At a glance
Fulfilment SLA gauge for eBay orders shipped through ShipBob. Measures the percentage of eBay orders fulfilled within the seller’s promised handling-and-shipping window. The “is my 3PL hitting its delivery promise on the eBay side” card; sustained below 90% triggers TRS / Late-Shipment-Rate concerns.
Calculation
Calculated automatically from your eBay data. See the At a glance summary above for what the metric tracks and the worked example below for a typical reading.Worked example
A US apparel seller using ShipBob’s Pennsylvania (US-East) and Illinois (US-Central) warehouses for ebay.com fulfilment. Period: 02 Apr 26 to 01 May 26 (30D).
Five things to notice:
- The Illinois warehouse is the drag. Pennsylvania is hitting 95.6% (above the 90% card threshold but below the 97% TRS threshold); Illinois is at 88.6% (well below the card threshold). The aggregate looks acceptable at 92.8% but masks per-warehouse divergence; per-warehouse is the actionable view.
- 88.6% on Illinois is a TRS-killing rate. eBay’s TRS late-shipment-rate cap is 3% (97%+ on-time). At 88.6%, this warehouse is contributing 11.4% late shipments to the seller’s overall late-shipment rate, far above the cap on a 12-month rolling basis. The seller has 1 to 2 cycles before TRS is at risk.
- Carrier handover is usually the cause. ShipBob warehouses pick and pack within their own SLA (typically 100% on-time), but the carrier’s first-mile pickup can be delayed. Illinois (servicing the Midwest) often hands over to UPS Ground or USPS Regional; carrier handover delays of 4 to 12 hours show up as late-shipment in eBay’s tracking-upload window.
- The fix is multi-step. (a) Talk to ShipBob about Illinois carrier handover frequency (more pickups per day = lower delay). (b) Consider switching the Illinois carrier blend toward UPS for time-sensitive orders. (c) Re-route Midwest US eBay orders to the Pennsylvania warehouse if PA can absorb the volume. (d) Increase the seller’s stated handling time on eBay listings from “Same day” to “1 business day”, legally accurate, drops the late-shipment rate by 3 to 5 ppt.
- eBay measures late-shipment from order-placement, not fulfilment-confirmation. ShipBob’s “shipped” event is when the warehouse hands over to the carrier; eBay’s late-shipment clock runs from the buyer’s order timestamp. Sub-day delays in ShipBob’s order-receipt-to-handover pipeline (rare but possible) can also contribute to the rate; check ShipBob’s order-ingestion latency.
Sibling cards merchants should reference together
Reconciling against the vendor’s own dashboard
Where to look in eBay Seller Hub (eBay-side data):Seller Hub → Performance → Service Metrics, tracking-uploaded-on-time and validated-tracking rates.Where to look in ShipBob (3PL-side data):
ShipBob → Reports → Fulfilment Performance, per-warehouse pick / pack / handover times.This card cross-references both: the eBay-side “tracking-on-time” rate and the ShipBob-side “handover-on-time” rate. Divergence between the two surfaces operational gaps. Timing, settlement, and reporting-lag table:
Why our number may legitimately differ from eBay’s late-shipment rate:
Cross-connector reconciliation against other connectors the same seller may run:
Known limitations / merchant FAQs
What’s “on-time” exactly? The card uses a strict definition: (a) the order is picked, packed, and handed over to the carrier within the seller’s promised handling-time window AND (b) the carrier’s first-acceptance scan occurs within that same window. Both must hit. eBay’s own late-shipment-rate uses a similar definition but adds (c) tracking resolves to “delivered” within the carrier’s quoted transit window. Why is the card’s threshold 90% but TRS requires 97%? Because TRS allows up to 3% late-shipment, but a healthy seller should be well above the cap to absorb noise. 90% is the amber threshold (something is degrading); below 97% is the red threshold (TRS is at material risk). Tune the card to 95% if you want earlier warning. My ShipBob warehouse claims 100% on-time but my card shows 92%, why? ShipBob measures handover-to-carrier (which is fully under their control); eBay measures carrier-acceptance-scan (which depends on the carrier’s pickup frequency). The 8 ppt gap is typical and represents carrier handover delay, ShipBob handed over on time, but the carrier didn’t scan-accept until the next pickup window. Can I split this card by warehouse? Yes, on expansion. The default headline is aggregate; the per-warehouse view is the actionable view for ops teams. Does this affect TRS standing? Indirectly. eBay’s TRS late-shipment-rate cap is 3% (97%+ on-time). If this ShipBob-fulfilled card sits at 92%, your overall late-shipment rate (which includes any non-ShipBob fulfilment too) will be close to the same figure unless other channels are perfect. At 92%, TRS is at material risk. Multi-site fulfilment: do UK and US ShipBob warehouses appear together? Aggregated by default; per-marketplace breakdown on expansion. UK ShipBob warehouses ship UK orders; US warehouses ship US orders. They operate independently. Does Best Offer affect the SLA clock? The handling-time clock starts at order-placement (i.e. when the buyer’s payment captures), not at offer-acceptance. So Best-Offer-resolved orders have the same handling-time deadline as BIN orders. What about Promoted Listings? No effect. Promoted-driven orders fulfil identically to organic. My SLA dropped from 96% to 88% in a week, what happened? Three usual causes: (1) carrier issue, regional facility delay (often weather-related); (2) ShipBob-side warehouse incident, sortation, system outage, peak-volume buffer overrun; (3) integration sync issue, ShipBob receiving orders from eBay with delay. Check ShipBob’s status page first; check carrier service alerts second; investigate ingestion latency third. Action playbook when this card alerts (<90%):
- Drill per-warehouse to identify the failing facility.
- Check carrier-handover frequency at that warehouse; ShipBob can sometimes increase pickup frequency on request.
- Audit the seller’s stated handling time on listings; if “Same day” but warehouse can only handle 1-business-day on average, raise the listing-side handling time, legally accurate, drops late-shipment rate.
- Consider re-routing the warehouse’s orders during the incident (ShipBob supports geographic re-routing on a per-order basis).
- If the issue persists, evaluate FBA’s multi-channel-fulfilment service as a backup for high-velocity SKUs.