Ebay fees on postage - Is this legal

vinylmusic

Why do these threads always seem to stray from the point with often annoyingly childish remarks. with some comments I would expect from 10 year olds

vinylmusic

lejog2003 wrote: »

You don't understand do you? They are providing software and web site services for you and support for these, they are charging for supplying these - it costs them several billion dollars a year to provide these services to their customers.

Part of the services they offer you is the facility to charge p&p to your customers.

Not to mention the billions they make in profits
Oh and the part of the service they offer the ability to charge for P&P is their other arm, namely Paypal which they also charge for
Between ebay and paypal I have to add another 15% to my postage charges to cover those costs. Not just 10%

lejog2003

Off the top of my head, Ebay last year made around £600m profit on £3..4bn turnover, so a 20% profit margin. What's yours?

If I'm being a little sharp, its because I worked in the IT services sector (not Ebay though) all my life and I've always found that people that think I should be working for free (and my employers should run multimillion pound data centres, invest in multi million pound software developments etc all for free) are a little annoying. Ones who think that charges for software services are somehow illegal even more so.

How would you like it if someone said that selling records should be made illegal?

lejog2003

vinylmusic wrote: »

Between ebay and paypal I have to add another 15% to my postage charges to cover those costs. Not just 10%

So Ebay/Paypal have always charged a 5% fee on p&p, did you think it was somehow illegal before?

I'm sure you have your costs and make a reasonable profit margin on your sales. You've said that if your costs increase you increase your prices. Why is it that Ebay are bad / doing something illegal if they do the same?

vinylmusic

lejog2003 wrote: »

Off the top of my head, Ebay last year made around £600m profit on £3..4bn turnover, so a 20% profit margin. What's yours?

If I'm being a little sharp, its because I worked in the IT services sector (not Ebay though) all my life and I've always found that people that think I should be working for free (and my employers should run multimillion pound data centres, invest in multi million pound software developments etc all for free) are a little annoying. Ones who think that charges for software services are somehow illegal even more so.

How would you like it if someone said that selling records should be made illegal?

When did I say that anyone should work for free? I certainly wouldn't.
I've been using ebay for over 12 years. I can't complain about the money I've made over the time. sales were much better when I started but it was hard work too. Most of my sales came from the US and I had a terrible time accumulating US cheques till there was enough to offset bank charges getting them cashed. Paypal made that much easier. It was up to the seller how much he charged fore postage and there was none of that 10% added for P&P
Ebay introduced that more recently asif they weren't making enough already from the listing and final value fees which I've never objected to.
I'll say it again
All I object to is paying ebay for a service which they don't provide.

I was in Tetouan bus station in Marocco once trying to buy a ticket to Marrekesh. I couldn't reach the counter because of a group of guys standing in the way. I leaned over to tell the clerk where i wanted to go. The only way I could pay for my ticket was through the guys standing in my way. I got my ticket ok but they wanted me to pay them for a service they had no part in
Ebay have been paid for the transaction, then what happens next is between me, my customer and the postal service. I don't see what that aspect has to do with ebay just like I dont see what my ticket purchase has to do with those guys in the bus station back in Marocco

Incidentally, if you looked at my ebay business account I havent used it in 2 years. I'm retired and now have a private account through which I sell the occasional item I no longer have use for

vinylmusic

lejog2003 wrote: »

So Ebay/Paypal have always charged a 5% fee on p&p, did you think it was somehow illegal before?

I'm sure you have your costs and make a reasonable profit margin on your sales. You've said that if your costs increase you increase your prices. Why is it that Ebay are bad / doing something illegal if they do the same?

I never objected to Paypal fees. That's a different service where I'm paying to have money transferred. It just so happens that Ebay bought out Paypal a few years ago. If anything Paypal has made things much easier

ballisticbrian

Hey PUNK, are you calling me a 10 year old ? By doing so, at least you've been able to avoid offering us up answers to pretty legitimate points.

burnleymik

Just on the legality, is the 10% fee on P+P equivalent to a tax and as such isn't it illegal to tax a business expense?

lejog2003

vinylmusic wrote: »

When did I say that anyone should work for free? I certainly wouldn't.

You've made the suggestion that charging for software services is illegal. If it were illegal then I wouldn't have received a penny's salary in my working life.

QuackQuackOops

vinylmusic wrote: »

I'm glad at least one person sees my point
Ebay pushed to have people use free postage long before they started adding the 10% to P & P just so they could get their 10%. Now it all amounts to the same thing, you pay the same either way.
The only advantage of choosing free postage is it looks better for sales but your only fooling buyers into thinking they are getting something for nothing when really your just adding it to the asking price.
This becomes even more unfair to international buyers because they are in effect paying the UK shipping plus international shipping.
I sell a lot of CD's and DVD's for around £3 each. It costs me over £1.70 to send them so I'm damned if I'm going to give absolutely free postage and only make £1 each sale


I've tried out the competition (other online auctions) and never sold anything at all.
For large items which are expensive to send I use a number of free ad sites such as Gumtree (ironically owned by Ebay). I deal directly with the buyer and no one else gets a cut


I've seen others try and when they become too competitive Ebay just buys them out. They've done that in a number of countries worldwide. Now there is no real competition and it's unlikely there ever will be

Ebay recommended free postage as a way of attracting customers and to keep sellers competitive.
They did not hold a gun to anyones head and say YOU HAVE TO DO WHAT WE SAY. Your choice to offer free postage. I never have nor never will.

The extra charge on postage is simple to understand. Ebay wanted to raise fees across the board. They did not do this because they wanted to find a way to also stop the postal gougers. Adding the charge onto postal charges only solved this problem.

What difference does it make to you really? Either you pay 10% extra on P&P or you pay extra on the total sale price.
Selling an item at £10 and posting it for 99p you pay the same extra amount either way.

Ebay have every right to charge a % of any P&P you take. You use their site to advertise your item and you use their site to advertise delivery method. Both of which Ebay are perfectly entitled to charge for, either as one lump sum or individually as it is now.

All this nonsense about "They aren't providing this as a service" is just that, nonsense. They aren't providing the product either, but they are charging you to advertise it.
They are now charging you to advertise your postage and packaging costs, how is it any different?
It's been this way for a year now.

Add a couple of extra pence into every sale and you'll have it covered.