughts and suggestions of things to look for my hubby. I have been googling like crazy trying to find something that will help him. I don't think figuring out the name of it will help , they know it's viral, so they would just treat the symptoms anyway.

He continues to have many problems and the Dr. and I (and the threat of my family coming and literally dragging him) finally convinced him to go to the ER. Where they found he is severly dehydrated (no surprise there, even though he kept telling me that drinking 1 gatorade a day was enough!) blood pressure and heart rate elevated. They gave him 3 IV bags, some anti-nausea medicine, took blook and scheduled some other tests.  After we get the other test results back they will be able to tell if they need to do a different round of anti-biotics or just let it runs it's course.

Its been a stressful week. This will be day 7 of no work for him. Along with this being my last paycheck, ebay defect rate looming, and now an ER bill.
My defect rate has been at 5.41%  for days, even though by my calculation it should be at 5.1% so hopefully there is some glitch that makes the defect rate not update. Sales have been picking up alot- for example I sold 7 items and got 5 offers between when I went to bed at 2 am and when the kiddos got up at 7 am. So I'm just going to keep listing and try to sell while I still can.

I also signed up for a kids consignment sale in September. I'm trying to find a few other ways to make some extra money in case the whole ebay thing falls thru. I've never done one, so see how it goes, but I have about 20 bins of kids clothes plus lots of toys and ebay rejects, so I should have plenty to sell, if I have the time to get it ready.

On the upside, I could have a very sick hubby and be starting back to school on the 14th. My teacher friends have already been in trainings, meetings and setting up their classrooms for weeks. I cannot even imagine trying to take care of him, the kiddos and be starting back to school!

tune in tomorrow for my Tip Tuesday post . . . .

Tenative Weekly Schedule for School Starting

Here's my tenative weekly schedule for school season. I named them so I can remember what my focus is each day. I will still continue to list everyday, my goal being at least $300 worth of inventory (if my defect rate allows!) and will probably source two days a week when November rolls around. I also have homemaker goals and will be hosting Christmas at my house this year, hopefully in a clean and organized house!

Start Back Sunday- Sunday afternoon or evening start taking photos of items to list during the week
Make it Monday- freezer cooking,  baking etc for my family, extra house hold chores and listening to ebay podcasts while I work! As Christmas gets closer I hope to be more caught up and be able to start making gifts for our family like we did last year.
Tuesday- take it away Tuesday- work on getting my sourced items for Amazon boxed and ready to be shipped and out of my dining room!
Wednesday- what are you behind on Wednesday -  work on whatever
Thursday -Thrifty Thursday- visit to the story time for tots at the library with baby girl, then grocery shopping, and sourcing for the week
Fun Friday- something fun for mommy- a craft project, garage saling, etc
Son Saturday- spend extra time with my son, who will be in kindergarten all day everyday once school starts on August 20th!

Hubby Update Again

Finally heard back from the Nurse- tests say not food poising, not flu, not West Nile.
So in other words they have no clue!?!
Is it just my hubby who never asks the Dr or Nurse anything?  He didn't ask if he was contagious, still needed to take the meds they prescribed, or what else we could do to make it better, other symptoms to look for etc.  So annoying!

The nurse just said if he gets worse to go to the ER.  Like we need that $5000 bill right now.

So I guess really we have no news to report. He is still running a fever, has a massive headache, upset stomach, but has been able to eat a some crackers and a little bit of broth. He has lost over 15 pounds since Sunday.

Someone told me that they had the same symptoms and nothing showed up on their blood tests, but 6 months later they finally tested positive for West Nile, in the dead of winter.

My guess is that he does have west nile but it isn't showing up for some reason right now.

On a more upbeat note I have gotten 8! postive feedbacks since last night!

Hubby Update

No news yet. I called the Dr. at 4:00 today and was only able to get the snotty nurse that I don't care for very much. She said she couldn't tell us the results and the Dr. would look at them and get back to us by Thursday.  Really people!?!? I'll let you know as soon as I know anything. He is looking very slightly better today and hasn't thrown up in about 5 hours. He is having major joint pain and headache, which can be signs of West nile, so we'll see.


On the ebay front, can I just say how much I hate multi variation listings. I sold a shirt today, first things I've sold in 4 days. When I  went to pack it for shipping, I discovered that I no longer have that one. Some time I must have relisted the multi listing and it reset. So I had to refund the lady. Ding!  I am currently at 5.41 defect, but expect to drop lower tonight when it updates again. I really wish some people would leave me some positive feedback to dilute the bad numbers. I have sold 65 things in the last 30 days and have gotten 5 feedbacks!   I'm starting to really worry about being below standard in 15 days. I hope I can trust the ebay person I talked to who said I wouldn't get kicked off.  If I can just make it to October a lot of my defect ratings will drop off. I'm just going to continue to list as much as I can, and hopefully sell a lot and get those defect numbers down!

700+ listings and such

Finally made it over the 700 listings mark today!

Defect rate is sadly hovering at 5.41.  Was as low as 5.02, but back up again. Haven't really figured out why its changing so much, I'm really working to get it as low as possible before the 20th.

Hubby started getting a fever and throwing up yesterday afternoon. He was violently ill all night long. He went to the Dr. today and the Dr. believes it's either food poisioning or West Nile.  We won't know the results of the blood test until tomorrow. Please pray for him that it's not West Nile. He has been working on the river bottom land my family owns the last 5 weekends putting up 400 acres of fence that the flood took down, so it's a very scary possibility. The goverment is helping to pay for us to redo it, but it has to be done by September for us to get the money.

and both of my kiddos were at the Dr's this week with ear infections (of course, not at the same two, so there are two co pays!)  There are times that I feel like our family just can't get a break.

I was able to take some more pictures today, so I'm going to keep listing in between taking care of everyone.

Next week's goal for listings is 800.  Probably won't happen, but I'm going to try to take a lot more pictures tomorrow, so in case Hubby has west nile and has to go to the hospital I will be able to do some work too.

What are your goals for the week?