topic Re: Greedy Ebay in Selling

Greedy Ebay

max-power-models — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 07:26:39 GMT

Ok So I sold an item, and of all places it was purchased by a buyer in France. So here is the break down

Sold for $90

Purchased for $75

Gross profit of $15

Minus the following:

FInal valuation fee : $8.91

Fee on postage costs:$3.96 (International Airmail of $40 )

Paypal fee :$ 3.42 As Paypal is owned by eBay

Leaving me a nett profit of negative $1.29

As of now I will not be selling items over 500 grams internationally anymore. and seriously considering not selling international anymore. Its nice to know Australian competitors in Asia can offer free or next to nothing postage to Australia cheaper than it costs an Australia seller to post to the same city.

I find this highly discriminative practice soley aimed at wiping out small to medium sellers in Australia. Unfortunatley no one that works for ebay in Australia has the ticker to take a phone call, as the call centre "cant find a direct line" to the Australian office.

Is it just me that finds this unfair? They can spin anyway they like but its simply a greedy cash grab in our pockets.

"The rich get richer, the poor get the picture"- Midnight Oil

Re: Greedy Ebay

phorum_junkie* — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 07:43:26 GMT

Nobody forced you to have such a low markup on your item and you should certainly have added the cost of all fees onto your purchase price and then worked out how much profit you wanted from the transaction and added that.

How much do you think you would have made if you had advertised the item worldwide in newspapers or had sold it through an international auction house? I suspect you would have made a more substantial loss.

Re: Greedy Ebay

asporty — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 10:56:46 GMT

Selling international can now be dangerously expensive. There is no way you can prevent an international buyer from putting in an express order instead of regular air mail, which means that you pay more to ebay in commissions. And that extra payment will then be an out of pocket expense.

Re: Greedy Ebay

asporty — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 11:04:24 GMT

The point here is that OP's item could have been bought by someone from NZ who would have paid $24 in postage and ebay would have charged something like $2.3 on top of that.

So you put $3 in handling fees and think you are covered. No you are not. Because along comes a buyer from Denmark who wants the product via express mail and shells out $80. So now ebay grabs nearly $8 on top of that and you just lost $5!

Re: Greedy Ebay

chameleon54 — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 11:14:52 GMT

The International postage FVF thing is a bit of a problem for sellers. If I,m selling items that can go in a large envelope, I add the fvf into my international postage quote. If items go as a parcel, the cost can be embarrisingly high. ( even without the FVF on postage ) Often I give postage discounts including the full FVF plus a bit extra as postage prices have just got out of hand. Sellers need to have reasonable profit margins to take a few hits and still come out in front. I figure a smaller profit is much better than no sale and profit at all.

Re: Greedy Ebay

digital*ghost — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 11:32:17 GMT

An interesting tid-bit, not wholly relevant to the OP but relevant to OS competition in general - as most know, FVF in Australia is charged on the cost of postage the buyer pays, whereas in the US is charged on the first domestic postage option... except for sellers registered in China listing on the US site, their FVF is charged on whatever postage the buyer pays same as here (ok, so their postage costs are generally pretty minimal if not $0 a lot of the time, but I did find it to be an interesting move on eBay US' behalf, none the less).

That aside, the fact that a seller offering to ship worldwide can not determine their actual costs of selling in many cases until a buyer actually purchases the item is one of the most unfair ways this whole thing has been implemented, IMHO, so while I know it doesn't help at all, I have a lot of empathy for the sellers this change has affected in that way.

Re: Greedy Ebay

bsal6160 — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 11:34:53 GMT

So now some sellers are starting to complain that they actually had a sale? **bleep** buyers. How inconvient for the seller.

Re: Greedy Ebay

phonebite — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 15:00:37 GMT

I think the Asian competitor also manufacture their products making it considerably more profitable for them as well as cheaper shipping.

I have to manufacture my own products in order to not lag behind because my item is too expensive.

Re: Greedy Ebay

ringinthedingding — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 05:24:09 GMT

Most of the stuff I sell on ebay I take a substantial loss on .. sometimes get a surprise and get a decent price but the stuff I sell these days is stuff I don't use anymore so don't care too much, just clearing clutter with little hope of ever finding a product that could be sold here profitably without ebay doing something to send me to bankruptcy at the flick of a switch .. been there done that .. with the fees the way they are it would be near to impossible to run a profitable business in this economic climate ..

