Using My Messages

The My Messages page is where you receive secure, relevant messages from eBay and from other eBay members.

Messages include information such as:

Important alerts about your account that require your immediate attention. These alerts can't be deleted for pre-specified period of time, even after you act on them.
Member-to-member communications (Ask Seller a Question and Contact eBay Member)
Customer Support correspondence and replies
Second Chance Offers (genuine Second Chance Offers are sent from eBay and never have the subject line "Question from eBay member")
Useful information about buying and selling
News about upcoming activities, events and product updates
Copies of your seller invoices for listing and Final Value Fees (check your Seller Account if you're not sure what you've been invoiced for)
Policy changes and other special notices

My Messages can help you to keep your account secure

My Messages is an important tool for helping eBay members buy and sell safely and efficiently. You should check your messages often to make sure you don't miss something important. You cannot opt out of My Messages or block messages from specific members.

If you want to change the messages we also send to your personal email account, see How do I change My eBay email notifications?
If a member is abusing the Contact Member feature, please report them to eBay via the Misuse of the Contact an eBay Member page.
If you receive a suspicious-looking email in your email inbox which claims to be from eBay, check it also appears in My Messages. You can also forward suspicious emails to spoof@ebay.co.uk or spoof@ebay.ie and we'll tell you right away whether they're genuine.

Learn more about:

Types of messages

You can receive two types of messages in My Messages:

Alerts: Only eBay can send you alerts. Alerts appear at the top of My Messages and contain important information about your account that requires your immediate attention. You cannot delete an alert until you’ve acted upon it. Once you’ve acted on an alert, you may not be able to delete it until the date specified at the top of the alert.
Messages: Messages contain useful information and may be sent by eBay or by other eBay members. You can delete messages whenever you want. Once you've deleted a message it can't be recovered.

Unlike online email services, messages expire from My Messages after 60 days. Since they contain important information about your account, alerts can't be deleted until the date specified at the top of the message, even if you've acted on them. After this date a "Delete" button is displayed at the top of the alert.

Using My Messages reminders

My Messages reminders let you know immediately when you have messages to view. My Messages reminders are included on your My Summary page, the same page as your buying and selling reminders. Reminders are also included in the My eBay at a Glance pages throughout eBay.

You can click on a My Messages reminder to take you directly to My Messages. You can also access My Messages from the link in the left column of My eBay. For direct access to My Messages, bookmark the page.

Adding the My Messages view to your My Summary page

If you’ve removed the My Messages view from your My Summary page, you can always add it back.

To add the My Messages view back to your My Summary page:

On the My Summary page, click the “Customise Summary” link near the top, right-hand side of the page.
On the Customise My Summary page, in the Views to Display list, select My Messages, and click the button to move it to the Available Views list.
Click the Save button.

About My Messages folders

The My Messages page includes folders—similar to a standard email Inbox—for managing your messages. You can organise messages by time and sender, mark as read or unread, add and remove follow-up flags, delete messages, or move messages to other folders. Folder views also include a status column that shows whether or not you’ve read a message, and if you’ve forwarded or responded to it.

eBay automatically provides you with the following My Messages folders. You can also create and manage up to 10 additional folders.

Inbox: Your Inbox is where you receive all new alerts and messages. Alerts are displayed in order of importance, most important at the top.
Sent: The Sent folder contains a copy of all the messages you’ve sent to Customer Support and to other eBay members. You cannot delete messages in the Sent folder, but you can copy messages in the Sent folder to another folder you've created.
Unread: The Unread folder includes all of your unread messages from all folders.
Flagged: The Flagged folder includes all of your flagged messages from all folders.

Managing messages

From the My Messages page, you can:

View and respond to messages
Delete messages
Delete alerts

Viewing and responding to messages

To view a message, from any folder view, click on the subject of a message. From there, you can respond to or forward a copy of the message to your registered email address, or navigate to the folder where you filed the message.

Note: When you respond to a message, eBay delivers a copy of the message to both the recipient's My Messages Inbox and to their registered email address. A copy of the message will be saved in your My Messages Sent folder and you can also choose to receive a copy of the email at your registered email address.

Deleting messages

You can delete any messages you no longer need, except for sent messages and alerts that haven't expired yet.

To delete messages:

From the My Messages section on the Summary page, click the link for your new messages. The My Messages page shows all of your new messages in the Unread folder.
Select the tick box next to the message you want to delete, and click the Delete button.
Optional: To delete filed messages, locate the message in the appropriate folder, select the tick box next to the message, and click the Delete button.

Deleting alerts

To delete an alert once it has expired:

To delete alerts:

From the Alerts section of My Messages, open the alert you want to delete.
Complete the action specified in the alert and check to see that the specified expiry date has passed.
Click the Delete button in the alert

Saving messages

You can save messages that you want to keep on your desktop.

To save a message:

Select the checkbox next to the message you want to save, and click the Save to Desktop button.
Select either EML or HTML as your file format.
Click the Save Message button to download a .zip file that contains your selected messages.

Tip: Click the "Save Messages" link on the left hand side to save time when saving multiple messages.

Responding to messages

There is a daily limit to the number of messages you can send to other eBay members. This is security measure is designed to prevent unscrupulous people from sending large numbers of irrelevant or fraudulent emails. We understand that this limit sometimes prevents members from sending genuine questions and responses to each other. However, we can't increase a member's limit. If you've reached your limit, please wait until the next day to send further messages.

Note: If you'd like to respond to a message regarding an item you've bought or sold, you can simply reply to the original message via your email program. We also send the other member's email address to you at the end of the listing. In addition, you can request the member's contact details, including telephone number.

Note: If you see a message saying you are attempting to communicate about an invalid item, please check the item number and try again. If you still get the message, the listing may no longer be on the eBay website. This could be because eBay has removed it or because it’s more than over 90 days since the end of the listing.

Information for eBay Developers

My Messages is Web Services-enabled. To learn more about how to access eBay Web Services, visit the eBay Developers Program Web site.

Related Help topics

Contact Customer Support

If you're looking for more help or have a question to ask, contact us.