How is it 'Free to Sell', if you're then forced to buy unwanted services from E-Bay?

[j.p.greenwood]

Surely that'll breach the Advertising Standards rules?

I think you can report it online.

[irobot100]

Hi  How do you mean forced ?

[jonatjonatjonat]

What on earth do you mean?

you list something for £10, you get £10. The rest goes to eBay.

there is no ‘direct’ cost to potentially making a sale. I have no idea what you mean by forced to buy unwanted services.

[papso22]

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@j.p.greenwood wrote:

Surely that'll breach the Advertising Standards rules?

I think you can report it online.

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It would breach them if you were required to purchase something in order to sell, but you are not. 

[j.p.greenwood]

Please tell me how you can list without buying shipping from E-Bay?

[thesmokingrunner]

Businesses can list without buying shipping from eBay, JP.

Correctly registered businesses...

[j.p.greenwood]

Private Sellers can't

[*devils.advocate*]

Isn't it the buyer who buys the postage from eBay?

I thought sellers only offered (the choice of) delivery?

[j.p.greenwood]

Nope, if the seller wants to exclude a specific carrier or offer 'free shipping' than the seller pays for shipping.

But, they are restricted in the carriers they can offer and are forced to buy from E-Bay.

Some members, due to their location, have no option except to exclude specific carriers as there's no drop off location nearby.

[*devils.advocate*]

But that's the seller's choice - and only the seller's decision.

The buyer still ends up paying for the postage cost which you'll include within the end price (if you're sensible, that is).

[j.p.greenwood]

No, the seller can pay the cost, it's only passed on to the buyer if the 'buyer pays' and as explained above some sellers have no option but to choose seller pays so they can either exclude certain carriers or offer 'free postage'.

[*devils.advocate*]

So if you offer "free postage",  you won't include any cost/amount to cover that postage in your price?

Surely nothing is "free"?

[papso22]

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@j.p.greenwood wrote:

No, the seller can pay the cost, it's only passed on to the buyer if the 'buyer pays' and as explained above some sellers have no option but to choose seller pays so they can either exclude certain carriers or offer 'free postage'.

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That is still all the seller's choice though.  Just as it is a sellers choice to use ebay at all.

To put it simply for you, it's free to sell unless you choose to make it otherwise.

[jonatjonatjonat]

Sorry but various geographical outliers like that don't really apply when it comes to generalised top level marketing campaigns. Otherwise where do you stop? An example is the Mirror used to do a load of 'Free Bag of Crisps or Bottle of Coke' years ago. But you had to go to a McColls shop. We didn't have a McColls shop near us. But that didn't make the bag of crisps any less free if you could get it and any longer statement would have looked weird.

Perhaps ebays advert should claim Free to Sell as long as you live near an Evri or Royal Mail dropp off. Should anyone who lists with free postage tell customers upfront in their description that 'oh, just so you know, the delivery charge is actually included in the price of the product'?