Just use the freeby listings to empty the shed and a cupboard or two is all this place is worth for me now plus buy some cheapo china stuff here and there, is almost impossible to sell anything due to the extortionate postage costs anyway .. for the mostpart it is no use buying from Australia as the postage is a stupid price and is way cheaper to get postage from overseas etc .. no use trying too hard here any more as ebay keeps rocking the boat with repeated policy and fee changes and has repeatedly startled tmany target markets so is rubbish to even try unless you are targeting a niche market with zero competitors .. us Aussies are getting reamed from the rear by all the international corporates and the government does nothing to protect us .. is truely a disturbing situation ..

Re: Greedy Ebay

i-love-my-sheep — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 05:25:43 GMT

Oh dear, I just noticed that person holding a gun to your head forcing you to sell here. Terrible when you are forced into selling on a particular site. Maybe you should try one of the other sites that have very few visitors and even less sales. Oh that's right, there's a gun to your head isn't there? My bad.

Re: Greedy Ebay

ringinthedingding — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 05:47:17 GMT

Oh dear, I just noticed that person holding a gun to your head forcing you to sell here.

Well seeing as ebay and their affiliates have repeatedly bought and shut down up and coming competitors to ebay in Australia with the blessing of the ACCC we have little choice. it is called monopoly practices .. but that aside, it doesn't mean we have to enjoy the experience of being Fed over by the corporate elite either .. you may enjoy it though .. lol boo hoo someone doesn't like ebay so lets attack them for retaining a smidgen of morality and exposing bold faced lieing corporate parasiytes for what they really are .. who woulda thought that could happen? ...

Re: Greedy Ebay

robinsonmarineparts — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 06:19:11 GMT

The Post, NOT the Poster.

Re: Greedy Ebay

li.vish — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 06:39:26 GMT

Hello, everyone. This discussion is getting a little heated. Could we please communicate with a more civil tone. Thanks!

Re: Greedy Ebay

*crikey*mate* — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 06:50:57 GMT

isn't that what most businesses do? buy out their competitors? often buy the competitors and break up those companies into chunks and sell the chunks off?

I daresay the people who sold their businesses received the financial gains they were after for their efforts.

Not sure why people think eBay should be exempt from doing what heaps of other corporations do the world over.

There is nothing stopping anyone else from entering the market. There is also nothing saying those people can't sell their businesses.

eBay are not a monopoly by any definition of the word.

Also I am never sure why people begrudge others who manage to build a successful business. Is it a jealousy thing that they could never do it or never wanted to do it, so when someone else does it they begrudge them their success?

Re: Greedy Ebay

digital*ghost — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 07:25:58 GMT

I think the main issue is eBay increasing their ~~success~~ financial gain, but not doing enough to ensure the success of the businesses that drives the success of theirs. Increasing the cost to do business on eBay and at the same time implementing it in such a way that creates myriad problems for myriad sellers, but offering nothing in the way of solutions do accomodate the increases / created problems. (I'm talking lack of sophisticated cart / checkout options, some of which are pretty basic to the majority of ecommerce sites).

Do I begrudge eBay success? Of course not, I hope they continue to be for a while to come, but success doesn't come from increased profits alone.

Re: Greedy Ebay

*crikey*mate* — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 07:37:28 GMT

I agree - their methods, at least of late have seemed a little screwy to me.

But what can ya do, eh?

I found something called the tender centre today - didn't know they were online - its all pick up stuff, no postage

every item costs the BUYER 20% of the sale price plus $2 over and above what the tender goes for. They do BINs as well.and that $2 is on every item/lot, no waiving a few if you buy multiples

Plus the seller has to deliver the goods to the premises of the tender centre, and if the item doesn't sell they have to collect it again. It can't be listed if it is not in the posession of the centre.

I don't know if the seller also pays a fee.

But when I saw that, it didn't make eBay look so bad, eh?

so imagine that eh? every thing you get you have to also account for an additional 20% of the sale price and $2

Re: Greedy Ebay

davewil1964 — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 08:06:50 GMT

I certainly don't sell in a niche market. My competitiors are OS with the ridiculously low postage they pay and Australian sellers who seem to want to race to the bottom, price-wise.

