Selling fees are too high on ebay, time to call it a day and just bin it all

[olivernorvillehardy]

I have been a loyal and faithful member of ebay for 20+ years now, till quite recently it has been good, but of late not so good, sadly. The fees are just too much for me and also for other sellers too.

So what to do, I think that the options for me are to list less items only every second week, so my fees are less and to list less items.

I have found it very theraputic as I had to have open heart opp over a year ago, it gave me something to focus on and I met a lot of nice people and remain in contact with them to this day. But I can see me calling it a day and just giving away my stock of old car parts or just taking it all to the dump, which will be to me a sad day, but such is life and it will be the end of an era too.

Not much else I can say, but I think that ebay should rethink things as it is going to cost them a lot of business, I wonder, I can see that nowdays that their is very little or no loyalty at all.

Kind regards to all who read this.

[iluvneighbours]

EBay now has plenty of competition in the clothing market and that has resulted in the introduction of 0%  selling fees for 'private' sellers selling new/used clothing leaving small business sellers struggling even more.  it seems their rationale is that these sellers then go on to spend more than they sell. EBay doesn't care about small business sellers.

[dougbat20]

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@christian_888 wrote:
What’s applicable to me may not relate to others for those who are selling to survive alternatively too giving clothes to charities for free which is where a percentage of pro active ebayers get their stock/auction taking into consideration eBay’s increased fees over and above RPi and the price you are knocked down by buyers for me it’s just time consuming and not worth all the hassle especially when buyers remorse kicks in as it often does you think do I need the hassle others retired or just trying to make ends meet I get it.
What eBay’s needs is some stiff competition in order to make it more competitive whilst reducing the selling fees.
Instead in a monopolised market place.


Sent from my iPhone iOS

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Regarding the sale of clothing, private sellers now get zero final value fees on clothing items, and also get 1000 free listings per month anyway (this is usually more than most private seller account limits). This was a response to a competitor (who I shall not name) who has, since the start, never charged the seller a FVF (the buyer pays a protection fee instead) and is more geared towards the sale of clothing.

[debuk39]

Yeah I completely agree, I've just sold an item 4.15. Plus postage 85p (which will be more my error)

And they have taken 96p of me including tax which on second hand stuff surly isn't right. 

So from the item taking best part of 25% is ridiculous, cost of posting making people not purchase 2nd hand.... I will be binning my items and closing ebay. These fees are greedy.

[1956glyn]

To be honest i do not think its worth selling cheaper items individually due to Ebays fees.   Maybe try offering a few as a bundle if you can?  Also I consider postage costs when listing because often its not worth listing cheaper items due to the additional postage costs 😞

I try not to sell anything under say £10 to £15.   Not that i am currently listing anything and unable to for the forseeable future.

[eastern-lights]

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@debuk39 wrote:

Yeah I completely agree, I've just sold an item 4.15. Plus postage 85p (which will be more my error)

And they have taken 96p of me including tax which on second hand stuff surly isn't right. 

So from the item taking best part of 25% is ridiculous, cost of posting making people not purchase 2nd hand.... I will be binning my items and closing ebay. These fees are greedy.

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Perhaps take them to a charity shop? 

[christian_888]

Small minority of Ebayers buy stock from charity shops with as little as 5% or less going to charity the guy who owns the charity shop near us has 15 shops all over the country he lives in a 5 million pound house drives a brand 74 plate Range Rover of course charity shops are tax and vat exempt so it’s a win win win !

Sent from my iPhone iOS

[sml192]

'And they have taken 96p of me including tax which on second hand stuff surly isn't right.' 

You are paying Vat on the fees that eBay charge not on the item itself.  Ebay are legally required to collect Vat on their fees. 

[eastern-lights]

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@christian_888 wrote:
Small minority of Ebayers buy stock from charity shops with as little as 5% or less going to charity the guy who owns the charity shop near us has 15 shops all over the country he lives in a 5 million pound house drives a brand 74 plate Range Rover of course charity shops are tax and vat exempt so it’s a win win win !

Sent from my iPhone iOS

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I am lucky enough to have a local animal sanctuary that I can support by donating to their shops. We have visited the sanctuary and as far as reasonable checked them out. No million pound house or new Range Rover. But your point is well made, and applies to all charitable support. How much does the CEO make? How posh is their office? What percentage of donations gets to the coal face? And do they spend your money on things that you really want to support.

OK, possibly simpler to just bin the stuff. ☹️

[53_main_street]

I agree, on a recent sale for £42 we made less than £5. We did an experiment and switched all marketing off the result was a complete collapse in sales. So we either turn on the marketing and make no margin or turn it off and get 90% less sales. After over 20 years on Ebay I think we are coming to the end of it. Plenty of alternatives now like Etsy, TikTok etc.

This was once a good marketplace (full stop)

[bw20b19s25j07]

Thanks, I totally agree!
It is all in the favour or eBay & the buyer & has been for a few years now!

[daro2096]

The fees are for private sellers 10.67% plus 0.35% plus 0.25p plus 20%VAT. At least they are for me. On a £100 sale the eBay fees come to £13.52 leaving £86.48 net before P&P costs. That is 13.52%.

