eBay

knit-in-styles · ‎03-03-2026

As eBay work closely with Royal Mail for postage etc, why can they not use Royal Mail's database for people to register their addresses?

Nearly every other place on line where you buy something, the majority of sites you only have to input your post code then select your house name or number from the dropdown. Obviously eBay does not use this system and allows users to set up an address in any format they so require.

This week I have had an issue with three buyers with things like the whole address on one line which wouldn't allow me to print a label as it exceeds characters. As well as the whole address being on one line, the address was also repeated on other lines. Why has the buyer been allowed to set it up like that? Another had no street, just a house number and a post code and a third had numerous spelling mistakes in the street, post town and area.

4_bathrooms · ‎03-03-2026

@knit-in-styles wrote:
As eBay work closely with Royal Mail for postage etc, why can they not use Royal Mail's database for people to register their addresses?

Nearly every other place on line where you buy something, the majority of sites you only have to input your post code then select your house name or number from the dropdown. Obviously eBay does not use this system and allows users to set up an address in any format they so require.

Royal Mail release a PAF file that businesses can use to verify addresses through a third-party - this is what you are seeing on other websites. A business performing lots of lookups can pay fractions of a penny per lookup which should easily be within eBay UK's budget.

I have often pondered why eBay UK doesn't employ it.

Give me ambiguity or give me something else.

therenewalworkshopltd · ‎03-03-2026

Why pay for something when you can just make do and it doesn't affect you directly?

4_bathrooms · ‎03-03-2026

@therenewalworkshopltd wrote:
Why pay for something when you can just make do and it doesn't affect you directly?

If a seller cancels a sale by selecting "problem with buyer's address" as the reason it has affected eBay directly due to the lost BPF/FVF. eBay could completely do away with that cancellation reason for domestic sales if delivery addresses were checked against Royal Mail's PAF file.

eBay could (currently) pay ~£7,500/year for unlimited website lookups via a PAF data access licence; that is absolutely nothing to eBay. In terms of the millions of lookups that would be performed that would equate to a small fraction of a penny per lookup. It doesn't take too many BPFs or FVFs saved through sales that would not otherwise have been completed to see that eBay would almost certainly financially benefit from employing PAF lookups.

Give me ambiguity or give me something else.

sml192 · ‎03-03-2026

@4_bathrooms wrote:
@therenewalworkshopltd wrote:
Why pay for something when you can just make do and it doesn't affect you directly?
If a seller cancels a sale by selecting "problem with buyer's address" as the reason it has affected eBay directly due to the lost BPF/FVF.

Not just the lost BPF/FVF, there are also the payment processing costs for both the original payment and the refund to take into consideration aswell.