I still make sales, though.

Re: Greedy Ebay

digital*ghost — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 08:21:14 GMT

@*crikey*mate* wrote:

But what can ya do, eh?

Sell on (or create) other sites that do meet my needs, for one. I was hesitant to open up my listings on eBay to international trade for a number of different reasons, despite several indications that I wouldn't do half bad - the new FVF certainly didn't do anything to sway me, so I'm listing my items on another site where - while I'm not doing what anyone could consider a roaring trade - I'm doing better than I expected, the move was well worthwhile, and my FVF is 3.5% on the sale price only, with a 20c listing fee per item. It's not "better" than eBay, just different, and meets a need eBay doesn't (for me) right now. And it does mean eBay's missing out on revenue from me.

As your post shows, there are a lot of business out there that can provide similar services to eBay, and they all have their pros and cons - no one site can cater to all the needs and preferences of millions of different sellers at the same time, so we all have to make a choice about which one (or ones) meet our needs the most.

But that doesn't mean a site doesn't have a responsibility to their end users, particularly when that site is charging money to use the site. Responsibility is not quite the same as obligation, by the way, to my mind anyway. I don't think eBay owe me anything in particular (above and beyond what I pay for), but I do still think they have a responsibility to make sure the site and user experience is at its optimum. A site that fails to provide some basic functions doesn't just cause problems for a few sellers, the failings are of detriment to sellers and buyers, so will be of detriment to eBay in the long run. While eBay can't (and never will) provide for everyone in every way, they can't maintain success and/or growth if they don't invest a little in some of the things that will improve the user experience for everyone.

Re: Greedy Ebay

haolove13 — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 08:54:27 GMT

Well I have moved on after Ebay decided to limit me to 0 items per month.

It has been little loss as the last two months was only able to sell one item per month.

Today while talking with customer service on a new site (for me) I discussed my dislike for Paypal and was told that they are introducing non Paypal options for payment as quite a few people have been complaing to them about paypal.

My traffic on this new site is considerably higher than the very low page views I was getting on Ebay and my sales are already happening and there is no commission on sales except for credit card sales. And that is half the rate I used to pay Paypal.

The monthly fee is less than a small shop on Ebay. No restriction on the number of items I can list.

And here is another thought about the morality of this place.

Are you getting a tax invoice for fees on postage and the FVF on same?

Are you getting the true benefit for a business of GST deductions on postage fees paid through Ebay? Despite having to report via ebay of sales but not being able to claim GST on charges.

In reality this is deducting another ten percent from your deductions which contributes to the reduced profitability on Ebay.

How can a foreign (Switzerland ) based company avoid charging and paying GST for a product only available in Australia?

The country is going broke rapidly.

Postage and freight supplied by Australia Post is surely liable for GST and should businesses be charging and receiving GST for allsales.

Surely Ebay would be making sales of more than $ 75,000 per day and it is only counting the items delivered to Australian addresses.

When selling overseas and posting at the post office it was great to be exempt from GST on a few dollars every now and then, but to be milking millions of dollars a day is really not a morally strong way to do business.

Am I the only person who has thought of this?

Pity we have lost SOLD, Oztion, OZEBID and so many others as they would probably be happy to have a tax problem with the ATO.

And I would be happy to have continued dealing with them.

To all the plants here I hope you enjoy trotting out the same tired responses to the complaints raised by so many people. And keep enjoying your little in jokes with each other . Have a happy little time defending the indefensible.

Re: Greedy Ebay

davewil1964 — Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:09:50 GMT

Presumably there was a reason for you being unable to list here anymore. And that is the reason you are leaving.

I won't buy from an unknown seller outside of Paypal, whether here or anywhere else, so you are limiting your market automatically.

GST - ALL postage charges attract a Tax Invoice, if required. eBay never has, so that is no change. BUT those costs are still tax deductions, so at the end of the FY there is no difference. It's a furphy, really.

I dunno about the rest, but OZtion is still around, albeit rebadged several years ago. Shows how much you miss them when if you were a member you would know about it.

Given your inability to posts facts, it might be good, your leaving.