THE EBAY OF 2025 - WHAT TO EXPECT AS A SMALL PRIVATE SELLER - SHOULD I STAY OR SHOULD I GO ?

[bittyboy101]

Just as the title says...

Apparently a few disturbing/concerning changes to eBay coming in January & February 2025... 

1) eBay Managed Shipping.

2) Payment Holds until delivery of a sold item has been confirmed.

So I'm a bit confused about number 1 - eBay's managed shipping... Not sure how this is going to work ? and whether it will be something like Packlink (only made compulsory instead of optional) ... or will it be like an "eBay Global Shipping program" type of setup where we send our sold items to eBay's 3rd party distributor and they then forward the item to the buyer by their default postal service ??... something tells me this could be Evri  (Hermes ! )  - Not happy or comfortable with this !  knowing Evri aren't always great !  😞

Moving on to number 2 - payment holds/delays until a sold items has been confirmed delivered (or 14 days have passed since buyer purchased the item and the buyer hasn't opened any cases during that time)... This can now be time consuming to get paid... Like eBay's new managed payments wasn't already slow enough !... now it's getting even slower !... not ideal if you've  got little money in the bank that week and have to 'find money upfront' to pay for posting sold items (this can get pretty expensive if 2 or 3 heavy items which cost £20 to post sell on eBay at the same time to different buyers)... Oh wait a moment... Conveniently eBay now does managed shipping and  they'll let you have an advance on your buyer's payment to cover shipping costs PROVIDING YOU BUY IT AT AN INFLATED RATE FROM EBAY ONLY !... How nice !  😞 

Now the debate of whether I should stay ? or go ?

I have always loved buying and selling on eBay for many years... Would it be worth carrying on with these new changes which are very worrying... or would it be better to do what the old saying says and QUIT WHILST YOU'RE AHEAD ???

All comments welcome - The good, the bad and the ugly - Let's know what you all think !

would a small private seller be skinned alive by the new 2025 eBay ? I wonder ! 🤔 🙄 😁   

[chuckysmyhero]

The 4% and £0.75 will kill small private sellers because it’s only going to be added to our listings - on something low value that will add nearly 50% onto of the price - buyers will look elsewhere 

private seller sales will drop off a cliff ! 

what happened to treating your customers fairly - private sellers are customers of eBay !  Yet we are now hit with 14 day hols on non tracked monies - no one is gonna pay £2.55 tracked postage ( cheapest) for something that cost less than that 

whole thing is a money making machine for eBay coffers 

[paxton-33]

Just my opinion: I will be deleting my sale lisitngs mid-January 2025 to avoid e-bays revised private selling conditions. Their decison as to how to manage their own site of course, but further delays in payment is not something I'm prepared to tolerate, neither do I like the sound of e-bay taking more control of how items are sent.  We used to get paid straight away, then it went to 1-2 days (bad enough),  but now it is up to when the carrier manages to deliver the item.  Most of us have had 'signed for ' and 'tracked items' that we have not been asked to sign for or have not been scanned - what happens then? Sounds like a mess best kept clear of. As to whether or not I remain as a buyer from private sellers on e-bay will depend on how pricing is affected by the changes.

[manicretrominer]

I'm a small, private seller. Only stuff that's sat in storage, that I need to move on to make space.

I rely, 100%, on Royal Mail collection. If Ebay take that ability away from me and give buyers options to use couriers that don't have a collection option, I will delete my account and walk away.

It's that simple.

[lucy_farmer]

'My other confusion is tracking, are all items issued with tracking or is it an extra?...'

I have no idea.

I find it very hard to pick the useful bits of info, about how all of this will actually work, out of the boggy morass of  'ebay speak',  which seems to be turning into a version of 'NewSpeak' (from '1984').

i.e. telling us how wonderful and simple everything is going to be  ; whilst simultaniously giving money with one hand (fee-free for private sellers) , taking away again with the other (buyer's fee which *will* end up coming from the seller one way or another) and making postage terrifyingly complicated for those of us  who were just used to going to the post office and posting things.....

my head hurts.

[podlingsmum2007]

Buyer fee announced is up to 4% of price plus 75p

[retired_heritage_phil]

Unless I mis-read it, 'Simple Delivery' as Ebay calls it, is only recommended, not compulsory. How could it be because it makes it clear that it is only available for UK buyers. Most of my sales go overseas so whilst like most of the community, I am totally fed up with Ebay constantly moving the goalposts, I am assuming that I can continue to use Royal Mail just as before. Except that now buyers will pay a buying fee (and hence result in a lower selling price) instead of me paying a selling fee, the point of which change totally escapes me + the newly introduced delay in receiving payments, which seems to me to be likely to just encourage 'item not received' cases for untracked shipments.

[lardzeppo]

Agree with you. Time to go. Too many restrictions over a supposedly free market and uncertain final cost for buyers.  As a buyer I am put off. As a seller I do not want to be dictated too as to who my carrier is. Will use up my 300 listings before month end then call it a day .

