Changes to meet buyer demand on eBay.com.au (26/07/2011)

[CmtyGuide@ebay.com]

Changes to meet buyer demand on eBay.com.au (26/07/2011)

This thread is to discuss with other eBay members the **Changes to meet buyer demand on eBay.com.au** announcement made on 26/07/2011.

These changes include:
· Changes to fees on eBay.com.au
· Introduction of eBay Top Rated Sellers

Please feel free to use this thread to ask any questions you may have about these upcoming changes, as well as other changes mentioned in the announcement.

Please remember, eBay Community Guides are here help you find what you need on eBay Forums but cannot offer advice pertaining to other areas of eBay or engage in conversation. You can find more information about eBay Discussion boards and how they work here: Discussion Board's Help Page

[pandora_z_box_123]

So eBay....have you earned an increase? Have you improved productivity or made the site better for all? In most industries you earn a pay rise if savings or improvements are made elsewhere. So whats on offer here??
(And I type this as a "consumer seller")
Increased item character length...tick.
No insertion fees and free gallery photo....tick. (Yes, this is an advantage to sellers and buyers but its also a BIG plus for eBay themselves. I know of buyers who only look at items with a gallery photo. No photo items get bypassed totally. Perhaps stats prove items with gallery photos sell better so offering this is better for their bottom line, not just for the customers.) It also saves lots of silly entries on the monthly account.
Increase in FVF....XXXXXXX
Do eBay honestly think the above 2 offerings equate to a 50%+ increase in fees?
Add to that previous decisions that have reduced search capability, reduced or amalgamated categories, limited postage in some categories and not others, etc etc etc.
SO NO THE INCREASE IS NOT JUSTIFIED.
Could you imagine eBay employees getting a 50% pay rise for such minor savings??
eBay...past decisions have cost you a lot of valued customers. Perhaps you are now losing money but increasing costs will NOT win them back or increase income.
Getting sellers and buyers back in the good books will.
SO HOW ABOUT THIS?
The above 2 tick improvements are great and help everybody.
Having one flat FVF is also easier accounting wise.
So how about me as a seller offer you, eBay, a flat FVF fee of say, 4.5% for my custom.
I'll put up a lot more items with nice long titles and a gallery photo which aids all buyers and hopefully I'll get a fair price for them, which will be good for me but also you, as you will earn more the more I sell.
And maybe other sellers will join in.
How about we implement it for a trial period from Sept 22 just in time for the Christmas buyers!!

Pinks ...can we please speak to your superviser?

hmmmm? Maybe ebay will be using some of the extra money raised from fees, into employing more staff to satiisfy SELLERS demands?:O

eBay Launches New Hub for Reporting Bad Buyers
By: Ina Steiner
Thu Oct 21 2010 23:05:16

Last month, eBay told sellers it would be launching a new way to report bad buyers. eBay said the new hub would be easy to access and would provide streamlined reporting to share their full experience with a buyer. An eagle-eyed reader spotted the new page here today.

eBay said in its September announcement that it would add links to the reporting hub in more places, including the Feedback flow, Seller Dashboard, the seller information page in the eBay Buyer Protection hub, and in Selling Manager and Selling Manager Pro. eBay stated, "Though it won't be public or visible to buyers, the information you provide will be used by eBay to help identify and take action against these buyers and sellers. They may be suspended or placed on restriction and their feedback and Buyer Protection cases removed from your account."

The AuctionBytes reader who found the new hub today was not impressed.

"That's the new and super improved reporting hub that seller have been waiting for ever and a half? That's just the plain old help page from before with new navigation on the left ?!?!?! That's the new page that was announced to sellers as a way to report buyers that eBay uses in the back to track and tell us how many times feedback were retracted and all? I hope not, this is very disappointing if it is."

However, eBay Vice President of Seller Experience Todd Lutwak told AuctionBytes last month that eBay would use that information the same way it uses reports on sellers. "We will look into the cases, we will look for corroborating evidence and things that other sellers have said and reported about those buyers. And if we find out that the buyers are not playing fairly, then we will take action against those buyers."

He said eBay had hired a team of people to look into those buyer cases, and to see if a buyer is giving too high of a negative or neutral rate, or have too high of an unpaid item rate, and to see if a buyer opens claims at a rate that eBay finds concerning.

