topic Re: Forced Immediate Payment in Selling

Forced Immediate Payment

*tippy*toes* — Wed, 06 Sep 2017 12:53:14 GMT

Had a buyer buy 12 items last night. He was forced into immediate payment for each one. He selected express post, which I have listed for $11.50. An over payment of $126.50. I paid 12 lots of 30c PayPal fees. Plus an extra $12,52 in fees, with 1.25 in GST on top of that. PayPal gave me the part refund of their fees minus the 12 lots of 30c.

I am really dirty about this because I don't offer immediate payment for this reason. I know the buyer was forced to pay because I asked. I suggested to try and use the cart for multi purchases in future to avoid that, and he said he'd never heard of the cart!

Most of my items I make a pretty good profit on. These were things that had been listed for ages so I'd dropped the price a fair bit and whacked them on as BIN's. With those extra fees, I didn't even break even. I've now added bank deposit as an option on my other 2 accounts to see if that makes a difference. I only had it on my main account.

I'm going to ring eBay and get those fees refunded because I shouldn't have to pay that because they've been tinkering with stuff. I know this has been happening to others for a little while, but it's the first time it's happened to me.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

lane-ends — Wed, 06 Sep 2017 13:20:05 GMT

To change this setting

My Ebay>Account>Site preferences>Postage preferences>offer combined postage & payments>combined payments>tick allow buyers to send one combined payment & set time frame

Otherwise it seems to commonly default to individual immediate payments

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

*tippy*toes* — Wed, 06 Sep 2017 15:36:23 GMT

Thanks so much for that Lane! Hopefully that fixes the problem.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

jorayjen-1 — Thu, 07 Sep 2017 04:22:12 GMT

Gday lane-ends

I have these settings and Buyers are still being forced into immediate payments.

I also offer Bank Deposit.

This has only been happening the last month or so.

Hope it works for others though

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

*tippy*toes* — Thu, 07 Sep 2017 15:13:30 GMT

I reckon it's eBay's way of forcing free postage. I told my buyer the reason I don't offer free postage. I would have added the costs into the item cost, so he would have been out a heck of a lot of money. Instead he's got the excess paid back and can use it to buy other stuff.

I've tried the free postage thing. I didn't sell a thing. It doesn't work for my items. $10 with $8 postage looks way cheaper than $18 with free postage.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

justkidzbiz — Thu, 07 Sep 2017 15:53:42 GMT

I've had the same issue. Not all but some buyers are are being forced to make immediate payment. I know it's not my settings because the listings are all done the same ie I copy and paste.

It's also annoying when buyers want to pick up items where I only accept cash payments on pick up.

very frustrating, particularly when I state payment required within 4 days, not immediately.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

clarry100 — Thu, 07 Sep 2017 20:24:57 GMT

@lane-ends wrote:
To change this setting

My Ebay>Account>Site preferences>Postage preferences>offer combined postage & payments>combined payments>tick allow buyers to send one combined payment & set time frame

Otherwise it seems to commonly default to individual immediate payments

I've just checked this setting on both of our accounts and it's already set = YES.

However, we still get buyers who pay for multiple item purchases individually.

I'm thinking it's due to buyers using the ebay app on a mobile device where the ADD TO CART button is hidden unless you scroll down a fair way. They simply don't find that function and so just pay for each one individually.

For us, since all our stuff is FREE postage and large letter without tracking, it's not so much of a problem except that it costs us a PayPal 30-cent flagfall fee for each individual transaction.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

shoppingbag* — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 05:11:10 GMT

I'm rather curious, you have zero feedback and zero listings yet you are selling so much?

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

davewil1964 — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 05:16:03 GMT

Here we go again...

Members are not restricted to one account. In fact, back in the day eBay advised people to open accounts purely for use on the boards. Like tippy's. For me, this account is mainly for buying. I sell on it occasionally, but I sell far more on the accounts I will not post on the boards with.

I'm rather curious, why is your question relevant?

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

everard6920 — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 05:46:32 GMT

@shoppingbag* wrote:
I'm rather curious, you have zero feedback and zero listings yet you are selling so much?

Is that you, Joe?

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

everard6920 — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 05:54:40 GMT

Jokes (Joe-kes?) aside, I, like others, suspect that it's an issue with the cart.

This is never a problem for me, except when the buyer uses the cart.

In that situation, Tippy, I would refund the buyer the excess postage less the fees, and less the extra 30 cent flagfalls. I stipulate on all my listings the following:

1. how to combine postage (with step-by-step instructions and a note that it will not work with the app).

2. that if they go ahead and pay without waiting for my invoice, or if they pay for multiple items separately, excess postage will be refunded minus the fees. I know eBay will refund the percentage if you ask them to, but frankly, I don't have time to call them all the time to do this.

