Buyer requested cancellation on eBay: what should sellers do?
When a buyer requests cancellation, the safest approach is to slow down for a moment and confirm whether the item has shipped, whether payment cleared, and what cancellation reason should be used. Small mistakes in this step can affect both seller metrics and feedback handling.
The main confusion is that buyer-requested cancellations, unpaid orders, and seller-initiated cancellations look similar in the order flow but have very different consequences. If the wrong reason is selected, eBay may read the order as the seller's fault even when the buyer initiated the change.
Review the order status first. If the item has not shipped and the buyer clearly requested cancellation, use the official order-cancellation flow and choose the reason that matches the buyer's request. If the order has already shipped, move into the return or refund path instead of trying to undo the sale informally.
Do not handle a buyer-requested cancellation through casual messages only. Use the actual cancellation workflow so there is a clean record of who asked for the order to be cancelled.
Official eBay pages to review: