Ebay gone to far with new policy change from 4th Feb 2025!

Langerhan

soolin said:

Langerhan said:

I was pleasantly surprised that we can still use normal postage on eBay - their press made it sound like it would be payments through them or nothing. As I'm usually selling things like beginner trading cards, sewing patterns, badges, and other things that can be a large letter or letter, and I have a lot of stamps left over that I've been using up, I was ready to stop selling. Most of the things I sell go for £1-£5 so it wouldn't be worth paying for RM24. I'm a bit annoyed that all my items are going to be 75p more expensive but heyho, will see how it goes.

The simple postage system was originally due in the 1st quarter of this year, but it’s gone very quiet. I do wonder if they will get past the 4th February, deal with the flack from that before considering another major change. 

Although having said that, some of their more recent changes have had very little run in notice, so even March or April might still be possible.

I'll keep my fingers crossed that it's not for a while then! At the moment it gives me a choice between the two. I don't mind waiting a couple of weeks for payouts because this isn't a business for me, it's just me getting rid of my own stuff I no longer use.

bittyboy101

I'm hoping that the investors of eBay have come to their senses after reading all the negative comments online regarding managed delivery and unwanted payment delays...

I mean the original eBay setup worked so well for almost 30 years... why change something that's not broken ?

They should scrap all this nonsense and leave buyers and small private sellers to get on and keep eBay ticking over smoothly rather than driving all the little guys away which actually are MANY and eBay wouldn't be here if it were not for these many small private sellers which are in greater numbers compared to big business sellers... 

RFW

bittyboy101 said:

I'm hoping that the investors of eBay have come to their senses after reading all the negative comments online regarding managed delivery and unwanted payment delays...

I mean the original eBay setup worked so well for almost 30 years... why change something that's not broken ?

They've been changing it since it started. I didn't hear any private sellers complaining when they changed the fee structure so they weren't paying any.
I doubt that the CEO of Ebay will look at half a dozen complaints and 150 signatures on a petition as a sign of anything much. I've seen Ebay sellers much angrier than this about changes and they were still made. I was at Ebay Live just after they took away sellers being able to leave negative feedback for buyers, there was a baying, angry mob shouting at Ebay execs and now, years later, no one's really bothered about it.

soolin

bittyboy101 said:

I'm hoping that the investors of eBay have come to their senses after reading all the negative comments online regarding managed delivery and unwanted payment delays...

I mean the original eBay setup worked so well for almost 30 years... why change something that's not broken ?

They should scrap all this nonsense and leave buyers and small private sellers to get on and keep eBay ticking over smoothly rather than driving all the little guys away which actually are MANY and eBay wouldn't be here if it were not for these many small private sellers which are in greater numbers compared to big business sellers... 

The majority of eBay’s income Is from business sellers and they are happy, so if the investors are reading the various groups they will be happy indeed with these changes . The actual negative comments compared to the number of users is tiny and a petition that is factually incorrect and merely shows that some people have not read the new policies does nothing to help. Also, if private sellers do make investors think, what income exactly would those investors be losing ? if private sellers pay no fees then what is there to lose. I accept that there is a minority of private sellers saying they will leave entirely and never buy from eBay again, but realistically many will come back when they want to buy something that they see on eBay, and even if they don’t there will be enough buyers left that it won’t be noticed. 

None of this is new though, we’ve had payments being held consistently in the past under various previous schemes, we had FVFs for private sellers until 3 months ago.  If you are new to eBay then yes suddenly making these changes may seem like an insurmountable step for truly private sellers, but for anyone who has been on eBay for a while this is basically just a rehash of previous schemes with new titles and a new payment focus. 

I do run a private account and yes I’ve had to remove some of my ultra low cost items and either donate them to a charity shop or bundle them to make that 75p standing charge worth while, but realistically pre eBay removing FVFs for private sellers I probably wouldn’t have listed them anyway and just donated them. 

bittyboy101

soolin said:

bittyboy101 said:

I'm hoping that the investors of eBay have come to their senses after reading all the negative comments online regarding managed delivery and unwanted payment delays...

I mean the original eBay setup worked so well for almost 30 years... why change something that's not broken ?

They should scrap all this nonsense and leave buyers and small private sellers to get on and keep eBay ticking over smoothly rather than driving all the little guys away which actually are MANY and eBay wouldn't be here if it were not for these many small private sellers which are in greater numbers compared to big business sellers... 

