Wakey, Wakey, eBay!!!! (ebay.co.uk)

Member Name: windwhisperer

Product:	ebay.co.uk
Date:	30/12/08 (78 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Has the largest viewing audience

Disadvantages: Expensive to sell. Increasing regulations. Have to pay for visibility in USA and Canada

How many stars eBay should receive I suppose would depend on whether you were writing from a buyer's or seller's perspective. I've been busy in both aspects on eBay for over eight years, and for now, will write this from a seller's perspective.

Over the years the rules and red tape, have unfortunately become more restrictive with regard to selling. It seems that in an effort to minimise bad publicity about fraudulent sellers, eBay has now pulled the plug and the baby is going out with the bath water. It also seems that their current forwarding thinking plan is based on what happened, economically speaking, during the last five years - which we are all now patently aware is simply not the case.

So, if you are new to eBay, have a desperate urge to clear your lives out in readiness for the forthcoming year and are chucking everything you don't need into a box ready to sell, there are probably a few things you need to know.

Firstly, it is, and always has been, possible to lose money selling lower priced items on eBay, simply due to the fees involved. Even 'free listing' days, where you should always read the Terms and Conditions to see if those 'free listings' really apply to you, will cost you if you want to upload more than one photo, or set your auction to start at a specific time/date.
It has also now come to pass that you will have to pay a fee for your items to be displayed to potential customers in the USA or Canada, the fee being dependent on how much you list your item for.

You will also, of course, have to pay a final value fee, should your item sell - again this is dependent on both the amount and type of item you are selling.

eBay do of course, have a free re-list policy, this means that if your item doesn't sell the first time round, you can list it once more and have your fees refunded - but only if it sells - if it doesn't you still get charged the listing fee.

It will cost you again if your customer pays you via Paypal (also eBay owned) in the form of a fee for each invoice paid, and a 25p fee to transfer the money to your bank account if it is less than £50.
You also have to remember that these fees will eat into any postage costs your customer pays you, because they pay the complete amount and you get charged on it. For example I recently quoted a customer £44 (the actual postage cost) for sending an item to the US, the customer pays me the £44 and the price of the item, but I pay Paypal fees on the full amount, thus not recouping the full postage costs - this equates to a loss that I am not allowed to pass onto the customer.


Then we turn to the more recent furore of negative feedback. The situation is one whereby the buyer can give you a negative for all the world to see, but you cannot leave a negative for a buyer. You can however leave negative comments for a buyer, but really these comments are negated because you have to give a positive rating which means the negative isn't highlighted and most certainly lost once the feedback comments are off the first few pages.

The costs involved in getting negative feedback? Well, directly there are none - but indirectly negative feedback, particularly if it is unwarranted such as an item being delayed in the post, can cost your reputation and hence deter potential bidders.

Certain categories of items also carry with them specific regulations recently devised by eBay and I would certainly advise anybody thinking of selling in media categories, DVDs and the like, to check out the postage and packing regulations before listing.

'Tis a shame that eBay have felt it, for whatever reasons, necessary to take the course of action they have in recent times. The site itself is sold to the public as a place to sell unwanted items, to then expect them to act like a business, seems whole heartedly unfair.

Maybe like other institutions who rode the crest of the credit wave, they really believed their success lay completely in their own genius and they could never fail, but, like other companies have found out, will end up floundering on the beach sucking a mouthful of sand.

I hope not, but increasing regulations and costs to sellers means more and more will be deterred from listing items. A reduction in items listed, at least of the type people are seeking to buy, means this eventually impacts on the buyers as there is less choice.
Making life more difficult for the sellers, thus makes life less pleasant for the customer - not difficult to figure out.

Personally I would be devastated, for many reasons, to see the demise of eBay, and hope they realise, before it is too late, that any fool can make money when times are good, it's the bad times that sift the wheat from the chaff.

Summary: Increasing costs to smaller sellers are making it less viable as a market place