Please note this is a channel-specific article only applicable to eBay.

Problem

An order from eBay Germany site shows Invalid request instead of a contact phone number from the buyer. On eBay, the phone number is present.

Cause

There is quite a common case with the eBay Germany site, which the ShippingAddres.Phone value of the API call response is always returned as Invalid Request if the buyer is registered on the German site. This behaviour cannot be controlled by Linnworks, and will show Invalid request in the Open order as a result of the API call, since that is the data provided by eBay

Solution

A proposed solution by eBay directly (see here) is to override this behaviour by enabling the Require phone number for shipping option on your eBay backend directly: in My eBay > Account > Site Preferences > Shipping Preferences > Require phone number for shipping.

For all other eBay sites, this option is used only to force the buyer to enter a phone number during checkout, however, for the Germany site, this option is also responsible for returning the buyer's phone number during the API call, which Linnworks uses to receive order data from eBay.