The majority of eBay’s income Is from business sellers and they are happy, so if the investors are reading the various groups they will be happy indeed with these changes . The actual negative comments compared to the number of users is tiny and a petition that is factually incorrect and merely shows that some people have not read the new policies does nothing to help. Also, if private sellers do make investors think, what income exactly would those investors be losing ? if private sellers pay no fees then what is there to lose. I accept that there is a minority of private sellers saying they will leave entirely and never buy from eBay again, but realistically many will come back when they want to buy something that they see on eBay, and even if they don’t there will be enough buyers left that it won’t be noticed. 

None of this is new though, we’ve had payments being held consistently in the past under various previous schemes, we had FVFs for private sellers until 3 months ago.  If you are new to eBay then yes suddenly making these changes may seem like an insurmountable step for truly private sellers, but for anyone who has been on eBay for a while this is basically just a rehash of previous schemes with new titles and a new payment focus. 

I do run a private account and yes I’ve had to remove some of my ultra low cost items and either donate them to a charity shop or bundle them to make that 75p standing charge worth while, but realistically pre eBay removing FVFs for private sellers I probably wouldn’t have listed them anyway and just donated them. 

It's all well and good for the investors of eBay to assume that big business sellers are more appealing and more important and just because the private sellers are now not paying any fees does not mean that they are not BUYING anything ! - Yes they are also BUYERS and they are lots of them that if driven away from selling on eBay they will not be buying anything from eBay due to bad feelings and feeling rebellious against eBay !   

RFW

bittyboy101 said:

It's all well and good for the investors of eBay to assume that big business sellers are more appealing and more important and just because the private sellers are now not paying any fees does not mean that they are not BUYING anything ! - Yes they are also BUYERS and they are lots of them that if driven away from selling on eBay they will not be buying anything from eBay due to bad feelings and feeling rebellious against eBay !   

From what I can see you're in a minority. The available figures suggest the buyer to seller ratio on Ebay is about 7-8:1. Worldwide there are about 133 million active buyers compared to 18 million active sellers. Given that the bulk of the sales will come from business that doesn't leave a lot of private sellers who are buyers. That's the figures the investors/shareholders will be looking, so no one will be really bothered about a small percentage of sellers being a bit peeved.

danny69

bittyboy101 said:

soolin said:

bittyboy101 said:

I'm hoping that the investors of eBay have come to their senses after reading all the negative comments online regarding managed delivery and unwanted payment delays...

I mean the original eBay setup worked so well for almost 30 years... why change something that's not broken ?

They should scrap all this nonsense and leave buyers and small private sellers to get on and keep eBay ticking over smoothly rather than driving all the little guys away which actually are MANY and eBay wouldn't be here if it were not for these many small private sellers which are in greater numbers compared to big business sellers... 

The majority of eBay’s income Is from business sellers and they are happy, so if the investors are reading the various groups they will be happy indeed with these changes . The actual negative comments compared to the number of users is tiny and a petition that is factually incorrect and merely shows that some people have not read the new policies does nothing to help. Also, if private sellers do make investors think, what income exactly would those investors be losing ? if private sellers pay no fees then what is there to lose. I accept that there is a minority of private sellers saying they will leave entirely and never buy from eBay again, but realistically many will come back when they want to buy something that they see on eBay, and even if they don’t there will be enough buyers left that it won’t be noticed. 

None of this is new though, we’ve had payments being held consistently in the past under various previous schemes, we had FVFs for private sellers until 3 months ago.  If you are new to eBay then yes suddenly making these changes may seem like an insurmountable step for truly private sellers, but for anyone who has been on eBay for a while this is basically just a rehash of previous schemes with new titles and a new payment focus. 

I do run a private account and yes I’ve had to remove some of my ultra low cost items and either donate them to a charity shop or bundle them to make that 75p standing charge worth while, but realistically pre eBay removing FVFs for private sellers I probably wouldn’t have listed them anyway and just donated them. 

It's all well and good for the investors of eBay to assume that big business sellers are more appealing and more important and just because the private sellers are now not paying any fees does not mean that they are not BUYING anything ! - Yes they are also BUYERS and they are lots of them that if driven away from selling on eBay they will not be buying anything from eBay due to bad feelings and feeling rebellious against eBay !   

Business sellers pay many more times in fees than Private sellers. As a business seller I would love to be treated as private sellers are, tiny fees and a small fee to cover the MBG etc. private sellers don’t know they were born! 3 months of zero fees really has turned some of them into spoilt brats 

bittyboy101

danny69 said:

bittyboy101 said:

soolin said:

bittyboy101 said:

I'm hoping that the investors of eBay have come to their senses after reading all the negative comments online regarding managed delivery and unwanted payment delays...

