my ebay store is finished, ebay is not.

[tradingcat888]

I know this type of topic has been done to the death, but still.

It was back in 2014 when I first started my business on ebay, selling gifts, fashion items, wedding accessories...etc; it was an exciting experience and I learned a lot.

2015 was my best year, over $600k business turnover (which means I paid almost 60K to ebay that year); I was busy, but happy, and really started to love ebay.

2016, things started to go downhill siginificantly, with new policies after new policies, I still pushed on; just work harder, things will get better I believed.

Now, 2017, my turnover on ebay for the last financial year was merely $100k, and my income isn't even enough to pay the bills anymore.

Time to quit.

How did everything go downhill so quickly you ask?

Ebay just doesn't give a S**T about us small or even medium sellers anymore.

They started to favour big big sellers, big brands that people already known of; as for us, we helped building ebay up, and now we are trash to them.

Most if not all traffic is now being guided to those big stores, or those extremely cheap but rubbish items from overseas.

This baffles me a lot, we pay a lot commissions to ebay, so do those big stores (I think), what makes ebay like them more than us?

Our item is more expensive than those from overseas, which means we need to pay more commission out of each sale, what makes ebay like them more than us?

If only big stores remain on ebay, would buyer still care about ebay then?

Obviously, if I want something from Good Guys, I go to Good Guys, why ebay? WHY?

Sale event you say? Discount voucher? As far as I know many of those sales events are straight lies, the price you get after you applied discount voucher is actually the same or even more than regular retail prices you get from elsewhere.

Yet still, every time ebay gives out vouchers for "selected" big sellers, my sale is dead.

Some other times my sale is just dead, with no clear reason whatsoever.

Yet I still have to pay extra for listing promotion, such shamless pratice and pathetic excuse for a rip off.

Also I have to suffer extra lose due to unfair requests opened by dishonest buyers aka scammers.

I tried hard to keep my feedback in good standing, and my seller status Top Rated, none seems to help even a bit.

Today I have decided not to list new items anymore, just clear the remaining of stock, and that's it.

I loved you ebay, you were so wonderful and made my dream come true.

Sadly it didn't last... we had a good run, but now, you have turned into a piece of S**T.

Farewell.

[tangledstitches]

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@georges_hobbyworld wrote:

We need to be really cautious when dealing with ANYONE on ebay.

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I think a lot of us don't trust the money back guarantee to work for us if there's a problem.  I certainly don't.  It seems to work okay for scammers, of course.  I buy very little on ebay now.  I always checked feedback very carefully before I bought but too many sellers have glowing feedback but still don't bother describing things accurately.  

In some categories it's not heading towards only 'new' items but it's going the other way and getting more like a garage sale every day.  I wouldn't mind this if you could trust people to describe things properly and to make an effort with their pictures, but some of them are a real turn-off.  Also, when people clear out their house the best stuff sells and then all the rubbish is left and is relisted again and again, and as time goes on the rubbish becomes a bigger proportion of the total listings - even more of a turn-off than ever.

[digital*ghost]

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@clubesquire wrote:

All of this is so disheartening, even downright scary for a new player. Not to mention the hurt for those suffering. I'm so honestly sad and hurt  for you myself.

I wrote a nice letter to eBay the other day. I'm regretting it. Never again. This is just too much. There's just far too much smoke to be doubtful about any of it. There's a fire alright and it's humongous!

My heart goes out to you all. I'm so very sorry.

Melina.

PS....The press don't seem to be picking up on any of this. Why?

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I think it's important to remember that the forum community is not really a good indication of the overall state of things on eBay. 

Member participation is a very small fraction of what it once was, and most people find their way here to either resolve a problem, or vent about a problem - which, to be fair, is the primary purpose of forums in this context, but it means good news stories are few and far between, and it can sometimes result in a grim, but skewed, view of things.

That is not to say there are not some real and serious issues and I'm not trying to downplay them, nor imply that there isn't a significant number of members who are, have been, or will be struggling to the point where eBay is no longer a viable option for them, just that a broader section of the community would likely paint a bit of a different picture. 

[clubesquire]

Yes, I understand Ghost and thank you for the reminder. I have been to the thread where people are doing well.

 I guess in here you've no choice but to take things at face value. I still have faith in people, although I sometimes wonder why, and there seems to me to be a constant with some of the stories in here and unless I'm being totally naive, there's a ring of truth. I don't know why it affects me so much, but I do get upset when I see or hear of someone's suffering. It just isn't nice. Things are all too impersonal these days and I'm sure at times some people forget that account number 88649567 is a real person with all the feelings and hopes and dreams we all have. I'm just so sure a lot of this 'stuff' could be satisfactorily sorted without anyone getting hurt. Most of it anyway.

I'll stop there, because I'll just keep blabbermouthing, but I'm sure you understand what I'm trying to say, I hope.

But look, thanks, I do know what you're saying and I appreciate it.

Melina.

[prettypaperprints]

I'm gone too as of tonight. Ended all my lstings.

I've been buying and selling on Ebay since 2003 and just had enough of all the policy changes etc.

At one stage I had over 1,000 listings and went through changing the codes to be Ebay compliant and it took me ages to do. Not long finished that and now there are new ones.

The latest change just kills me. The pictures in the descriptions are the actual items.

If I don't put some sort of text to protect them from being right clicked and copied and printed that way, then I have no business.

I cannot face going through all the listings again to change the photos.

I phoned Ebay today and explained my situation. They said to keep listing new items, but would NOT give me any guarantee I would not have to change them next year. So, that's it for me.