[daro2096]

I miss the days when you got pay no more than £1 on eBay sales promotions.

[bittyboy101]

Its a vicious circle, eBay's fees are now really crippling, if I add 80% of what fees they take to all my listings my stuff ends up being the most expensive on eBay... this in itself then kills my chances of making any sales... If I sell cheaper most people still don't buy my stuff... they just watch instead... 

Eventually I might get 1 sale out of the blue (usually when I don't need the money and it's raining heavily)....

I look  and see my £80 lock which I had reduced by £10 has only given me £55.83 !... after eBay took a MASSIVE chunk of my money just for the privilege of letting me sell on their site !

.... so basically I am forced to sell expensive just so I don't sell at a 50% loss !... and when there is a promotion offer of "80% off selling fees" it seems eBay ensure that my items stay ghosted with 0 views for MANY DAYS when I sell my stuff cheaper than my competitors ! 

So it's basically their very high fees that is now hampering my sales... 

Whilst I would like to make all my listings look professional and replace my own mugshot for a photo of a fancy lock and key like other's have suggested on the other "no sales" thread... I fear by doing so I will look to HMRC like a business seller when I am NOT.

This is why I have chosen to keep my listings looking unprofessional and have my mugshot and a brief description of myself so that people can see I am just another unprofessional domestic  seller selling off my own personal items which I had collected over many years since 1990 when I was a kid... these items are now worth money to the people who restore old buildings so I have every right to ask for what I believe they are worth now in the prestine condition they are in. 

My sales only decreased since I had to increase my prices to compensate for eBay's high selling fees !... and eBay are not being very helpful by giving me a promo 80% off selling fees and when I go to use it then hiding all my listings so nothing of mine gets seen and sold... 

EDIT:

No matter what others say - I strongly believe that eBay MANIPULATES SEARCHES and HIDES LISTINGS if they think a seller's items are too good and too cheap or they are making too much money too soon... 

[btr.style]

" I fear by doing so I will look to HMRC like a business seller when I am NOT."

Unfortunately you already look like a business seller because you are one and I'm sure HMRC will also see that too, business logo or no business logo. 

It is indeed suspicious and peculiar that one individual would have 63 old antique victorian padlocks just somehow laying around that they no longer want. I can't see claiming they are from your own personal collection would wash with HMRC and instead they'd be inclined to believe you've bought them to profit from. 

Even if you acquired them somehow in bad condition, did them up and are selling them for a profit, that's still classed as business selling. 

I can only go by what it looks like and by the looks of your listings, if you aren't already doing self assessment tax returns (and are exceeding the selling limits for reporting), then HMRC are certainly going to be in touch for their slice of tax. 

EDIT: Well continue living with that belief all you want. eBay want things to sell. They won't exact look at some old locks and think "yeah they are too good, let's hide the listing". You are selling a very niche product, hardly something people will buy to collect or have framed. If someone needs one of those locks, fine, but there's a tiny number of people who will ever need anything you are selling. 

[bittyboy101]

MATE - IF I WAS A PROPER BUSINESS - I WOULD HAVE MORE THAN JUST ONE SALE IN A WHIOLE MONTH ! - SO PLEASE SAY SOMETHING USEFUL...  

63 ITEMS = MORE CHANCE OF SELLING SOMETHING - NOTHING SINISTER - WHEN I AM ALLOWED UP TO 100 LISTINGS.

[fireblade51ian]

A bout time you and millions of sellers Feel the same

[zoe385us]

It was 4% and now 12.8% how is it static? 13% is way too high from any standpoint. Where money go to? Just higher profits? Time for new site. Probably coop of sellers. 

[sml192]

The fees may have been only 4% right back at the start (25 years ago) but eBay was a very different platform then.

The fees have, however, been pretty static for private sellers for at least the last 10 years.  When I first started selling in 2013 the fees were 10% plus PayPal's fee (which back then was something like 2.4% plus 20p),  Now eBay charges 13.22% (including the regulatory fee) plus 30p.  There are obviously no PayPal fees anymore, so that represents an increase of just 0.82% plus 10p in just over 10 years. 

[classicaled1]

I just sold a bunch of old music cassette tapes for £30 buy it now (with free postage uk) was shocked to see ebay fee's taken £4.27 thats like 15% i thought fees were 12% but it turns out that in some catagories seller fee's are higher towards 15.5% in the music catagory which i sold in that is the case i suspect the same for your car parts - they have hiked the seller fee's in the catagories which they know sell well its just greed on ebay's part then there's the good old promote a listing tool which ebay want you to use which adds more fee's onto the price of the item you have sold and if you don't use it your items sell very slowly and get hardly any views views - after postage approx £8 i make £18 which is ok for a bunch of old stuff just sat around not used or wanted but it just feels these days that ebay and the postal services make more money than us sellers do, - fee's should be no more than 5-7% ebay would still make huge profits and people would sell more

[christian_888]

When you consider ebays volume turnover we are talking hundreds of billions every year

Greeds the word I’m looking for ,!