Amazon Fees, anyone have a clue?

minicooper272

In an attempt to make a few pennies, I have listed a load of items on Amazon. In an attempt to be competitive, I listed my items at 1p (because everyone else has).

I asked a friend who sold books on the site and they said you get £2.80 for standard delivery and you don't get charged fees for such a low price.

My first item has just sold, and I received 1p + £1.26 for postage (£1.27 total). Amazon have taken £1.02 in fees from this, which leaves me with 25p. Postage cost me £1.17, so I am out of pocket by 92p and I'm not very amused.

Is there anything I can do about this or do I just need to put it down naivety and never sell any of my items again? Can anyone recommend somewhere better to sell (where I'll at least break even)?

InsideInsurance

See http://services.amazon.co.uk/services/sell-on-amazon/pricing/ for the pricing

So if your not paying subscription and selling books you will be charged 75p insert fee, 15% commission on total price excluding P&P (so 15% of 1p which is 0) and a seperate closing/ shipping fee (43p for a book to the UK) which should have come to £1.18 - if they only charged you £1.08 you got a bargain

If you are selling a lot of items then you can drop the 75p insertion fee in exchange for a flat £25 a month fee and so only pay 43p per book sent.

On this occasion you need to put it down to not reading what your agreeing to.

The other obvious option is eBay but check the fees before listing the item!

mrmajika

I sold some books last month on Amazon. The fee they charge, together with the fact that they make you half the postage costs with the buyer, means that it's just not worth it.

I was selling books for £5 and only making about £2 a book. It's just not worth my while buying the jiffy bag and waiting in the post office queue at that profit.

Why / how did your book sell for 1p?? Was that the price that you listed it at? And if so, how much profit were you expecting from this?

Chalk it up to experience.

hermum

Amazon are more expensive than ebay for selling.

InsideInsurance

hermum wrote: »

Amazon are more expensive than ebay for selling.

A bit of a sweeping statement and not necessarily true, it depends on what you sell, what volume and if your using PayPal or not etc

I would argue Amazon is aimed more at bulk sellers than small scale individuals or one offs. With eBay putting up (aka simplifying) their charges for individuals the gap may narrow.

tyllwyd

I sold a few books on greenmetropolis a few years ago - I did get caught out by postage on hard back books but it was better than you've described.

woohoo_postingid

You can normally get away with selling books for 1p if you have an "Out" tray in work.........

minicooper272

Hmm, yeah, in hind sight, I should have fully read through the fees page. When I was listing, I found that there were hundreds of the same books selling for 1p, it seemed cheap but I wanted to be competitive. And I had my friend telling me they hadn't paid fees when they charged 1p.

£1 odd of fees seems very expensive given what you get for your money. It can't cost them that much to let you advertise! I don't think I'll be selling anything else there in future... Though I will look at the other sites!