2 Things that make me angry about eBay
Summary: silvertrowe1 shares frustrations about eBay's allowance of private sellers who seem to operate as businesses without the same fees, impacting their ability to compete. They also express concerns over eBay’s policy on refunding shipping costs when customers return items due to mistakes. sml192 and jonatjonatjonat agree, explaining that the refund policy is a legal requirement, not an eBay issue. fosterandson discusses the advantage private sellers have with free listings and cheaper postage, contributing to a decline in their sales. silvertrowe1 considers exploring other platforms like Vinted due to dissatisfaction with eBay's policies.
There are two things About eBay that are making me angry.
The first is the shear amount of Private sellers with thousands of feed backs for thousands of items sold and they have hundreds of brand new items listed.
Because we pay fee's as a business seller, we cannot compete with the prices some of these private sellers set.
We were selling a new line of toiletry called 'Neils Yard' and over a period of time, noticed prices were falling. We saw several private sellers with these products and they were selling them at a price that we could not match.
As an experiment I reported 6 accounts who were obviously businesses but months later, they are still operating as before.
I don't think eBay takes this abuse of the rules seriously.
My wife and I work very hard to maintain our account to a high standard and when you factor in the time and effort, we're probably making less than minimum wage per hour.
Some private accounts are basically giving us a slap in the face, earning more than us and getting away with it...... And I doubt they pay taxes.
The second is postage.
We've just had a return with the stated reason as 'Ordered by Mistake'. So fair enough, we refund the item but why do we have to pay the £3.00 postage we charged the customer?
They made a mistake and we are out of pocket? Why is there no option to deduct postage costs from the refund?
We have only recently started charging postage because we felt it was unfair that we had to fully refund people when they made a mistake. So we thought that by charging postage, we would not have to refund it.
So basically what is the point of charging postage? We may as well include postage costs in the sale price and list items as 'Freepost'
Please eBay, do something about the untold amounts of private accounts selling as businesses as you promised a while back when you first introduced private selling with no fee's
And please eBay can you not figure out a fairer system of postage for business sellers so that they don't lose out when a customer 'makes a mistake', 'orders the wrong size' or 'Just didn't like it'
fosterandson
·1 month agoPrivate sellers getting 300 free new listing each month is a massive problem. Being undercut with pricing and now being drowned out by the sheer number of listing being created by private seller each month.
They also get cheaper postage than Business sellers, using simple delivery
I saw a private seller with 428 listing, all new items. But only 3 different products, same pictures.
Private sellers get 3600 listings a year, no sales fees, no returns, no shop fees & cheaper postage costs.
ebay's answer to this, pay them more money in promoted listings
ebay, how did you get this so wrong
Start of the year sales of around £1,200 to £1,500 now £300 to £500 and going down.
silvertrowe1
OP1 month agoSomething has to be done.
I'm not putting anymore time into this so they can jog on with 'Live' auctions.
And I have never and will never promote any listings regardless of how many discounted offers eBay send me.
The answer may be jump ship to Vinted or just find another business because I don't feel I'm getting the service I'm paying for.
jonatjonatjonat
·1 month agoLooking at your listings - I've no idea why you wouldn't list on Vinted.
The only negative there is you would have to do their version of Simple Delivery (though it works a darn site better than ebays)
I'd also say the prices are probably lower on Vinted - but just take the clothing - that will sell on Vinted.
silvertrowe1
OP1 month agoWe might cross list on vinted but we don't really want the extra work. We work full time and put enough time and effort into this already. All we ask for is a fair shot at eBay which we are not really getting right now, so as I said before, we just might have to jump ship.
jonatjonatjonat
·1 month agoBusinesses adapt unfortunately.
Consider if you looked at your customer base. If you had a customer who was always late with payments, messed you around, didn’t pay etc - would you prioritise that customer, or would you look to try to acquire other customers?
Treat eBay that way. If they aren’t generating the business due to “decisions” it is perhaps worth looking elsewhere, as opposed to spending time trying to convince a multinational company they are wrong.
jonatjonatjonat
·1 month agoThe 'its only a hobby' brigade? Yep - agree and agree with sml192 - many are probably paying tax - but many just don't genuinely realise they are a business. I don't think any level of education of this from ebay would help - so they should police it.
Postage refunds is a legal requirement - you'll have to level that issue with the Government - not ebay.
sml192
·1 month ago · EditedI agree with everything that you say about Business Sellers masquerading as Private Sellers accept possibly the last bit about them not paying taxes. Whilst there will be some who aren't paying the correct taxes most probably are paying tax and probably think that because they are that they are doing nothing wrong by trading on a Private Seller account.
As for the postage, as a Business Seller you are legally required to refund the whole of the original amount paid, Including postage, so that is nothing to do with eBay.
silvertrowe1
OP1 month agoI didn't know it was a legal requirement to refund postage costs no matter the reason for the return.
It sucks and the Gov need t look at that
jonatjonatjonat
·1 month agoNot sure it’s going to be high up the list for them to sort.
You as a seller should build in these costs into the price of your items. Most businesses will do this.
silvertrowe1
OP1 month agoWe can't build the costs into our items pricing because costs are often determined by Private sellers.
Sigh