What kinds of bad buying behavior exists on eBay? Feedback abuse, feedback manipulation, feedback extortion, unpaid item, unwelcome bidding or buying, customs fraud, and abuse of the Buyer Protection program, according to the reporting hub.

With eBay aggressively promoting its Buyer Protection program, sellers need a defense against abusive buyers. Sellers who encounter bad buyers may be able to point them to this page to keep them in line - will it be enough to deter them from abusing sellers?

[label-loot]

Dear eBay

Please define the following

"Reward"

"Valued"

"Discount"

either I'm confused or my dictionary is out of date!

[missionsellit]

😞 a slight fee rise try a 50% fee rise , if this was petrol bread
Milk or Butter people would be marching in the street
I wonder if the ACCC has any say in it , this does effect over 10,000 Australian business
the utter greed of this tribe. seems like they want us Aussy sellers to bale out the USA problems , no wonder the country is a basket case, when clever people like Ebay smartys who make these decisions............

Funny, I worked out the fee increases on items over $75 as much worse than 50%, Gross hikes to fees.........FVF increases for sale price of $75 or more, by let me see....... 2.75% upto 7.9% is only...............approx..........300%. and if you have an item over $1000 the rate goes up from 1.5% to 7.9%, that is OVER 500% increase. Don't forget folks the CAP fee is only on the first 30 transaction for hobby sellers, so if you are Store or Powerseller, no FVF cap on even the first listing.........

I doubt anyone selling items over 100AUD in value really thinks this was wanted by the demand of the buyers, or by any sane seller.


Next time a business lease, based on turnover wants an increase of between 300-500% with a few cents given off 30 transactions only, DOESN'T end up at the fair trading (Department of Commerce, or even ACCC,) I would be shocked.

But somehow we are supposed to 'assume the position' and not complain about a fee increase in one area of +300%. If your annual sales are more than 3000aud a year you qualify as powerseller, and they, and store subscriptions don't even get the 30 free listings.

Previous posts saying we have a choice, to leave are right, and as I said in my other posts, I am actively seeking and have found, other sites especially where I will be listing my big ticket collectibles over my self imposed, laughably low threshold of about 100aud. My numerous big(ger) ticket items will not be seeing the light of ebay after 22 sept. Ebay just chose to get 7.9% of nothing on my big ticket sales after that date.

Ebay needs to learn the lesson of overtaxing gov'ts, charge too much to do business, and the business migrates to Switzerland, much like Paypal location.........Oh yeah right, eBay already learnt the" MOVE if paying too many fees' trick, silly me, well there is the green light to reduce our 'taxes' by going elsewhere to do business, Ebay and Paypal have taught us all well

[kimmidoll001]

I'd agree to the extra costs of selling on ebay IF ebay reinstated my categories to sell in again.

Was a power seller, now it is not worth selling as there is no visibility either here in Australia nor worldwide.

BIGGEST MISTAKE EVER EBAY!

Character Toys lumped into 1 measly category in Australia. In the USA they have 80 different characters listed - yes 80 available as a sub-category to correctly list items.

I sell Thomas the Tank Engine, which in the US alone is the BIGGEST character toy category with over 20,000 listings. Total character toy listings in the USA is over 268,000.

Yet you deemed to lump all our character toys into 1 non matching category for selling here, does not match or lineup at all with USA and UK or anywhere else worldwide.

You tell me ebay how one of my listings here in your character toy category is going to gain visibility in the USA? I tell you where it goes, mixed in with their toys and hobbies in an UNSPECIFIED category because nothing matches. This category is the only category that matches from Australia.

Select worldwide and my listing in Toys and Hobbies here in Australia and with no matching category gets absolutely lost completely in MILLIONS AND MILLIONS OF WORLDWIDE LISTINGS.

You took away my ability to sell here in Australia and also my ability to sell worldwide, same as you did for hundreds and hundreds of Australian Sellers in these categories you removed in June 2010.

No wonder ebay is going down, I sell hardly at all now, not worth it.

