This is going to mean the end for many small private sellers. "Buyer Protection Fee"

[vinylscot]

https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/buying/paying-items/buyer-protection?id=5594

75p plus 4% buyers fee, so something which was priced at £5 will be £5.95 in February.

[burniebanter]

For me, the biggest issue as an occasional seller, is the expectation that you send the item before you receive payment. Crazy!

I generally sell items out of my collections that are surplus, some of them can be quite valuable and there is absolutely no way I'll be sending anything without the payment being in my account, so I guess that's the end of my days selling on eBay since 2005 (in fact before than under a different account, so probably 2001).

That is the biggest issue here amongst what were some of the original users of eBay, people buying and selling bits and pieces out of their private collections / adding to them.  

You never let go of an item without receiving the money first.

[studiomaster_uk]

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@belascos wrote:

If you are purchasing from an individual, there is an inherent increased risk of transaction difficulties vs a professional business seller,

---

Firstly, within that grossly critical comment you have, wholly inappropriately, 'tarred all "individuals" with the same brush'.  There may be the a few 'bad apples' but by far the majority of individuals are sound, decent and honourable people with a fine moral compass and behave accordingly.

Secondly, there are a notable number of "business sellers" operating on the ebay platform who are far from "professional" in their activitivies as well as a few who are downright dubious.

For example, one sends a product query to a business seller often to receive no reply at all, or one which is nonsense. One orders to receive no response but a tracking number and no goods, delayed and deliberately erronious responses ending in an ebay 'not received' claim to effect recovery. Such devious actvity not a one off accident but a repeated issue (per feedback) and ebay still supports these accounts after years.

To the contrary, serious private sellers have far more interest to protect their 'good behaviour record' because they know ebay will act to restrict their accounts far sooner that they will act to disipline a business seller (if at all). They, as individuals, will be giving personal support to their buyers and potential buyers and, in the vast majority of cases, working hard to make sure every transaction goes smoothly.  They are aware that the only matter that is outside of their control is errant / unlawful buyer behaviour.

Finally, your use of the word "inherent" is inapt and misguided. It simply makes no sense.

[pitstop.pippa]

And some business sellers - with well over 600,000 feedback - don't even let go of the item after 4 weeks of sitting on your money, as my partner can attest. Having ordered me an expensive book on December 10th from a well known specialist book seller, first my birthday passed by without dispatch, then Christmas and finally new year. After so long without any communication or update from the seller, my partner finally asked for a refund - which was promptly issued! And very strangely, the feedback he left - polite, truthful but scathing - only lasted about 5 mins before that disappeared without trace....all very odd. 

[tressygirl]

Did your partner mention a refund in that feedback?

That would break feedback rules,  and the seller could ask eBay to remove it.

@pitstop.pippa 

[incredible_how]

Ebay do have a policy of holding the money "if you're a new or infrequent seller"

https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/selling/getting-paid/getting-paid-items-youve-sold/payments-hold

My Ma was new to ebay in October and all her sales payments were on hold until 3 days after confirmed delivery.

Which of course is the opposite of the "old days" when it was recommended you wait until payment cleared before sending

[maujohwai]

I don't know why this post has been designated as a 'solution' to the original post. It just contains a self-acknowledged 'opinion' and a link to a different eBay information page.

[vinylscot]

I don't know how it has been designated as a solution, either.  I started this thread, so I should be the only one able to mark a post as a solution, and I definitely have not done so in this instance.

[papso22]

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@vinylscot wrote:

I don't know how it has been designated as a solution, either.  I started this thread, so I should be the only one able to mark a post as a solution, and I definitely have not done so in this instance.

---

In that case, it was probably done by inadvertently clicking on 'accept as solution' while scrolling on a tablet or phone, it's very easy to do.

As mentors have 'special powers' we can remove incorrect solutions, would you like me to do that for you?

@vinylscot 

[pitstop.pippa]

No, he didn't mention the refund, just pretty much what I said above about shocking service, four weeks with no dispatch/updates and the disappointment of all the special occasions that the non-appearance of the book missed over those four weeks. No specific names or details given, no hurty words towards ebay etc.

[vinylscot]

That would be very helpful @papso22  There's nothing wrong with the post, but it's not really a solution, is it?

Thanks.

[papso22]

There you go, your thread is now 'unsolved'!

[pitstop.pippa]

Just as a matter of interest, why is mentioning a refund against feedback rules? I'm sure I saw other feedback for the same seller that mentioned getting a refund.

[akemp1]

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@papso22 wrote:

There you go, your thread is now 'unsolved'!

---

Maybe it should be left unsolved until ebay come up with a better way of recovering their costs?

The sad thing is that I think ebay have done this to attract private sellers who want to 'sell for free' but it's backfired as it turns out most of us (on this thread at least) would rather pay seller fees than have a buyer tax.

[jessiejones006]

As a very occasional seller I moved from “V” back to eBay to sell things I have accumulated and no longer need. I moved because V was becoming more difficult and perceived to be more difficult for sellers. I am between a rock and a hard place.

[papso22]

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@pitstop.pippa wrote:

Just as a matter of interest, why is mentioning a refund against feedback rules? I'm sure I saw other feedback for the same seller that mentioned getting a refund.

---

It used to be that the feedback policy said that you couldn't mention 'disputes' and ebay seemed to take mentioning things like refunds and cases as implying there must have been a dispute to get to that point, so would remove the feedback.

The rationale put on it by members (not by ebay) was that ebay didn't want buyers to think things could actually go wrong on the site and so wanted to keep disputes under the carpet, so to speak.

The feedback policy has now changed (and expanded), but I can't see dispute being mentioned anywhere as a reason for removal.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/policies/feedback-policies/feedback-policy?id=4208&st=3&pos=1&query=Feed...

[johnwash1]

It would hardly be a big surprise if ebay staff were not fully aware of the rules for feedback removal.

[maujohwai]

---

@pitstop.pippa wrote:

No, he didn't mention the refund, just pretty much what I said above about shocking service, four weeks with no dispatch/updates and the disappointment of all the special occasions that the non-appearance of the book missed over those four weeks. No specific names or details given, no hurty words towards ebay etc.

---

eBay may have misapplied this rule when removing that feedback:

"We remove neutral/negative feedback when any of the following occurred and this is what the buyer is referencing:

[...]

• The seller offers free returns, handled the return and issued a refund"

by ignoring the fact that it was negative because of the initial delay in delivery.

[tsdragon63]

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />

I'm going to try eBid and go back to Preloved

[incredible_how]

it says you can opt out

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

[lucy_farmer]

'It says you can opt out'

Yes....for now.

But eventually we'll all have to use 'Simple Delivery', sometime within the next 2 or 3 months.

(The CEO of ebay said so during one of his recent broadcasts of turgid business verbiage....)