Preloved - Free Classified no longer free.

melliott1963

But surely, if no one pays, all that this means is that, effectively, your listing sits there for 10 days until people can respond to it?

I've only used Preloved to sell and have a 100% success rate so far.

As far as I'm aware, this £5 membership to respond to listings as soon as they appear isn't a new thing, so I too can't see what the fuss is.

All it does is give you priority access to items as they appear.

But as a seller only, it doesn't affect me at all.

Also, at the end of the day, Preloved is a business, so how else are they going to make any money?

CrazyRatLady_2

Completely agree with Melliott1963. They're a business not a chairty, don't see how you can begrudge them trying to make a bit of money out of it.

It's not like you're being forced to pay - just wait 10 days to respond to any ad's you're interested in, you might miss out but that's the risk you take.

vinylmusic

melliott1963 wrote: »

But surely, if no one pays, all that this means is that, effectively, your listing sits there for 10 days until people can respond to it?

I've only used Preloved to sell and have a 100% success rate so far.

As far as I'm aware, this £5 membership to respond to listings as soon as they appear isn't a new thing, so I too can't see what the fuss is.

All it does is give you priority access to items as they appear.

But as a seller only, it doesn't affect me at all.

Also, at the end of the day, Preloved is a business, so how else are they going to make any money?

They make their money through commercial ads.
Likewise up to now I've only used them to sell. I just happened to look at an ad from a private seller. When I went to look at it I had a page come up to say I'd have to register and pay minimum £5.

I wont pay the fiver. I very rarely buy on there. I found what I was looking for elsewhere for free so its just as well I didn't pay.

It bothers me that if I advertise on there someone in my position who rarely buys may pass on it like I did and go on to look elsewhere too

Crowqueen

Sometimes ad revenue is not enough. Look at all those free auction sites out there - they are usually (relatively) empty of listings because a free site cannot attract a continuous stream of revenue to advertise themselves and put money into buyer protection.

I think it is problematic that they charge buyers rather than sellers, but it may be that they can't handle the traffic without some sort of charge levied on a per-user base.

StaffsSW

Too many people seem to be wanting owt for nowt these days. There as another thread elsewhere on here from somebody complaining that a charity shop has charged them for a carrier bag!

However, I think the £5 membership is actually a good thing for sellers as it may help prevent the number of timewasters that approach them, or pester them into haggling a price. It may also stop a number of the snatchers that take the bargains early on just to resell them at carboots or ebay.

Hopefully it will improve the overall quality of buyers and sellers - a small charge does tend to have this effect.

vinylmusic

I did get a reply from preloved concerning the feedback I sent them through their survey

"It would be nice to be able to offer a completely free service but unfortunately it is just not possible to do that and meet the costs of running the site, monitoring it to try to ensure that fraudsters don't take advantage of our members, and promoting it to bring as many potential buyers and sellers to the site as possible etc.

We thought long and hard about our membership system. The alternative would be either to use aggressive banner advertising, pop ups, interruptive ads etc. which make the site difficult and unpleasant to use, to use a premium rate phone system, or to charge people to place adverts on the site.

Our full membership charge is very modest and lasts a full year so we find that a large proportion of buyers are happy to upgrade, and the few that can't afford this or do not want to pay still have the opportunity to use the site for free. All free members can contact adverts once they reach 10 days old".

Well, I've given it a lot of thought and I have to say it makes sense.
I've started selling my stuff on sites like this since I've been treated so shoddily by ebay
The beauty is that there are no listing fees and no commissions to pay.
I'm sick to death of the way ebay treats its customers

vax2002

Nothing to stop them inventing a few bargains !
At £5 a pop to get then number, they will be coining it in.

hermum

Some of the others use premium rate phone numbers
Freeads Classifieds allow you to buy and sell for free and in order to maintain the website we do make a small amount from calls. There is no connection charge and all calls are charged at 51p per minute from this service. Rates on other price plans and from other service providers, including mobile service providers may vary.
Adtrader also use these numbers.
At least with Preloved you pay £5 for a whole year & can call as many sellers as you want.
Freeads could easily cost £5 per item if you have several questions to ask & getting the address to sort out a viewing, unless the seller's happy to immediately give their direct number but that's still 51p.

vinylmusic

hermum wrote: »

Some of the others use premium rate phone numbers
Freeads Classifieds allow you to buy and sell for free and in order to maintain the website we do make a small amount from calls. There is no connection charge and all calls are charged at 51p per minute from this service. Rates on other price plans and from other service providers, including mobile service providers may vary.
Adtrader also use these numbers.
At least with Preloved you pay £5 for a whole year & can call as many sellers as you want.
Freeads could easily cost £5 per item if you have several questions to ask & getting the address to sort out a viewing, unless the seller's happy to immediately give their direct number but that's still 51p.

I noticed that with freeads much to my annoyance
I tried calling someone and got nowhere. Just dead lines both from my mobile and from my home phone

I'm dead against premium rate numbers and usually wont call them.

I've changed my tune a bit since starting this thread.
I'd rather pay a fiver to preloved than call premium rate numbers. I really really hate them. I'm a big supporter of saynoto0870. I only call such numbers as a last resort

vinylmusic

vax2002 wrote: »

Nothing to stop them inventing a few bargains !
At £5 a pop to get then number, they will be coining it in.

No its £5 a year. not £5 a call