Seller making no money

trads2

Hi, Thank you for all your replies, really appreciate this, I've been selling on ebay since 2011, and some of the time it has worked really well as a site. Recently postage hasn't been working for me as a seller that is all and so have decided to leave the site as too much money is going missing.

GDB2222

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82108213#Comment_82108213

Do you simply intend to stop, or will you continue your efforts elsewhere?

trads2

Ebay UK and VInted

Thankyou for all your comments, we seem to be looking at this from different angles.

1 . I agree if I sell a book and the ai generated postage label generates to the same price that I sell the book for, the item sent is the customers and is no longer mine as the seller.

The price I generated isn't wrong for the book, the ai generated label compared to my local post office counter price there is a difference in cost.

I as the seller no longer have the option of choosing my own postage options, as ebay now generate the postage label themselves, they choose the postage costs. Ebay generating the postage label this is out of my control as the seller.

2. If I sell an item on vinted, I send the item with a royal mail tracking number, my own courier that I have chosen. The item is delivered. The funds are withheld by vinted, I don't know why ?. The buyer confirms they are happy with the item. The funds are never released to me. This is stealing and the item sent is still legally mine, I could go to a solicitor for this, the charity I chose, because the funds were never released also did not get their percentage of the sale.

3. Nothing to do with ebay and paypal links.

Paypal on its own, if I sent £50.00 to one of you that has replied to me on this forum and I asked you to read out the amount that had come through to you, it probably wouldn't be the full £50.00, you will probably find a transfer fee had been deducted and if it had you would have to query this with paypal. The point is checking between the seller and buyer the transaction amount.

4. Yes, I understand if as a seller I can't fulfil a sale for a duplicate listing, the buyer gets a refund. So we have ebays dashboard if you like. I sell 2 candles on one listing, I didn't realise they were prohibited items, but they were sold on one listing. This generated after postage a small profit of abut £4.00. Then for some reason a duplicate listing appeared and they were sold again, the amount processed on this 2nd listing ebay took this amount, it went missing, some money went missing. I explained to the customer it was a duplicate listing and I couldn't fulfil the sale, ebay had collected the money for this sale but this hadn't as a transaction been passed at this stage to me. What should have happened ebay should have refunded the customer from the duplicate listing that they held. On the ebay dashboard is the £4.00 profit I had made from the first listing, that money was sent as a refund back to the customer. Ebay however still held on the second listing the unprocessed transaction that belonged to the customer on the duplicate listing. So again money went missing through a transaction, that should have been sent back to the buyer, not from my amount made from the first sale.

Please on this forum, reply in a reasonable manner to me, don't treat me as though I am not here, because I am very much here and taking note of your replies. Please reply respectfully, I am happy to read your replies, when their is time and reply to them. The problem is consumer rights and refunds on websites. The problem is quite a lot of money is going missing on websites and help in recovering lost money would be helpful. Which organisations should consumers go to complain about financial transactions going missing ?

GDB2222

I don’t think there’s an ombudsman for this, so you’re on your own, really. Sorry.

savergrant

You're right that 'most' items which are bigger than large letter sized are automatically simple delivery. There are some opt-outs though, but you must use a tracked service and upload the tracking number. You do have the choice of seller pays or buyer pays. If it is set to buyer pays and you don't use the supplied label it is the buyer who will receive a refund of the cost of the label.

I don't use vinted but what you say contradicts what others (specifically soolin) have said, basically that ebay simple delivery is very similar to vinted.

Annoyingly ebay does have this habit of deducting refunds and payment holds from cleared funds rather than pending funds, so in effect refunds are processed before the original payment reaches your balance.

If you transfer money to a friend or family member on PayPal from a bank account no-one will pay fees, the full amount will be received. However if you send money to a business or make a credit card payment there will be a fee.

soolin

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82108338#Comment_82108338

1. I still don’t get this at all, so apologies if I’m misunderstanding. If you are a business then on eBay you still set your own postage. If you are private then buyer pays ebay and eBay generates a label for you, with RM for parcels that it cheaper than you buying your own, but you don’t touch the postage so it is immaterial and can’t be costing you money?
2. again I’m co fused by this. On Vinted you can choose to opt in or out of many couriers, but again you as the seller don’t get involved with payment m you are just sent a pre paid label. Why on earth Vinted are keeping your money o can’t say, that isn’t normal, have you verified yourself and if requested supplied your NI number? What do they say when you ask them why your money isn’t paid out like everyone else’s?
   
3. if you have been selling for a long time then the PayPal fee can’t be new to you, it’s always been there for payments. However like savergrant says above if you are sending money to a friend or relative you can choose to send it that way for free. However for proper sales then yes the seller pays a fee, it is a service after all.
4. if an item was lost then buyer will get a refund but if this was a simple delivery item eBay cover that loss. EBay will always take available money for a refund, that doesn’t impact the money you would receive if first item showed as delivered.