I wish you all the best 

[lyndal1838]

What a shame you did not keep your listings up through December.....you may have done well with your Christmas themed items.

[prettypaperprints]

I had twice as many Christmas items listed last year and sales were pretty poor.  Nothing like like were a few years ago.

Just don't have my heart in it anymore. I can't run my own business on Ebay with all the throttling and blackouts etc. 

I'm having much better sales elsewhere.

Cheers

[chameleon54]

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@digital*ghost wrote:

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@clubesquire wrote:

All of this is so disheartening, even downright scary for a new player. Not to mention the hurt for those suffering. I'm so honestly sad and hurt  for you myself.

I wrote a nice letter to eBay the other day. I'm regretting it. Never again. This is just too much. There's just far too much smoke to be doubtful about any of it. There's a fire alright and it's humongous!

My heart goes out to you all. I'm so very sorry.

Melina.

PS....The press don't seem to be picking up on any of this. Why?

---

I think it's important to remember that the forum community is not really a good indication of the overall state of things on eBay. 

Member participation is a very small fraction of what it once was, and most people find their way here to either resolve a problem, or vent about a problem - which, to be fair, is the primary purpose of forums in this context, but it means good news stories are few and far between, and it can sometimes result in a grim, but skewed, view of things.

That is not to say there are not some real and serious issues and I'm not trying to downplay them, nor imply that there isn't a significant number of members who are, have been, or will be struggling to the point where eBay is no longer a viable option for them, just that a broader section of the community would likely paint a bit of a different picture. 

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I ran the numbers on my main featured store again last night. I have mentioned this a number of times, but I,m sure many dont believe it. Anyway here goes again. My sales for the last 30 days are within 0.4% ( less than half a percent ) of my 90 day sales divided by 3. So to say may sales are consistent is an understatement. The average monthly variation in sales is less than $10 on a four figure turnover.

So while I cant increase sales on this store I am grateful that I am still achieving reliable, regular sales figures which still well and truly make it worthwhile maintaining the store.

Sales on my smaller basic store have improved since it was downgraded from featured to basic and are maintaining the increased sales for a few months now. It appears sales from basic stores may not be regulated to the same extent as featured stores.

My new ( third ) store achieved around 30 sales valued at close to $1000 in its second week, but this has slowed as I am not putting the same effort in as the first couple of weeks when i initially started it up. I will try to find the time to do some more listings on this store and see if I get an immediate improvement.

All up the combined sales from the three stores are actually better than six months ago and showing some positive trends.

[*tippy*toes*]

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@georges_hobbyworld wrote:

RE: And yet they let the Chinese scammers continue to repeatedly rip buyers off. It doesn't make sense.

It's not just Chinese scammers! There are scammers of every race on eBay!! We do a lot of business with Chinese ppl and can assure you not every Chinese is a scammer either.

We have just spent over 2 months battling to recover more than $3000 from an Aussie guy selling solar equipment he doesn't deliver. It has turned out that this guy has been doing the same thing to other people. He sells the item. It doesn't turn up. Customer files claim with eBay. Guy says 'So sorry for mixup - will you accept new delivery date?'. My boss accepted without thinking only to find out later that new delivery date was 45 days after sale. Of course, date arrives, no item, so back to eBay - who say sorry - can't file a claim any more. Item was paid for by Paypal but the claim took weeks to recover the funds.  

Complaints to eBay have done nothing - the guy is still trading on eBay. When I posted a public comment on his facebook page - under his 'see my eBay store' ad - asking him to explain where the item was, he blocked the comment, closed the page and opened a new one. Information is being collected and some customers are now working together to try to get the law to investigate him.

In fact, this is the 3rd time I've dealt with a true blue Aussie who was an eBay scammer. About 8-9 years ago, a group of more than 50 ebayers (including myself) banded together in a forum to try and share info in the hope of catching a guy who reaped a reward of $98k in 4 days selling used laptops on eBay. Working together, they managed to discover who the guy was. From what I understand, one of the ebayer victims who purchased a laptop had also sold him something on eBay. The item was collected at it his local PO where he had to present his ID (driver's license) and sign for the item. Once the ebayer realised this, he contacted the local police who were able to get the identity of the scammer from his driver's license # - last I heard they were pursuing a fraud conviction.

We need to be really cautious when dealing with ANYONE on ebay. There are plenty of factors to take into account to improve our protection against scammers when purchasing an item on eBay - race is not one of them. 

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I kind of get the feeling you are implying my comment was somehow racist. If you are, then I expect an apology. Most of what I buy comes from China. I don't buy cheap junk and I don't buy electronics of any kind. I love my Chinese sellers and I would defend them to the death. 

I agree with you that there are scammers everywhere. Yes, you'll find them in Australia, US, England, Poland. However, for every 1 scammer in other countries, there are 500 Chinese scammers. Anyone who has been around eBay for years knows that most scammers are of Asian origin. There is nothing racist about that, it's fact. 

If you persist, you will eventually get scammers shut down.........unless they are Chinese. They are untouchable. EBay make a lot of money from them, so they are free to do what they like. Again, nothing racist, it's fact.

The definition of racisim is thinking your race is superior to another. Not agreeing with someone is not being racist. Saying the word black in front of a black person is not being racist. Saying that a large proportion of scammers come from a certain demographic is not being racist. It's telling the truth. There is a big difference.

[prettypaperprints]

All good. My oldest daughter has decided to take over and give it a go.

Me.... I'm taking a long rest

Cheers

[chameleon54]

Looks like some-one heard you and switched your ligts on yesterday. Best of luck for the Christmas period.