Combined postage now that eBay charges Final value feed including postage

[gabrielle255]

I'd really appreciate any advice from other sellers on this one. Currently have my first lot of listings up, since the change in commission structure. Now that ebay's commission includes my postage costs, I will obviously make even less per item. If a buyer requests combined postage, what then? I've always been more than happy to oblige and have never charged buyers any extra to do so , but on my small cost items, this could actually cost me money! I really want to help buyers get the best deal, but don't know how to get around this. What are other sellers doing? Many thanks in anticipation.

[go-tazz]

The difference in fees could be the difference in staying viable but they just want you to suck it up,(they don't

care as they will have the extra dough).

So instead of taking the FVF's when the transactions are complete they will take the FVF's earlier so that they

may make some extra dough,(so in other words taking money they are not entitled too).

Final Value Fees should be taking when the payment is final,(if it's taking earlier then they should word it

differently),

[digital*ghost]

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@go-tazz wrote:

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Gotta love that, eh? 

Encouraging sellers to incur additional cost / less profit and creating goodwill with customers by refunding overages, yet not being prepared to do it themselves. 

Tsk, some companies need to practice what they preach.

Oh yeah, and fix the cart issues to minimise overages, because at the moment the cart 'glitches' often maximise them.

[ambridgebuckskins]

I had a buyer last week who purchased 9 things. Postage come to $58 so she paid without waiting for a combined invoice.

As soon as she paid, she requested a 'combined invoice'.

Now, you and l know its too late to combine once they have paid but try telling that to a buyer who has just forked out $58 postage instead of the $11.70 it would of been had she of waited.

By eBay's stance, l should tell the buyer to wear it? And l would last how long before the negs would rock in?

l refunded the excess for the buyer, eBay took their fee from the $58 and my request for a re-evaluation on the postage fee was knocked back.

It's all about enhancing the buyer experience......cough.

The only one getting shafted out of this postage fee is good sellers.

[*crikey*mate*]

I reckon send that up the line and ask eBay about the negs?

two thoughts about you post though ambs -

1) what would happen if you went "I'm really sorry, but eBay don't allow me to combine postage once paid etc" or on that scenario, extra fees were about $4 - could this be passed onto the cistomer with or without an explanation? they still saved a heap

2) In theory, when you list one item, you do so in anticipation that only that item will be bought, so all associated fees and expenses incurred by the purchase of that item, should already be built into the product cost

This means that on that item, say you allow $8 for postage, you have already recovered the 80c from the customer that will be charged on the postage component, as it is added to the product cost.

Thus, even if eBay charge you that 80c, you already have it to pass on, so any discount provided on the postage costs shouldn't affect your profit margins - cos the fee is a business expense, not a postage expense and thus, by ebay postage policy cannot be built into the postage cost, anymore than the regular FVFs or PayPal fees can.

So how is it that the seller is out of pocket anyway?

The money for the full FVF fee has already been recouped to pass on in the slae price of the good - if not, you had to pay it anyway if they bought just the one thing, so you lose out anyway

the seller still only pays aus post the $12 or whatever post, so they have that too

and if a seller is building the fee ionto the postage component, (which is naughty), but if they are, then why not explain to the customer and ask for the additional $4 or whatever or just add it into the combined postage quote?

[digital*ghost]

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@*crikey*mate* wrote:

2) In theory, when you list one item, you do so in anticipation that only that item will be bought, 

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Not necessarily, business plans and how costs are recovered differ from seller to seller. Take those like myself for example, whose buyers more often than not purchase more than one item and who use flat rate shipping (i.e. buy one item, all additional items post at no extra cost). I can only offer this if all items are paid for together. The initial price I charge for postage often doesn't cover the cost of postage on multiple items, but if they pay for the items in one payment, I can recover that somewhat because it reduces other costs that would be incurred by individual payments. 

If someone buys and pays separately, they don't qualify for the automated flat rate postage - it is, as far as I'm concerned, a conditional special offer, so it's not available to those who pay separately, if I honoured the offer when the conditions weren't met, I would most definitely be much worse off, which is why I don't (I will refund some of the overage in some circumstances). 

Don't forget that for a lot of sellers, the FVF on postage is not only variable, but effectively unknown until a buyer purchases, so for those whose turnover can't absorb averages, it's not as straightforward as adding a specified amount into the item price. 

[*crikey*mate*]

so, if 20 people buy 20 items and you make no other sales that day/week, you operate at a loss?

(generally speaking, not meaning to be personal)

see, for me, that seems weird - you know, just in case that happened?

Reckon I'd approach that scenerio by listing with correct postage but emphasizing combined post discounts - encouraging multi purchases - even detailing "I can send up to 20 items for $8"

on one line I have a table in the listing outlining postage costs and details below the combine postage blurb - say it's a guideline to contact me for price etc or I would select the most suitable iykwim

ie

500g satchel - $xx

3kg satchel - $xx

Bx1 box $xx - up to 1kg

and so on

If I sold something uniform weight and size, might go as far as to say can fit up to 20 in this box/satchel - I see that last bit used by a lot of plant sellers - they say they can fit 8 or 40 or whatever into that postage price

Not sure - I guess i just like to play it safe and work on worst case scenarios within the system constraints. I don't wanna do all this for free or at a loss

I might have a few loss leaders or a few free post things to help out the DSRs a bit - but I personally couldn't operate like that 100% - I'd never sleep wondering if I was gonna go broke or not!

