Ebay's new buyer protection scam

[wayne15071965]

So I have been a seller on and off her since June 2001, Over the years I have sent items recorded delivery that either never turn up , or arrive with no notification of delivery.  Now someone wants to charge a buyer a fee for safe delivery, when they would have been charged that in the P&P cost.  Frankly it sounds more like a scam than customer service and Ebay are also trying to force us to use their shipping option, So much for free enterprise, sound like trying to get the monopoly on delivery as well.  As for hanging on the sellers cash til 2 days after delivery, really so post office goes on strike and you don't get paid, Think I may start looking to leave. So much for eBay's loyalty to us .

[leighbayuk]

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@edwardian-dreams wrote:

The buyer making the offer doesn’t get told by eBay that your bpf will be deducted from the offer and what the seller gets will be less than the £10 you’re offering 

try it and see

theres nothing there

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It is there, but eBay are trying their best to hide it. On the Offer screen there is no mention of BPF. If the buyer continues to the Checkout screen there is some small grey text which says “inc. buyers protection fee”. If they click this, it then shows a breakdown of the fee and the offer that the seller will actually receive.

eBay say the buyer pays the fee based on the final sale price. In reality, if the buyer makes an offer, the fee is deducted from the price. eBay think this is fine.

[newsgood2]

I don't know if it is that way around or just confused as, I just bought something last week and paid the amount the item was on for. When I look at the item now it is cheaper that what it is on for now, which means the buyer (Myself)I s paying for the BPF. It appears that it is inconsistent who is paying depending on what format it is in.

Ebay are basically completely devoid of any real intelligence as, the whole set-up is barking mad, unethical and dishonest!

[leighbayuk]

Exactly, the way the fee is presented is different depending on the listing type or direction of the offer. It is added onto a seller’s offer, deducted from a buyer’s offer, and variable for an auction. 😜

[papso22]

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@newsgood2 wrote:

I don't know if it is that way around or just confused as, I just bought something last week and paid the amount the item was on for. When I look at the item now it is cheaper that what it is on for now, which means the buyer (Myself)I s paying for the BPF. It appears that it is inconsistent who is paying depending on what format it is in.

Ebay are basically completely devoid of any real intelligence as, the whole set-up is barking mad, unethical and dishonest!

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It's always the buyer who pays, contractually and legally, it's just that because a seller can get less than they thought they were going to it feels to them as if they paid it.

It's an issue of perception over reality.

[action_man]

Papso22:

It's always the buyer who pays, contractually and legally, it's just that because a seller can get less than they thought they were going to it feels to them as if they paid it.

It's an issue of perception over reality.

__________________________________________

Yes it is an issue of perception over reality. Because if a buyer makes an offer to a seller of £25, the seller does not get £25 and won't know that until after the event. The BPF is deducted, so that is the reality. The buyer doesn't always pay the BPF and no amount of gaslighting will change that fact.

[papso22]

And no amount of spin will change the legal and contractual position that it is a fee charged to buyers by ebay.

There is no agreement whereby the seller pays the fee on behalf of the buyer, which would be third party consideration.

Sellers may perceive it as they are paying it, but the reality is that they are not.  Whatever a  buyer pays or offers to pay, includes an element for the BPF, sellers need to get used to that.

[action_man]

Papso22:

And no amount of spin will change the legal and contractual position that it is a fee charged to buyers by ebay.

There is no agreement whereby the seller pays the fee on behalf of the buyer, which would be third party consideration.

Sellers may perceive it as they are paying it, but the reality is that they are not. Whatever a buyer pays or offers to pay, includes an element for the BPF, sellers need to get used to that.

_________________________________________

So sellers need to get used to finding out something after the event, rather than eBay be honest and upfront. Sellers need to get used to a bait and switch. OK, thanks for the clarification.

[faceache65]

I've also removed the option to let buyer send me an offer. 

I now rarely send offers.

I've also stopped adding new listings as sales plummeted once buyer fee was introduced.

There doesn't seem any point!

[return_of_the_king]

To be honest I have been put off selling or buying on Ebay full stop by the new changes.

After a very long lay off from selling and very few purchases using Ebay I was enticed back with the no fees ad campaign Ebay ran before Christmas. Things seemed great and I even purchased some add ons along the way to support Ebay. Sadly that has now come to an end.

I also bought a lot of higher priced items in the hundreds of pounds, spending £3500 since the end of November. I am totally put off of buying with the new Buyer Protection fees and more so as I already have that with my preferred payment option, this means I will buy less on Ebay.

As for selling it now makes less sense for me, to attract buyers you have to price items in a way to make it worthy of the purchase, you list an item and then Ebay stick the the buyer protection fees on top which makes it now look like the seller is over pricing an item. If I adjust the price to make it more acceptable to a potential buyer I am basically paying the buyer protection fees for the buyer and losing out myself and doesn't make sense to sell in the first place.

When you buy something from most retailers they try to sell you extended insurance as a option and you can choose to take it or not but that isn't the case with buyer protection.

I have a few items still listed which I will probably end and look at alternatives to sell them. Ebay needs to take a good long look at how the changes has impacted both sellers and buyers and rethink it as this is clearly not the way forward.

I have been on Ebay since the day it pretty much started mainly as a buyer but also sold items occasionally. My wife was a power seller and again was with Ebay pretty much from the start.

Message to Ebay

Without sellers there are no buyers! Without buyers there are no sellers! Without both there is no Ebay.

2024: Revenue of $2.6 billion, up 1% on an as-reported basis and up 2%

2025: potential losses the way you are going.

[theelench]

As you say "It's an issue of perception..."

And "It's always the buyer who pays, ..."

