Promotion fee massive errors

[dwtrading2015]

I have been bulk editing promotion fees for years.  Normally I set everything to the same rate and this shows up on the manage active listings page.

Recently, in a desperate attempt to boost sales I have tried experimenting with the suggested variable rate promotion fee.  Because this is often very high I mostly select the option for suggested variable rate adjusted by -25% or -33%.  I've recently been examining fees in detail after discovering the 10% Top Rated Seller deduction isn't being applied.  The amended suggested variable promotion fees are all over the place.

I had noted on the manage active listing page the promoted fees only seemed to be correct when selecting a fixed fee and had assumed there was an update lag which perhaps never caught up as the suggested fees keep changing and it takes days at times for eBay to update anything.

Well I've been examining things per sale now, and the promotion fees charged are all over the place.  What should be a set -25% of the suggested promotion is not applied, there is no reduction.  Some promotion fees are well above the suggested and some a shade below.

I am being charged whopping fees and nothing at all like they are set to.  Together with the missing FVF 10% discount this is a huge chunk out of a very small margin to begin with.

Is it just my account or are others noticing significant discrepancies (and this is nothing to do with VAT)?

[rjwilmsi]

Personally I wouldn't even touch this variable promotional fee option. eBay is going to apply a fee and you will have no way of determining how they came up with that fee - how much advertising was actually shown to promote your items. Unfortunately, as with a number of new features on eBay, it is likely to have been implemented imperfectly. You will probably find it nearly impossible to get eBay to admit to that and correct the fees for you. But you never know you might later see some spontaneous pro-rata fee refunds being applied to your account.

If you think that increased promotion rates will boost sales then personally I would apply a higher fixed percentage promotion rate for a trial period and see what the effect is. That way you know the maximum additional fees that will apply to you.

[rainbowtrax]

Completely agree with @rjwilmsi. Given their track record, I'd never trust ebay to implement anything without errors and any errors they do make will always be in their favour, not yours. Giving them any control over your ad rates is a recipe for disaster as you've unfortunately found. The best you can do now is regain as much of the control as possible yourself going forwards. Anything that ebay claim to implement automatically always goes wrong sooner or later - usually sooner.

[robbtyke132010]

I have also tried the variable promotion fee but it is like trying to get through a snowstorm on a very dark night - the eBay charges are exorbitant and levied on every single sale. Surely there must of been some buyers who came to my shop directly? Not according to eBay.... 

[dwtrading2015]

Update, first CS cut off call.  Second CS insisted full dynamic rate correctly applied.  Was going to offer me a token refund of a fee on a sale.  Huh?  eventually said it would be passed by his supervisor but to escalate properly need to send details to ebay@ebay.co.uk, which is a generic eBay address likely scanned by bots.  For the record I have sent it and will chase via the community chat on Wednesday 2pm.

There is clearly something very wrong with eBay fees, also having a major issue with dynamic promotion fees which has been ignoring reductions being applied and charging full suggested rate.  These software routines and algorithms should be robust and bullet proof but seemed to be almost random number generators.

[rainbowtrax]

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@dwtrading2015 wrote:

There is clearly something very wrong with eBay fees, also having a major issue with dynamic promotion fees which has been ignoring reductions being applied and charging full suggested rate.  These software routines and algorithms should be robust and bullet proof but seemed to be almost random number generators.

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Doesn't it charge them at the rate it was on when the buyer first clicked on it? So you'll only get the reduced rate if the sale's from a new viewing since you reduced.