Does anyone have any experience on selling on Amazon (confused about fees)

Chris_P_2

Im considering signing up to Amazon to maybe sell some books that I have. So i will not be doing this professionally.

On looking into it I am struggling to confirm what the costs would be . I have seen a commissiojn of 2%, then one of around 17%, and also mentions of monthly fees.

I dont mind paying a commission what ever it is, but do not want to pay a monthly fee as it wont make £ sense.

if anyone has advice or links that apply I would be very grateful.

MissAT

I did this last year, so apologies that my experience doesn't give exact figures.

I sold some dissertation books my son paid £20 for each. I sold them for £12, which was slightly cheaper (inc. the +£2 delivery fees) that other sellers had the books listed at. Overall, I GOT about £8 back once Amazon had taken the sellers fees. (I used the PAYG service, not a sellers subscription)

It took around 3 months to get the payment confirmed as there is a period where the buyer can dispute the item. Also, I sent the book through recorded post, which cost me more than the £2 for delivery, but I though this would lessen the chance of disputes. I did re-use amazon packaging, and just taped up, so that was free. I probably only got £7 in total incorporating all costs.

Generally I would only consider using Amazon to sell stuff if you could stand to make a decent amount of money on it, you can check this by looking at what other people/companies are selling the same product at. Sometimes products cost £00.01 and £2 delivery, in which case it wouldn't be worth your time.

I hope this helps.

miwa

Hi. I researched Amazon selling, and like you, I found the rates of commission purposely confusing.

I will just quote from an e-book I am writing on the topic.

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Amazon
For the past 10 years Amazon has been the place to buy online. With fixed price listings at nigh-unbeatable prices, Amazon Marketplace also offers a place for the private seller to list their items.

Sellers have the option of registering as a basic seller or a seller pro. Seller pro incurs a £25/month subscription fee, but opens up new features and selling categories. For this guide I will assume most readers would be basic sellers.

Amazon basic sellers can sell in 20 categories, all except groceries, health and beauty, jewelry, apparel, and watches.

Amazon fees for basic sellers are at £0.86 per item completion fee, plus a closing fee that is a percentage of the sales price for each item sold:
⦁ 11.5% for Electronics & Photo items
⦁ 40.25% for Kindle Accessories
⦁ 17.25% for other items

Amazon fees also take a cut from P&P. At UK Standard Delivery, Amazon's variable fee would be:

⦁ Books (includes audio books): £0.49
⦁ CDs - £0.28
⦁ Video - £1.32
⦁ DVD - £0.16
⦁ Video Games- £0.29

Some examples:

Elena sells a used CD on Amazon. She lists the price as £3 + the standard UK delivery charge of £1.26 for CDs. The listing appears right away on that item's page. The item sells, and Amazon take £1.44 in fees. It will also take VAT on Amazon's fees of £0.22. Altogether Elena pays £1.66 in fees of the final price, £4.26. After this, Elena is paid £2.60.

Paul sells an unwanted birthday present: a case for his Kindle Fire. He lists the price at £10 plus the standard UK delivery on Kindle accessories, £4.48. The item sells. Amazon takes £5.82 in fees, plus VAT, of £0.88. The total fees are £6.70 of the final sale price of £14.48. Paul earns just £7.78 on the sale. Poor Paul.

Anwar sells a DVD boxset. He lists it as £20 + £1.26 standard UK delivery on DVDs. The item takes months to sell, but eventually it does. Amazon takes £3.89 in fees, plus VAT on the fees of £0.58, so total the fees are £4.47 altogether. Anwar receives £16.79 from the sale, out of the closing sale price of £21.26.

Letitia sells a well-known book. Because of competition driving down prices, she lists the price as £0.01 + £2.80 standard UK delivery on books. The book sells. Amazon takes £1.18 in fees, plus £0.17 in VAT on Amazon's fees. Letitia recieves £1.46 on the sale out of the final sale price of £2.81. However, she still needs to pay shipping. Good luck Letitia.

There are several reasons to sell using Amazon Marketplace. One is the security of a worldwide brand, as well as the traffic the site receives. Items tend to sell quickly, and are listed for up to 6 months, whereas ebay auctions last at most 10 days.

The biggest downside to Amazon Marketplace is the fees. Competition also drives down the price of popular items, meaning it's harder for sellers to compete or make a profit.

Amazon has an easy-to-use Seller tab with an inventory you can edit, stats, open orders, and various other features to enhance your experience as a seller. Like ebay, Amazon relies on feedback, which shows next to a seller's name on their listings.

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I have no idea of the prices make coherent sense with the commission guidelines quoted above, but I input every price and simply quoted what Amazon said commission, VAT and what final payment received would be, so I know they are correct.

If you're wondering, Ebay has lowest commission (auction-style listing) out of Amazon and Play.com. If you're just getting rid of knickknacks and not trading seriously, I'd suggest you try local Facebook sales pages or even Gumtree as well. To become a successful professional seller seems almost impossible, at least within popular categories of second-hand books, DVDs, games etc. You will *probably* get a better price taking games/DVDs to CEX and putting books on ebay (non-fiction books especially sell well on ebay, such as textbooks). For anything else - go with ebay or FB seller pages, unless you make handmade or artisan crafts, in which case, use etsy. I say this for people aside from the OP, who mostly seems to want to sell books. As a casual seller of books on Amazon I can only say - it's nearly impossible to make a profit, sometimes I only barely break even. Some people report doing well selling books at car boot sales or jumble sales, or even at brick and mortar book independent shops, but I can't say I have experience with those methods.