[digital*ghost]

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@*crikey*mate* wrote:

so, if 20 people buy 20 items and you make no other sales that day/week, you operate at a loss?

(generally speaking, not meaning to be personal)

see, for me, that seems weird - you know, just in case that happened?

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That's not what I said. I said that I can not honour my flat rate postage offer if people pay for things individually, which is relevant to the issue of people buying and paying full postage for each item, then requesting combined postage, thus attempting to address some of the assumptions about how costs / postage discounts were calculated and admistered, and that can differ quite a bit depending on how the buyer purchases and pays. Or, in short, saying it's not the same for everyone.

My listings basically state that people can by an unlimited number of items for X postage cost (where X is the cost of postage on a single item), but only if they are paid for together. For the sake of ease, lets say my flat rate P&H charge is $5.00, so one person can buy 20 items and only pay $5.00 postage for all if they checkout only once. If someone buys 10 items, pays for the separately for a total of $50 postage paid, I will not refund $45.00 to give them the same flat rate offer because they did not meet the condition of my flat rate postage - I will refund overage, but (again for the sake of ease) it's likely to be in the $40 ball-park. 

I'll just point out again, many sellers do not have fixed P&H costs due to the items they sell, making it that much harder to do things the way you do, I am (thankfully, in the current climate on ebay) not one of them, but I am aware that they have different needs and methods for trying to operate at an overall profit. 

[ambridgebuckskins]

This particular item that the buyer purchased - they purchased 9 of the same item. l cannot set a postage rule for more than 2 of that item because it depends on the buyers postcode (parcel would be cubed).

The buyer had feedback of well over 400 so would of known the ropes. If nothing else, going through checkout and seeing $58 postage would make you think twice.

Instead, she paid it and then asked for the combined rate and a refund. Buyer's choice to do that, of course, but eBay should not profit from the original postage amount of $58. Fair enough that the fees are an auto system but there needs to be something in place to account for postage refunds.

eBay's stance of 'just send the parcel, buyer was aware of the cost' will not wash. Because if l did that and the buyer rightly left low DSR's for postage and a red dot, l could not count on eBay removing them.

eBay's idea of 'enhancing the buyer experience' does not apply to either the seller or the buyer in this case.

[digital*ghost]

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@ambridgebuckskins wrote:

Instead, she paid it and then asked for the combined rate and a refund. Buyer's choice to do that, of course, but eBay should not profit from the original postage amount of $58. Fair enough that the fees are an auto system but there needs to be something in place to account for postage refunds.

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Just my personal opinion, but what eBay really need to do at this point, particularly if they are genuinely serious about keeping up with modern ecommerce and buyer expectations, is focus less on encouraging free shipping and upgrade both the shipping calculation and cart features, so that sellers can opt to set flat postage rules based on weight and/or volume (which would mean there'd be something that'd work for everyone, no matter what kind of items they sell or which delivery service they use), and buyers can add any number of things from one seller to their cart and get an accurate shipping quote immediately. The basic, free shopping carts are able to function in this way, so with all their resources, I don't see why eBay's can't... 

These half-assembled features they keep introducing are going to do more harm than good in the long run. 

[*crikey*mate*]

I get what you are saying, so I have two more thoughts

1) is there a way around the 2 item limit thing? - I was looking at dinner sets - I need 4 of them, the seller had one listing with two available. Can't remember how it came up, but somewhere they told me they had 6 in stock, and if I wanted the 4 to contact them and they would create such a listing etc with combined postage costs for the courier. I wondered at the time why they didn't just list all 6. I suspect I now know why.

(They were listed as free post - so they actual;ly said they should be able to reduce the price of all 4 as the postage costs should be cheaper iykwim)

2) I get what you say about the discount credit etc

But the thing is, eBay has millions of transactions. They have to determine some point in time when they will apply the fees. They give us all the leeway for combined post fees by not adding that portion until payment - what else could they use as an indicator that the transaction was complete? They couldn't rely on the seller to say "ok, done now - charge me" they have to pick a point in time for it to be viable.

Now, imagine the costs involved if a few thousand people applied for the credit each day. (remember there are millions) eBay would need more staff for this - and guess how they would recoup these costs. They would get passed onto us.

I understand the incongruity of the situation the sellers face, but eBay make it clear that they apply all fees on completion of the contract. How are they to know which sellers choose to continue on to negotiate adjusted terms of the original contract?

I know it's a tough one

all I have is - ask ebay -

and

just hope like crazy that situations such as that become rare

to me, the low DSRs and the reed dot have not been "rightly left" if the buyer couldn't follow simple instructions.

They are told what to do to qualify, if they don't do it, then????

Where else in the world can I get a do over if I don't do what I'm supposed to in order to redeem a sopecific offer?

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or - havent thought this out - don't know if its legit - but how does this wash?

explain the situation to buyer

create another listing for the buyer with those items and the new price

when they purchase that - mutually cancel the other transactions.

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I know none of it is ideal, but there must be a way to make this work for us.