Can someone tell me why we are charged a Final Value Fee on Shipping?

[samboogem]

Why do we get charged on postage costs? I posted an item in a 3kg satchel & charged the buyer $13.80, yet I get hit with a $1.50 fee on that.

[countessalmirena]

Some eBay members say that it is because there were some sellers who were attempting to circumvent final value fees by having their item price ridiculously low with a grossly inflated postage price.

While this may have been a factor, I don't believe it is the underlying reason. Your guess would be as valid as mine... but my impression is that eBay charge a final value fee on postage / shipping simply because they can. Profit is the name of the game; eBay are a business, and want to maximise their profits.

There has been much outcry about the FVF on postage, and I know that quite a few people contacted the ACCC about it. However, from what they were told, there was nothing that could be done about it.

[rocket2retro]

My guess is eBay feel they can't raise the FVF on the purchase price any higher and they looked for other ways to increase revenue.

Adding the FVF to postage was one. So were eBay postage labels (where they can extract a bit from the postage side of things).

Realising that they can't raise these fees any higher they are now looking for other ways to extract more fees. Hence they've recently added 2% extra FVF on sellers who fall below standard.

In coming years they are also divorcing PayPal (whom they used to own) and have bought another similar company (whereby they will extract more fees).

Having screwed sellers to the point where its barely worth selling on eBay, they've turned their attention to buyers & have recently introduced the subscription eBay Plus.

No doubt, just when you've thought they've added a fee to everything, they will find another avenue to invent a new fee,

I think all the fee adding is their way to keep the company in (marginal) profit growth despite eBay sales plummeting.

Time will tell but my guess is that once they can't add any more fees their profit will start showing negative growth (it has already plateaued).