Now you want extra FVF's for what service I ask? My listings will never get seen worldwide and Toys and Hobbies here in Australia is set up as such that NO SELLER KNOWS WHERE TO LIST THEIR ITEMS ANYMORE WITH NO CATEGORIES!!

NO BUYERS KNOW WHERE TO FIND THESE EITHER.

NO INTERNATIONAL LISTINGS FROM OTHER EBAY SITES ALSO DO NOT GET SHOWN HERE IN AUSTRALIA - NO MATCHING CATEGORY.

WHY DID YOU TAKE OUR CATEGORIES AWAY????

Pink, oh pink where are you because I would love to know when you are going to reinstate our categories in OZ.

Reinstate our categories to match USA and UK as it was pre June 2010 and I would be more than happy to pay your increased Fees.

[missionsellit]

kimmy 7250

Do as I did with my UK made collectibles,

SELL on UK OR USA Ebay, and because you are in OZ, if you tick the international visibility option in the UK listing form, (cost 13pence) you will be homepage search in UK and USA, and for free because you are domiciled in OZ, you will be home page search in OZ in that unspecified category. !!!!:O

You did say you wouldn't mind paying the new fees if you got your categories back !!!

The UK FVF is a little bit more than the 7.9%, but my sell thru rate is way up from my Oz listing days

Use the new 80 character length title field to put all the info in (up from 55) and you will be much more visible than the 'lost in space' OZ listings.

LIST in oz pay 7.9% and be invisible

List in UK at 8.75% in right category with worldwide visibility
Still get free listing in auctions starting at 99p, oh thats 100 per month.................B-)

Why WOULD YOU PAY OZ FOR A NON SERVICE ???

OZ GETS AN INCREASED COMMISSION EQUAL TO WHAT THEY DESERVE OFF YOU, OF 7.9 % OF NONE OF YOUR SALES. :-x

[not_an_eloi]

yeh, ej, the reason for that, is :

"an attempt to stop the haemorrhaging of members closing their Vshops, nothing more and nothing less"

B-)

[ejholden1963]

That may be true, old friend, but they are certainly not shovelling themselves into a hole ......

[boost_for_life]

Amazing! I thought when they surveyed sellers they would realise that we are sick of paying ridiculous fees. Now they are demanding a greater percentage of our sales for all formats. 7.9% is the margin on most products. Apply a higher percentages to non-business customers. Not to businesses. Even better....if you really want to meet buyer demand and get more listings up, ablolish listing fees! Oh no, you can't do that because that doesn't give you instant cash in your bank. It's time to concentrate on my website! By by ebay!! You make enough without me anyway. You have finally managed to get rid of me.

TOTALLY AGREE I GAVE UP ON EBAY TOTALLY.

[kimmidoll001]

kimmy 7250

Do as I did with my UK made collectibles,

SELL on UK OR USA Ebay, and because you are in OZ, if you tick the international visibility option in the UK listing form, (cost 13pence) you will be homepage search in UK and USA, and for free because you are domiciled in OZ, you will be home page search in OZ in that unspecified category. !!!!:O

You did say you wouldn't mind paying the new fees if you got your categories back !!!

The UK FVF is a little bit more than the 7.9%, but my sell thru rate is way up from my Oz listing days

Use the new 80 character length title field to put all the info in (up from 55) and you will be much more visible than the 'lost in space' OZ listings.

LIST in oz pay 7.9% and be invisible

List in UK at 8.75% in right category with worldwide visibility
Still get free listing in auctions starting at 99p, oh thats 100 per month.................B-)

Why WOULD YOU PAY OZ FOR A NON SERVICE ???

OZ GETS AN INCREASED COMMISSION EQUAL TO WHAT THEY DESERVE OFF YOU, OF 7.9 % OF NONE OF YOUR SALES. :-x

I was told this also by ebay last year, list in the US or UK to get visibility. Trouble is I list overseas and yes I gain visibility and sales, but I lose my Australian bidders then too.

I recently listed an item in US, no cost at all either because it didn't sell, and then listed the rest of my items in OZ. Hoping that people would View Seller's other items from both Countries. This could work, but I dread to think how to work out a payment if someone wins an item in either US or UK currency and also Oz currency. Hmm.

I am certain that ebay's big plan is to get rid of Australian listings altogether and that we will have to list OS just like New Zealand has to do. Their ebay exists, but to sell on this site you get bumped to the US.