I mean the original eBay setup worked so well for almost 30 years... why change something that's not broken ?

They should scrap all this nonsense and leave buyers and small private sellers to get on and keep eBay ticking over smoothly rather than driving all the little guys away which actually are MANY and eBay wouldn't be here if it were not for these many small private sellers which are in greater numbers compared to big business sellers... 

The majority of eBay’s income Is from business sellers and they are happy, so if the investors are reading the various groups they will be happy indeed with these changes . The actual negative comments compared to the number of users is tiny and a petition that is factually incorrect and merely shows that some people have not read the new policies does nothing to help. Also, if private sellers do make investors think, what income exactly would those investors be losing ? if private sellers pay no fees then what is there to lose. I accept that there is a minority of private sellers saying they will leave entirely and never buy from eBay again, but realistically many will come back when they want to buy something that they see on eBay, and even if they don’t there will be enough buyers left that it won’t be noticed. 

None of this is new though, we’ve had payments being held consistently in the past under various previous schemes, we had FVFs for private sellers until 3 months ago.  If you are new to eBay then yes suddenly making these changes may seem like an insurmountable step for truly private sellers, but for anyone who has been on eBay for a while this is basically just a rehash of previous schemes with new titles and a new payment focus. 

I do run a private account and yes I’ve had to remove some of my ultra low cost items and either donate them to a charity shop or bundle them to make that 75p standing charge worth while, but realistically pre eBay removing FVFs for private sellers I probably wouldn’t have listed them anyway and just donated them. 

It's all well and good for the investors of eBay to assume that big business sellers are more appealing and more important and just because the private sellers are now not paying any fees does not mean that they are not BUYING anything ! - Yes they are also BUYERS and they are lots of them that if driven away from selling on eBay they will not be buying anything from eBay due to bad feelings and feeling rebellious against eBay !   

Business sellers pay many more times in fees than Private sellers. As a business seller I would love to be treated as private sellers are, tiny fees and a small fee to cover the MBG etc. private sellers don’t know they were born! 3 months of zero fees really has turned some of them into spoilt brats 

Believe me this is not the case and not a true picture of how eBay really treat private sellers by constantly ghosting their listings in the searches and delaying the indexing stage by over 10 days in some cases !

As a private seller and even with all my listings optimised for keyword searches (the first 4 key words in listing title)  I've had many of my listings sitting there on ZERO VIEWS for 14 DAYS and I've had to take them all down and relist them all again under "sell similar" with only 1 or 2 listings out of 10 actually making it  through the indexing stage and getting any views !

They also tell you as a private seller that you can pay extra to promote your listings (basically a bribe to eBay) but even after paying - NOTING CHANGED !, NO VIEWS AND NO SALES FOR MANY WEEKS.

So if you think private sellers have it cushy then you really don't know the half of it ! and what really goes on !

I've been on eBay since 2004 and I remember very clearly how it was dead easy and fast to get hard to find niche items sold quickly at good prices and to generate QUICK MONEY !

Nowadays I'd be lucky to make any sales at all... only one sale once in a blue moon if I'm lucky and eBay let one of my listing through their net !   

MattMattMattUK

bittyboy101 said:

I mean the original eBay setup worked so well for almost 30 years... why change something that's not broken ?

The way eBay operates has changed considerably over that period. It worked well in some ways, not in others, in my opinion over the last decade it has swung against sellers and in favour of unscrupulous buyers. My only issues over the last decade have been dishonest buyers who ebay went out of their way to actively help screw me over.

bittyboy101 said:
As a private seller and even with all my listings optimised for keyword searches (the first 4 key words in listing title)  I've had many of my listings sitting there on ZERO VIEWS for 14 DAYS and I've had to take them all down and relist them all again under "sell similar" with only 1 or 2 listings out of 10 actually making it  through the indexing stage and getting any views !

They also tell you as a private seller that you can pay extra to promote your listings (basically a bribe to eBay) but even after paying - NOTING CHANGED !, NO VIEWS AND NO SALES FOR MANY WEEKS.

So if you think private sellers have it cushy then you really don't know the half of it ! and what really goes on !

I've been on eBay since 2004 and I remember very clearly how it was dead easy and fast to get hard to find niche items sold quickly at good prices and to generate QUICK MONEY !

