Enforced free P&P on Ebay listings

deeds

stevew8975 wrote: »

Yes, much in the same way that people "accidently" bid on items that they do not want... It's intentional deception and does nothing to improve the integrity of the many honest sellers on ebay.



It's not confirmed, but it does not take much to deduce that as ebay are making more money from it and using it as a PR exercise to increase buyer activity, that it will continue to be rolled out across more and more categories.

No, but using turbolister and a saved template, one could easily end up listing in the wrong category. Not quite the same as bidding on something accidentally. I always found the excuses for that hilarious! Like their child bidding by accidentally pressing buttons, or their cat stepping on the buttons.. *despairs*
:rolleyes:

chja

qw3rt7 wrote: »

Ok, 1st off, i will say i used to use ebay, quite a few years ago, before any of the free sub 99p rules existed (or quality score or any other such stuff), and i agree the new system is bad for small hobby sellers.
However, you must understand ebays main concern is......

EBAY

Its a business after all. The restructuring and pricing are clearly designed to improve profits. I believe the free sub 99p policy was implemented after the initial changes where made, this has been trialed, and has resulted in masses of junk being endlessly re-listed, which is detrimental to the company, hence the changes now being made.
To those that previously used this tactic, regardless of whether you made any sales (after x months of re listing??), you are why this is being stopped!
Just because it made a few quid for yourself, it had the opposite effect for ebay - this is a private company, its responsibility is to its shareholders.
Once again, Ebay DO NOT WANT YOUR BUSINESS if you traded like this.
On the flip side, if there is a void created by this change in ebays business model, it will be filled.
To the OP, i do however 100% agree with you that a policy of a single non-escalating complaint procedure is bl88dy annoying, but this is not a contracted service - you can use it or not - so really have no hope of getting anywhere.

Total tosh.

eBay's stated reason for introducing free postage on these items is to make buying on eBay (and generating their fees) a more competative option when compared with other services that sell the same item.

Free postage on CD's , books, DVD's, etc is pretty much the market norm (play, tesco) so eBay are simply bringing themselves into line with the market.

Their strategy does appear confusing sometimes - on one hand it appears they don't really want private sellers and on the other they bring in 99p free listings to drive private volumes up.

In reality, there are two eBays in one.

1) A new modern market place with professional sellers.
2) The old style flea-market type operation for private customers that want to "clear their clutter".

Buyers may be looking for items sold under either or both of those, depending on their need and neither private or business sellers have a god given right to priority over the other beacuse they think they are more important to buyers.

chja

kharyss wrote: »

But I am a consumer of a product supplied by eBay ie their website. I pay them a proportion of any sales I make using their site so I am buying a service from them. I am a customer as much as the buyer is.

It is true that eBay set the rules and you have a choice whether to take them or leave them, but that does not mean that users should not give feedback to eBay.

Policies have changed before and they will change again. I'm sure from their point of view they would rather be contacted by users with feedback, than those users just drifted away.

Personally, I'm all for free postage, provided that they then scrap all listing fees. That way there is no fee avoidance, no postage rip-off and if the start price is too high then the item will not sell.

ampersand

I have just resumed ebay selling and fell foul of Free UK P&P listings yesterday.
Book and Video are sorted, via increased start price - but this begs another question - email sent to ebay, but whether a lucid or pertinent reply will come is another thing...
It sems that any overseas bidders are forced to 'pay' UK P&P in addition to their own appropriate amount, by virtue of the increased Starting price. Am I missing something here?
The other listing was rectified by category change; I genuinely agonise over these a great deal. This was Music memorabilia>Pop>Beatles and I had no clue why it was refused. Changed to another category it's fine.
I have also asked about a msg threat of fund freeze....no idea why it came during listing procedure and will hope for helpful response.
Hmmm........

cally6008

I posted this yesterday

I'm thinking of moving things round to other categories and seeing if that works (example ... fiction book about horses was in books section, moving it to sporting goods > equestrian section)

To be told by one member that they would be tempted to report me to Ebay for doing it

My reasoning

Why ? The "Sporting Goods > Equestrian" category has a sub category of "Books" in it so I dont see what the problem would be ???

No reply as yet

Thread here - http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=2028855

RFW

ampersand wrote: »

It sems that any overseas bidders are forced to 'pay' UK P&P in addition to their own appropriate amount, by virtue of the increased Starting price. Am I missing something here?

That would only be a problem if the overseas postage was less. If UK postage is £1 and you are selling inclusive and OS postage is £2, you only have to add £1 for OS postage. Simples;)

All_eBayed_Out

Your better off giving the books to charity. I have sold allsorts in the past but books have always been a no go area. I once WON a load of brand new kiddies books but I couldn't sell them at all (osborne books etc) not even for a quid, they were worth about £10 each and my p&p was fair. I wont waste my time again!

cyberbob

RFW wrote: »

That would only be a problem if the overseas postage was less. If UK postage is £1 and you are selling inclusive and OS postage is £2, you only have to add £1 for OS postage. Simples;)

Thats what most people do. I state in my listings for overseas buyers that I have taken the price of UK domestic off there postal charges. So they are no paying extra.

kid992

The reason Ebay has given for this is to increase sales How? when

1. All sellers now have to put up their prices to cover costs of paying insertions fees(because they risk making a loss on a 99p "free" insertion) and the extra FVF for selling the same item at a higher price AND the FVF on postage.

2. A lot of sellors as emphasised in this post will come to the conclusion its not worthwhile and stop selling.

3. Therfore prices have gone up and choice is reduced.

So difficult to see how sales wiil increase doesn't normally occour in a situation such as point 3. BUT what might happen is Ebay may make more money from less and thats basically more to the point.

RFW

kid992 wrote: »

The reason Ebay has given for this is to increase sales How? when

1. All sellers now have to put up their prices to cover costs of paying insertions fees(because they risk making a loss on a 99p "free" insertion) and the extra FVF for selling the same item at a higher price AND the FVF on postage.

2. A lot of sellors as emphasised in this post will come to the conclusion its not worthwhile and stop selling.

3. Therfore prices have gone up and choice is reduced.

So difficult to see how sales wiil increase doesn't normally occour in a situation such as point 3. BUT what might happen is Ebay may make more money from less and thats basically more to the point.

The media insertion fees are less than they were anyway, they are 10p for over 99p with free gallery. So around 18 months ago they were 15p and above plus 15p gallery, surprising that most only notice the increased fees and not the decreased ones. I think the argument that they've introduced free p&p to get more fees is a poor one, the net increase in fees is probably negligible given the change in listing fees.
I do think that they haven't done it solely for the consumer, more to put the brakes on certain sellers and certain products.