Today I received an email from eBay asking me to complete a survey on the new Buyer Protection Fees. I took it and made sure that I ticked the most NEGATIVE OPTION for every question, and where asked, told them exactly what I thought of the new fees.
Looking through the recent Community posts it is clear that the majority of Private Sellers object to this TAX (for that is what it is), so I urge EVERYONE who gets this invite to do the same. eBay needs to be made to realise just how much they’ve f***ed up this time (more than usual!)
This TAX….
# Makes Private Sellers less competitive. (And they used to be the LIFEBLOOD of eBay!)
# Increases item prices. (I’ve seen Business Sellers increase their prices to ‘match’ new Private Sellers prices BPF-inflated prices).
# Increases costs by encouraging use of Tracked Services especially on low value items.
# Decreases profit if Seller has reduce price to absorb BPF.
# Decreases profit if Seller has to use Tracked services.
# Makes it hard to list items to a Price Point (ie £3.99, £4.49 etc).
# Increases costs to Bidders by adding unknown variable to winning bid.
# Makes it hard to gauge maximum bid to allow for addition of BPF on possible sale price.
# Delays payments for up to 14 days if non tracked services are used. (Good for ebays cash flow on top of retaining funds within ebay for up to 1 month before releasing to Bank accounts 😡)
# Delayed payments disrupt Sellers’ cash flow.
# Delayed payments may reduce ability to use eBay balances for Payments.
# Offers no new benefits to Buyers or Sellers on Tracked items.
# Offers no new benefits to Buyers or Sellers on non Tracked items.
In short, BPF’s make eBay a lottery for Buyers and Sellers, will drive away Private Sellers, restrict choice to Business Sellers and make it harder to find used, unusual and bargain products - the very essence of why eBay became popular in the first place.
