why does ebay charge a reserve fee but not starting price fee?

tc1992

If you set a starting prcie it's just like letting people know your reserve, right? But it effectively does the same thing as a reserve.

The only advantage i can see of a reserve over starting price is that with a reserve you can start your item, at say 99p, which mind attract more people to the auction and might spark a bidding war. but generally seems like wasted money to me/

am i missing something?

TurkishDelight

tc1992 wrote: »

If you set a starting prcie it's just like letting people know your reserve, right? But it effectively does the same thing as a reserve.

The only advantage i can see of a reserve over starting price is that with a reserve you can start your item, at say 99p, which mind attract more people to the auction and might spark a bidding war. but generally seems like wasted money to me/

am i missing something?

No, you're pretty much spot on. Except ebay does charge a insertion fee that goes up depending on the start price. The other advantage is that you can see what it is worth without it being a binding sale, and offer it to the highest bidder if you're happy with it.... but basically it is just giving ebay money, especially as a reserve will put bidders off.

Premier_2

I find that a reserve price often puts potential bidders off for items that are worth about £50-£100.

cyril82

i have recently been selling some items that i wouldn't let go for less than £50 and which i have sold for upto £100 in the past, i tried them with a starting bid of £49.99 no reserve and it returned poor results i listed 10 and sold 2.

i relisted the remaining 8 at 99p start with a £50 reserve and i sold them all at prices from £55 to £110 so it does appear to work. at the end of the day it's about attracting attention then once you have 3,4 or 5 serious bidders it becomes a personal battle and often leads to better final sale prices.

tc1992

TurkishDelight wrote: »

No, you're pretty much spot on. Except ebay does charge a insertion fee that goes up depending on the start price. The other advantage is that you can see what it is worth without it being a binding sale, and offer it to the highest bidder if you're happy with it.... but basically it is just giving ebay money, especially as a reserve will put bidders off.

i have some music equipment that i am thinking of selling and hoping to get about 1300 quid for. According to ecal (sorry can't put a link in as i'm a new user) if i put the starting price at 1300 the insertion fee is 1.30, and seems to be 1.30 no matter what i set the starting price at .

but you're saying the insertion price goes up with the start price. so is ecal wrong?

If i set the reserve at 1300 with a start price of 1 then its a 26 pound fee

Interesting what the other posters are saying . . maybe a reserve is better for common items? and also in the price range mentioned 50-100

TurkishDelight

tc1992 wrote: »

i have some music equipment that i am thinking of selling and hoping to get about 1300 quid for. According to ecal (sorry can't put a link in as i'm a new user) if i put the starting price at 1300 the insertion fee is 1.30, and seems to be 1.30 no matter what i set the starting price at .

but you're saying the insertion price goes up with the start price. so is ecal wrong?

If i set the reserve at 1300 with a start price of 1 then its a 26 pound fee

Interesting what the other posters are saying . . maybe a reserve is better for common items? and also in the price range mentioned 50-100

It varies from nothing to £1.30

http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/sell/fees.html

StaffsSW

tc1992 wrote: »

If i set the reserve at 1300 with a start price of 1 then its a 26 pound fee

Correct - and that is £26 whether it sells or not.