I've done thousands of refunds (minus the fees) and nobody has ever complained. And I don't feel the least bit guilty about it because it's in every listing, and as far as I'm concerned, that's fair warning.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

padi*0409 — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 06:18:48 GMT

@everard6920 wrote:
Jokes (Joe-kes?) aside, I, like others, suspect that it's an issue with the cart.

I couldn't even put items into the cart this morning (Freaky Friday no doubt), then when I finally got them there I was told "no combined postage" even when the seller said "yes we do combined postage". So I had to email them directly for an invoice.....................

At least the items didn't come up as "immediate Payment".

eBay's just getting harder to deal with all the time.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

everard6920 — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 06:55:41 GMT

@padi*0409 wrote:
@everard6920 wrote:
Jokes (Joe-kes?) aside, I, like others, suspect that it's an issue with the cart.

I couldn't even put items into the cart this morning (Freaky Friday no doubt), then when I finally got them there I was told "no combined postage" even when the seller said "yes we do combined postage". So I had to email them directly for an invoice.....................

At least the items didn't come up as "immediate Payment".

eBay's just getting harder to deal with all the time.

Agreed - I'm not blaming the buyers at all. eBay is at fault here.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

ozstockman — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 07:46:50 GMT

Please read my first post at https://community.ebay.com.au/t5/Selling/How-does-a-seller-send-an-invoice-with-combined-postage/m-p/2116863#M164099
Do not waste your time on trying to change it in settings.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

ozstockman — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 08:06:14 GMT

@*tippy*toes* wrote:
I reckon it's eBay's way of forcing free postage. I told my buyer the reason I don't offer free postage. I would have added the costs into the item cost, so he would have been out a heck of a lot of money. Instead he's got the excess paid back and can use it to buy other stuff.

That's one of the biggest eBay lies that they help buyers with better prices if there is free postage. Their free postage idea is actually ripping off buyers and only makes eBay richer. It also makes unhonest sellers richer who doe not refund excessive postage when combining more than one item. All buyers should be aware of that so if you explain to your buyer who is ripping them off setting it all that way you may get another angry at eBay member. With a mass of angry members we can force eBay to stop doing it.

Actually you may have that power later, I am in the process of stop selling from this dump and unfair hole. I just do not want to do it over holidays.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

chameleon54 — Fri, 22 Dec 2017 23:20:23 GMT

@shoppingbag* wrote:
I'm rather curious, you have zero feedback and zero listings yet you are selling so much?
Knowing at least one of both Dave and Tippys other selling accounts, I can vouch for the fact that they both have feedback in the thousands and are highly experienced sellers. Like many on the boards, the ID,s they post with are not their selling ID,s

The use of posting ID,s allows experienced sellers to give more frank and honest answers to questions than they would otherwise do. It also allows them to give out more details about thier own businesses than would otherwise occur such as current sales trends etc. without fear of other forum readers copying succesful product lines etc. and driving prices down in the catagory.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

clubesquire — Sat, 23 Dec 2017 02:26:47 GMT

....and we're grateful, at least I am, that they unselfishly share their time and experience with us.

Thank you.

Melina.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

aussie-picker — Wed, 27 Dec 2017 06:13:59 GMT

Same here, Its a pain in the butt , Im refunding overpaid postage fess like no tomorrow.

Many of my customers regularly have bought off me for years and never had an issue with this before.

Its a joke , they cannot buy multiple items and request an invoice as per normal .

its immediate payment with postage cost on each item compounded to ridiculous levels.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

*tippy*toes* — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 06:28:06 GMT

@shoppingbag* wrote:
I'm rather curious, you have zero feedback and zero listings yet you are selling so much?

I'm rather curious why it's any of your flipping business?

As for the more recent suggestions since I started this thread in September, none of them work. My buyers are still being forced into immediate payment. The only solution I can see is to go back to auctions and add a note to my listings that I am happy to end the item early for them if they want it that way (most of my auctions only get one bid). EBay can get stuffed and stick their immediate payment up their clacker.

Re: Forced Immediate Payment

5kazam — Fri, 05 Jan 2018 05:35:17 GMT

Last sentence - big tick !!

I've been out of things for a while and just starting to get a hang of what's going on.

For years, whether it be BIN or Auction, I've been able to do combined invoices, but it seems that eBay has changed my settings without any advice to me that they were doing so. Not happy about that.

I had a recent enquiry as to postage cost if the buyer bought 2 items, and I quoted a figure which was happily accepted. I did say not to pay immediately as I would send a combined invoice, and as an afterthought said 'unless eBay has shifted the goal posts'. And sure enough they had!. So my buyer had to pay postage twice, with me doing the overpayment refund through PP and then having to get a credit from eBay on post FVF.

If eBay was a normally run business it wouldn't be around for too long with that sort of rip-off. But as it IS eBay, and a lot of sellers don't/can't be bothered requesting their small refunds ('cos of the time it takes to get hold of someone/anyone), eBay is making a hell of a lot of additional money.