[valueaddedresource]

@retired_heritage_phil you didn't mis-read, eBay just hasn't updated the policy page or made a public announcement yet.

However, CEO Jamie Iannone explicitly stated in the Q3 2024 earnings call presentation that Simple Delivery will be mandatory for private sellers sometime in Q1 2025.

You can read the full comments in post 137 of this thread.

https://community.ebay.co.uk/t5/Seller-Central/THE-EBAY-OF-2025-WHAT-TO-EXPECT-AS-A-SMALL-PRIVATE-SE... 

[department28]

I presume you are currently using Royal Mail independently, not on eBay/via Global Shipping?  If we all end up having to use 'Simple Delivery', does that mean overseas buyers will have to choose what service they want for the domestic part of the shipping process?  That's going to add to the fun, isn't it?!

[paxton-33]

Sometimes RM from the PO, other times Evri. Evri print points are often out of action though. As for foreign purchasers I've used PO boxes in the UK that forward the item to the buyer, my liability ended once the UK PO box company took delivery. Glad I won't be having to deal with the 'simple' delivery carry-on. TTFN.

[findingmj]

I'm a small scale seller and only do auctions as I'm not sure on the value of lot of my products - is there actually a decent enough alternative to eBay for this kind of selling? Or is everything else fixed price selling?

[valueaddedresource]

---

@valueaddedresource wrote:

@retired_heritage_phil you didn't mis-read, eBay just hasn't updated the policy page or made a public announcement yet.

However, CEO Jamie Iannone explicitly stated in the Q3 2024 earnings call presentation that Simple Delivery will be mandatory for private sellers sometime in Q1 2025.

You can read the full comments in post 137 of this thread.

https://community.ebay.co.uk/t5/Seller-Central/THE-EBAY-OF-2025-WHAT-TO-EXPECT-AS-A-SMALL-PRIVATE-SE... 

---

On this note dave@ebay  kate@ebay  - any word on when mandatory Simple Delivery for private sellers of eligible items goes into effect?

Based on today's updates about buyer fees, I would assume it would make sense for that to also be on February 4th, but don't see anything explicitly stating that anywhere.

[myoldpaperclutter]

Simple Delivery - Your all-in-one delivery solution - It certainly isn't!!

There is no collection from home service - which 1000s of sellers use. This is straight from their FAQs:

"Can I arrange for my item to be collected?

Collection is not currently available for Simple Delivery. If you would like your item collected, you should opt out of Simple Delivery when creating your listing".

[heidi1605]

I 100% agree with your statement but they will not listen to us . I  was a collector and been on E-Bay for over 20 years and come to a part of my life to get rid of 60 years of collecting and all I want to do is to sell it in my time and my way of posting my choice. I think this is E-Bay trying to get rid of the private seller and this might end up biting them back.

[lucy_farmer]

'I think this is E-Bay trying to get rid of the private seller and this might end up biting them back.'

Well it certainly makes us *feel* like they want to get rid of us, but, oddly, they apparently think that private sellers who also buy are amongst the most 'valuable' customers on ebay..??

If you go back on this thread and read post no. 79 onwards a very knowlegeable poster goes into the business bullsh** speak and ebay speak and worked out what's actually happening!

most of us on here, definitely including me 😄 have neither the understanding or the patience to bash our way through all this guff....

[incredible_how]

Is there some information somewhere about managed shipping?
I use royal mail collection or evri collection for large light items - there nearest drop of is 7 miles or more for Evri...

[department28]

...'most of us on here, definitely including me 😄 have neither the understanding or the patience to bash our way through all this guff....'

Yes indeed!  Introducing too many (mostly unpopular) changes in a short space of time creates confusion, stress, frustration & anger...😠

Selling a few odds & ends has become over-complicated & time-consuming -  no wonder many smaller sellers are deciding to call it a day... it just feels like it's not worth the hassle. ☹️ 

Charity shops can expect a big increase in donated stuff...

[jackpants]

If I can’t use Royal Mail to collect and deliver then I’ll be leaving eBay after 20+ years. 
Not being paid until delivery is confirmed - that’s just appalling. Where else in the world of commerce do you hand over your goods to a buyer with receiving payment ?

I think eBay have made yet another awful decision. It will be the end of private sellers.  And for the buyers who use them for 2nd hand goods

[valueaddedresource]

---

@incredible_how wrote:

Is there some information somewhere about managed shipping?
I use royal mail collection or evri collection for large light items - there nearest drop of is 7 miles or more for Evri...

---

@incredible_how there are a lot of details in the FAQ on this page:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sellercentre/postage/simple-delivery

eBay hasn't given much information about what will happen when it becomes mandatory for private sellers, but I think they're likely to start with keeping the terms pretty much as they are currently and just taking away the ability for private sellers to opt out on eligible items, so it's a good idea to at least be familiar with the current terms and policies.

[vintique*violet]

Me too after 17years... and not ever buying on here again!