And exactly, why would I pay OZ for a non-service, this is why I don't sell much anymore and no longer a power seller. Australians can't find it, internationals don't see it in Unspecified. I don't sell much now, I have less money to spend on ebay. Ebay loses all round on fees from me as a seller and buyer. I have lots and lots of stock to sell, just want my categories reinstated.

And funny too when they took these categories away - you know what it said "THIS IS TO ALIGN US WITH UK AND USA CATEGORIES". Biggest porky of the century that one. We were aligned before they took these categories away.

[missionsellit]

I was told this also by ebay last year, list in the US or UK to get visibility. Trouble is I list overseas and yes I gain visibility and sales, but I lose my Australian bidders then too.

I recently listed an item in US, no cost at all either because it didn't sell, and then listed the rest of my items in OZ. Hoping that people would View Seller's other items from both Countries. This could work, but I dread to think how to work out a payment if someone wins an item in either US or UK currency and also Oz currency. Hmm.

I am certain that ebay's big plan is to get rid of Australian listings altogether and that we will have to list OS just like New Zealand has to do. Their ebay exists, but to sell on this site you get bumped to the US.

And exactly, why would I pay OZ for a non-service, this is why I don't sell much anymore and no longer a power seller. Australians can't find it, internationals don't see it in Unspecified. I don't sell much now, I have less money to spend on ebay. Ebay loses all round on fees from me as a seller and buyer. I have lots and lots of stock to sell, just want my categories reinstated.

And funny too when they took these categories away - you know what it said "THIS IS TO ALIGN US WITH UK AND USA CATEGORIES". Biggest porky of the century that one. We were aligned before they took these categories away.

LOL yeah I loved that category porky. How ebay get away with such blatant LIES is beyond me.
My feedback to ebay 'Star rating' on categories aligned (item as described ) 1 star, if you get my drift......
We put one foot wrong and Whammo. They stuff up regularly and you can read about it here on bulletin board but its like water off a ducks back, nothing other than the paypal only dispute thru ACCC has ever stuck. ( that I can recall)
I live helped a question on category mismatches, ended up with a phone call from america !!! They were unaware of the problem I raised, said they would fix, and let me know.......They never phoned back, over a year, and I know the prob is still there, costing people star ratings in 'item as described' as we speak, one year later,,, more water off the duck's back.


Now back to your queries?

You are definitely on the right track, if you go to my homepage, scroll down, and view my reviews and guides, I have 3 there, all relevant to your situation, but one about this very visibility prob. I will update it soon in relation to the 22 sept changes but not yet. OR If you are on my feedback page, they are under the member quick links on right side of page. They are too long to repeat here....

On selling to one client, both a UK GBP listing and an OZ AUD one?
I love it, it happens regularly, you are right, list both places, the overseas buyers look at 'other item' then see the OZ stuff. If you have a scrolling gallery, as long as they open one listing, they will cop an eyeful of the others.

I explain to the winner in 2 currencies, that I cannot combine invoices, but that I will calculate combined postage ALL on the OZ invoice, as that will get it exact, and I ZERO (free post) the UK invoice, subject to payment of the OZ invoice. Works like a charm only had one complaint, it was an ozzie....but once I explained WHY... they were impressed.....

I have not experienced less australian buyers, all my old clients still find me, and once I went listing UK, HEAPS I had never seen before became valued repeat clients. If you have retained any contact with old customers, zip them a note explaining where and when to find you. More importantly WHY you are listing O/seas. Initially perhaps before 22sept definitely list both places so your old customers locate and tag you before the more complete transition to UK or USA.

The biggest pain I have had, is listing our postage in UK GBP while it crashed over the last year from 1GBP = 1.72aud right down to only 1.45 (Paypal rates....) It meant changing each weeks postage tab to get it right, I also quote an airmail rate for each world zone, by 'adding a service' on UK sell form, for each world zone, so auto invoice issues to the winners designated domicile, works OK. but not like a postage calculator.

If you have so much stock you would like to shift, try the UK, as I would think thomas the tank collectors would be going there first up. If it doesn't work, at least you tried, and can say you gave it your best shot .