final value fees now include shipping

Oliver14

Brooker_Dave wrote: »

I thought these days those who offered free postage were the most visible?

Surprisingly for once Dave is actually correct.

shaun_from_Africa

I thought these days those who offered free postage were the most visible?

They are, then the next ones in the list will be those with lower priced items who are charging for P&P, (people who have low price items and high P&P will be here) and at the bottom of the list with be those with items whose price hasn't been artificially lowered by bumping up their postage costs.

So people who list with honest postage costs will lose out in search visibility to those who have high postage.

soolin

shaun_from_Africa wrote: »

They are, then the next ones in the list will be those with lower priced items who are charging for P&P, (people who have low price items and high P&P will be here) and at the bottom of the list with be those with items whose price hasn't been artificially lowered by bumping up their postage costs.

So people who list with honest postage costs will lose out in search visibility to those who have high postage.

If you search for lowest price inclusive of p and p then the actual total lowest cost items are first, and it doesn't matter where the postage is added as only the total matters.

thriftymanc

I really hope they don't introduce that here. I put all my P&P costs at the exact cost of postage (I don't bother charging for packaging as I recycle it) - and despite this I have had crap stars left for me by buyers who aren't happy with the costs imposed by Royal Mail, like it's my fault! Imagine if you we have to up ours postage costs to cover the FVFs as well as the actual cost of P&P, it'll only encourage these stupid buyers who don't know how the stars work

terra_ferma

thriftymanc wrote: »

I really hope they don't introduce that here. I put all my P&P costs at the exact cost of postage (I don't bother charging for packaging as I recycle it) - and despite this I have had crap stars left for me by buyers who aren't happy with the costs imposed by Royal Mail, like it's my fault! Imagine if you we have to up ours postage costs to cover the FVFs as well as the actual cost of P&P, it'll only encourage these stupid buyers who don't know how the stars work

Have you thought that maybe that's a way for your buyers to let you know that they don't like recycled package? the P&P rating includes packaging, so they may be using it to score the quality of the material and the care taken when packing (for example if the packaging gets damaged).
I'm not saying it is, but it's worth considering that as well.

soolin

I agree with Terra-ferma. If you only charge actual stamp cost and are still being marked down then it must be the packaging.

I marked someone down on stars the other day for a book with actual stamp cost charged but sent in a brown paper cover that was completely ripped and open to the elements by the time it got to me. I could not in all honesty give them 5* for post and packing.

lovinituk

soolin wrote: »

If you search for lowest price inclusive of p and p then the actual total lowest cost items are first, and it doesn't matter where the postage is added as only the total matters.

Unless you search for the lowest item price only, then postage is not taken into account.

soolin

lovinituk wrote: »

Unless you search for the lowest item price only, then postage is not taken into account.

I think though if people are going to choose a non default search then they will choose an inclusive price? I certainly don't want my searches cluttered up with sellers listing at 1p with huge postage costs.

thriftymanc

terra_ferma wrote: »

Have you thought that maybe that's a way for your buyers to let you know that they don't like recycled package? the P&P rating includes packaging, so they may be using it to score the quality of the material and the care taken when packing (for example if the packaging gets damaged).
I'm not saying it is, but it's worth considering that as well.

I did think about that, so on my listings I starting putting a little note saying that I was using recycled packaging to keep costs low for the buyers. Recycled packaging doesn't mean !!!! packaging! I always make sure everything is packaged extremely well and appropriately for the item, and have never had any complaints about the packaging itself. I've had a couple of buyers email me and ask if they could pay extra for me to buy brand new packaging, which I've been happy to do, though didn't think was necessary to be honest, but if they want that then fine.

But, I managed to work out one of the buyers who left me 1 star, and sent them a polite message asking if everything was ok with the parcel. They'd left me glowing feedback but this one crap star. They said the parcel arrived fine and very happy with the packaging but it had cost too much. I said, "but I only charged the stamp cost". They said "yes but the stamp cost was too much" - ! I said "sorry you feel that way but unfortunately I have no control over how much the Post Office charge me and I hope you understand that when rating other sellers". I hate for buyers like this to go around penalising sellers over the things they don't control. The other buyer who left me a crap star was the same. Now I have to put a note in my auctions saying that I only charge the exact postage costs too. I shouldn't have to say this!

terra_ferma

thriftymanc wrote: »

I did think about that, so on my listings I starting putting a little note saying that I was using recycled packaging to keep costs low for the buyers. Recycled packaging doesn't mean !!!! packaging! I always make sure everything is packaged extremely well and appropriately for the item, and have never had any complaints about the packaging itself. I've had a couple of buyers email me and ask if they could pay extra for me to buy brand new packaging, which I've been happy to do, though didn't think was necessary to be honest, but if they want that then fine.

But, I managed to work out one of the buyers who left me 1 star, and sent them a polite message asking if everything was ok with the parcel. They'd left me glowing feedback but this one crap star. They said the parcel arrived fine and very happy with the packaging but it had cost too much. I said, "but I only charged the stamp cost". They said "yes but the stamp cost was too much" - ! I said "sorry you feel that way but unfortunately I have no control over how much the Post Office charge me and I hope you understand that when rating other sellers". I hate for buyers like this to go around penalising sellers over the things they don't control. The other buyer who left me a crap star was the same. Now I have to put a note in my auctions saying that I only charge the exact postage costs too. I shouldn't have to say this!

Sorry to hear you have been penalised for doing nothing wrong...
You took a risk by contacting the buyer as ebay say very specificly that you cannot contact them about the stars left (if you make sure they don't realise you know what they left you should be OK, otherwise they could report you to ebay).

I think this is a typical example of my belief that low DSR are just random scores that don't teach you anything. The overall score is useful, because it reflects a trend and a potential problem, but single, unrelated low scores that you can't (or shouldn't) even identify are not that useful to me.