All that indicates is there is not adequate/any demand for what you want to sell. It does not say anything about eBay as a platform or how they operate.

soolin

bittyboy101 said:

danny69 said:

bittyboy101 said:

soolin said:

bittyboy101 said:

I'm hoping that the investors of eBay have come to their senses after reading all the negative comments online regarding managed delivery and unwanted payment delays...

I mean the original eBay setup worked so well for almost 30 years... why change something that's not broken ?

They should scrap all this nonsense and leave buyers and small private sellers to get on and keep eBay ticking over smoothly rather than driving all the little guys away which actually are MANY and eBay wouldn't be here if it were not for these many small private sellers which are in greater numbers compared to big business sellers... 

The majority of eBay’s income Is from business sellers and they are happy, so if the investors are reading the various groups they will be happy indeed with these changes . The actual negative comments compared to the number of users is tiny and a petition that is factually incorrect and merely shows that some people have not read the new policies does nothing to help. Also, if private sellers do make investors think, what income exactly would those investors be losing ? if private sellers pay no fees then what is there to lose. I accept that there is a minority of private sellers saying they will leave entirely and never buy from eBay again, but realistically many will come back when they want to buy something that they see on eBay, and even if they don’t there will be enough buyers left that it won’t be noticed. 

None of this is new though, we’ve had payments being held consistently in the past under various previous schemes, we had FVFs for private sellers until 3 months ago.  If you are new to eBay then yes suddenly making these changes may seem like an insurmountable step for truly private sellers, but for anyone who has been on eBay for a while this is basically just a rehash of previous schemes with new titles and a new payment focus. 

I do run a private account and yes I’ve had to remove some of my ultra low cost items and either donate them to a charity shop or bundle them to make that 75p standing charge worth while, but realistically pre eBay removing FVFs for private sellers I probably wouldn’t have listed them anyway and just donated them. 

It's all well and good for the investors of eBay to assume that big business sellers are more appealing and more important and just because the private sellers are now not paying any fees does not mean that they are not BUYING anything ! - Yes they are also BUYERS and they are lots of them that if driven away from selling on eBay they will not be buying anything from eBay due to bad feelings and feeling rebellious against eBay !   

Business sellers pay many more times in fees than Private sellers. As a business seller I would love to be treated as private sellers are, tiny fees and a small fee to cover the MBG etc. private sellers don’t know they were born! 3 months of zero fees really has turned some of them into spoilt brats 

Believe me this is not the case and not a true picture of how eBay really treat private sellers by constantly ghosting their listings in the searches and delaying the indexing stage by over 10 days in some cases !

As a private seller and even with all my listings optimised for keyword searches (the first 4 key words in listing title)  I've had many of my listings sitting there on ZERO VIEWS for 14 DAYS and I've had to take them all down and relist them all again under "sell similar" with only 1 or 2 listings out of 10 actually making it  through the indexing stage and getting any views !

They also tell you as a private seller that you can pay extra to promote your listings (basically a bribe to eBay) but even after paying - NOTING CHANGED !, NO VIEWS AND NO SALES FOR MANY WEEKS.

So if you think private sellers have it cushy then you really don't know the half of it ! and what really goes on !

I've been on eBay since 2004 and I remember very clearly how it was dead easy and fast to get hard to find niche items sold quickly at good prices and to generate QUICK MONEY !

Nowadays I'd be lucky to make any sales at all... only one sale once in a blue moon if I'm lucky and eBay let one of my listing through their net !   

Times change, fashions move on. Even on my business seller side I’ve had to change what I sell several times as markets wax and wane. It must be remembered as well that private sellers are just selling unwanted items so it might be the things that used to sell are no longer of interest to people.  15 -20years ago for instance I could sell 100 books a month easily as a business , now they don’t sell at all, so it is very likely that things from a private seller will just not be as easy to sell as they once were.

Regardless of that I would think that eBay are unlikely to roll back on major changes just to keep a tiny minority of private sellers on board. There might be tweaks to the scheme, and almost certainly new changes in the future, but with the vast majority of big sellers being happy with the changes it’s not going to be stopped. 

I sell both as a business and a private seller and haven’t noticed my private items being hidden at all, in fact I’ve sold items within 20 minutes of them being listed before now. However I check out completed sales and make sure my stuff is worth selling, if there isn’t a market for something, and a lot of things I’ve sold in the past wouldn’t even get a look in now, I just charity shop it.