Previously buyers saw a price, that was all they saw.  They paid it, no mention of fees at all.

The seller knew that ebay would deduct the fee paid by the buyer during processing and they would get what remained sent to their bank.

Now the buyer sees a "new" fee and many don't like it, thinking they're paying extra. 

Some sellers are confused as to whether the fee is added, deducted, whether they or the buyer is paying it and also don't like what they see.

Most buyers and private sellers know nothing about "the legal and contractual position", nor do they care.  Business sellers might do but again ebay has taken something simple that has worked for 20 years and turned it on its head confusing non-business users and as usual with little info. or explanation.

The perception is - They don't like what they see now, are confused and are re-acting accordingly by not listing, not buying and not bidding.  It doesn't matter how often  a few business sellers on here tell everyone that it's a great idea, that nothing has changed, or that other sites are doing the same.  They are talking to a tiny minority of ebay users and that minority is made-up of mostly other business sellers, so non-business users will likely remain confused and resentful for the foreseeable future.

[kath3735_wxmjn]

You would think that after the past month that regular buyers at least would and sellers who get involved with offers should also be aware of it!  Personally i do not get involved in offers at all but i am still aware of it through these boards.  Buyers will not give a damn how the £20 offer is split as long as they only pay £20, the seller obviously would care but i would say the majority know about it by now and should be taking it into account when they accept any offer.   Like a lot of things it has not been simple to understand the changes but we are slowly getting there whether we like them or not.  SD is now becoming confusing, i understood the original concept and would have left when/if it becomes mandatory but now i am just waiting for the hammer to fall....

[papso22]

The published guidance on the BPF is aimed entirely at buyers (and I can see why ebay thought that was all they needed to do), but with hindsight I think guidance for private sellers would also have been a good idea, if only in relation to offers. 

If there was seller guidance we wouldn't have to keep explaining that a seller generated offer starts from the premise that the seller wants £X for their item, and the BPF is added to that to get to what the buyer sees, and a buyer generated offer starts from the premise that the buyer wants to pay £Y in total for the item (plus any postage), so the seller will get that amount less the BPF.

[dcmr-99]

They might as well go back to charging fees to the seller, at least that was straightforward and would most likely generate more profit for the sellers anyway, judging by the amount of lost revenue caused by this buyer's protection fee..

[newsgood2]

I have just sent this to Jamie Iannone, CEO of eBay.

Now,  when as a private seller you try and pick postage it is a total nightmare.

Until very recently you put the weight and dimensions in and it told you how much for say, Royal Mail Tracked 48, which has insurance upon to £150.

Now it tries to get you to use the new special delivery, which means that the seller pays. Why do I want to pay for a delivery?

It then chooses tracked standard postage or 48 but asks you to put the postage charge in, whereas before it told you how much it was.

"This whole episode with BPF has been a total disaster and one has to wonder how anyone in senior management at eBay is still employed, because it is a massive management error with eBay trying to,  and failing miserably to be clever.

For pity’s sake wake up and sort out this disaster and be straightforward. "O, what a tangled web we weave, when first we  practice to deceive." 

[jckl1957]

Hopefully, they will realise that, when you say 'special delivery', you actually mean Simple Delivery'.

You are mistaken when you state the seller now pays for postage, the buyer pays and, it is worth pointing out, Simple Delivery is not yet mandatory.

All of my listings still use either RM Large Letter or RM Tracked 48.  You just have to opt out of Simple Delivery.

[newsgood2]

Simple delivery charges the seller as far as I can see. If you go for advanced options there is tracked 48 amongst other options but when I chose tracked 48 they expect you to put the price in although you have already given dimensions and weight. So, for example if I put in £6 it changes that to £7.20 on the item page. Again a charge added by eBay.

The whole process is flawed from beginning to end and it is tantamount to to a complete management failure by eBay in any way you look at it. 

[jckl1957]

The link is below - this is from Ebay who make it quite clear that the buyer pays.

I am not a fan of the BPF in any way, but spreading misconceptions and misinformation is not helpful to anybody.

Simple Delivery

If your item is listed with Simple Delivery, we'll provide you with a prepaid postage label and QR code when your item sells - you don't need to purchase your own label. If you don't have a printer, simply show the QR code at the drop-off location and the carrier will print off your label for you.

With Simple Delivery your buyer pays for delivery at checkout and the cost of the postage label is paid directly to eBay. If you offer free postage on your listing, you'll pay the postage cost for a standard delivery service and the cost of the label will be deducted from your sales proceeds.

If you use Simple Delivery, you can also update your postage preferences to select the carrier you'd prefer to use. To find out more about this programme, see our Simple Delivery help page.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/selling/posting-items/labels-packaging-tips/buying-printing-postage-labe...

[return_of_the_king]

Just ended all my listings and removed all items from my watchlist until a time that Ebay decides to take this matter more seriously. I am not against fees for selling as I can choose if I agree to them or not. If I go to a website to buy something I do not have fees on top of the purchase price for protection. I am not prepared to pay protection fees to buy when my payment method already protects me against any wrong doing by a seller.

[dcmr-99]

I think it's now obvious that ebay introduced this unecessary (for us)  BPF in order to make up for the losses incurred from scrapping seller's fees, and in the process of doing so, have made a complete mess of it. They could have simply re-introduced seller's fees and then have specific time periods  (the equivalent of happy hour) when these seller's fees are suspended, for example one weekend per month when selling would be free of fees..

[newsgood2]

Simple delivery gives you two choices, standard and tracked 48, which the buyer chooses, however, tracked 48 has up to £150 insurance, whereas stand has no information. Ebay are simply stupid in any way that you look at it. They do not know what they are doing besides being greedy, which has always been the case.