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.

[zeldagate]

Thanks everyone for your comments, Sorry I had to have my little rant about this as the whole thing is just getting too stressful, but I have made the decision to end my business as well next January when my royal mail OBS ends, I have started clearing a lot of my stock, eBay doesn’t understand the craft market, suppliers I buy from are also suffering due to the large amount of imports from China.

Take care and good luck to those of you who are hanging on in there.

[rowater82]

Does anyone else object to eBay's new revised fees - delayed payment for seller until two days after delivery and rip off buyer protection fees , which also adversely impact on sellers - such as small private sellers like me? eBay have become greedy robbers.

[andha-21]

Hi there and I doubt they would enjoy bad publicity and I'd suggest you familiarise yourself with their updated terms & conditions.

Personally I don't think it would hurt our cause, but I still think we should be challenging the BPF on legal grounds.

Before their roll back Simple Delivery was a shoe in for a legal challenge but the way they've updated it now probably means we need to get lucky and have a disabled person being on the receiving end of its worst possibilities when active.

Alot of the people here have tendencies to repeat mantra. Like Buyers don't have the same rights buying from private sellers as they do from businesses. That is true.

But that's where eBay are slipping by unnoticed.

Before a buyer could buy directly from a private seller, eBay just being an intermediary. 

Now a buyer cannot buy from a private seller without paying eBay for the BPF service.

So the entire transaction is reliant on that consumer to business transaction.

The consumer to private seller transaction cannot exist without it.

So it's no big leap of imagination saying the consumer to business transaction is the main part. If it is, then consumers gain rights.

Some of which the BPF are actually charging for.

It's a really strange system. It invokes the very thing it's trying to charge for and that probably means it's leaning heavily into the miss selling/fraud arenas that Trading Standards and the Financial Ombudsman deal with.

Another area that Trading Standards almost certainly wouldn't like is the different prices guests see when purchasing. Last time I checked it looked like they were seeing 3 different sets for the same item. Not allowed in UK law and as eBay UK is aiming at trading with habitual UK residents UK law applies.

Another really bad area now is the Offers system. If a buyer and seller agree via message at a price they will both find out afterwards that it is impossible to accomplish. Buyer sends seller an offer, seller receives less. Seller sends buyer an offer, buyer pays more.

Basically there is a total lack of clarity in the system and alot/most of the information above is users finding that out and sharing here. eBay are just dumping stuff on people and letting them learn by trial and error. Fortunately for eBay the errors only seem to hurt the sellers though. Boo hoo, right?

There are a number of areas in this rollout that aren't right.

[goodibags]

You can certainly be logged in and see both prices with and without the fees, for example when you view your own selling page as a buyer and scroll down to the banner below.

Apparently, someone reported earlier that when bidding on a private seller's auction the item price has the correct 'gross' price including the buyer fees, but the summary page showing the bid history had the seller prices (or what the seller would receive) instead. They were left feeling very confused. And pleased they'd been outbid.

And an item search will show items in the wrong order, that is items from both private and business sellers and with the buyer fees included but not taken into account when sequencing.

It feels a bit as if Ebay UK may be using Ebay's corporate templates which may be unable to correctly handle some of the new changes now in operation in the UK? Ultimately, it's a confusing experience for buyers and sellers alike.

[incredible_how]

Sending offers: I've just made a little chart of prices to show me what the buyer will see. But yes agreeing prices via messages is not going to be easy. And you can send an offer via a message can't you if someone askes a question? Never tried that. But have agreed prices with a buyer who has asked if they buy 2 items  can they have a bit off.

[andha-21]

My post was in response @rowater82 post. At the end they ask for feedback so they can gauge opposition to these changes.

[andha-21]

Sorry I have to modify a part from my first reply to you but can't edit it.

The original post above;

"Now a buyer cannot buy from a private seller without paying eBay for the BPF service."

 Modified to;

Now a buyer cannot buy from a private seller that is selling an item that has BPF applied without paying eBay for the BPF service.

[rowater82]

Got this. Thank you.I've just had a long telephone conversation with an eBay real person. Told them about the strength of feeling among eBay private sellers against the recent fee changes - delayed payment but even more so the Buyers Protection Fee - and I'm promised this agent will pass up to the eBay powers that be what adverse effects these changes have. I pointed him to the eBay conversation posts to demonstrate hundreds of posts since these changes imposed on 4 February. And also potential of sellers leaving eBay. I think he took what I was saying seriously and said he would ensure eBay powers that be are aware of our objections. We shall see. I feel better for having raised this with the eBay community, and also eBay directly. You know the mantra: change the things you can change, put up with the things you can't change. And wisdom to know the difference!

[andha-21]

If you have colleagues that work with these sorts of things this is probably worth some of their time. 

There are things happening here that deserve questions from people that are harder to ignore.

[rowater82]

Would you like to explain more ?rowater82

[kath3735_wxmjn]

There may be hundreds of posts but it is so often the same people!   

[andha-21]

If you have a look through the threads you will see pinned ones at the top of Seller Central regarding VAT.

That's because alot of Business Sellers just lost all their VAT details from their listings. Reading a specific thread about it in the Business Seller area it seems like it's happened at least once before, a few years ago.

So through no fault of their own they are in dangerous waters. It's eBay's system that failed. 

I only started using this forum when the new update was due to start, Feb 4th 2025, but some of the stuff I've read here since then is jaw dropping. Most of it points directly at business practices.

[rowater82]

Hey thanks for that info.I personally do not have the energy to pursue such an investigation.I do think eBay are greedy robbers and I will pursue that.The possible VAT scam I do not have the energy for. But thank you for passing on. If you have the energy, you might pass it on to another journo?x

[andha-21]

It definitely needs to go somewhere because for the most part it looks like they choose to ignore us.

[valleyrc1]

Funny you say that, I noticed in a large, established sellers listing the other day that they had manually entered the VAT number into the listing text, which I thought was a bit redundant, as it's automatically entered in the details below.

Now I know why!

[insidethe93]

I wonder if that eBay agent realises he (and other staff) could lose their job(s) if eBay shrinks or even folds. If he did pass on your feedback, would senior execs listen or act?

Does anyone else remember that years ago a leading high street shop famously decided grey would be the forthcoming fashionable colour? Grey was everywhere in store, very little other colour choice. Customers disagreed, complained, left in droves, including me as grey was the colour of my school uniform and even years after leaving school I didn't want to wear grey as leisurewear. But the top execs stubbornly refused to listen (trying to save face?) even when their own staff were reporting sales were dead. The firm took a big hit, and it took years before those customers who'd gone shopping elsewhere finally returned, though not all of them. Sound familiar, eBay? - eBay,  please listen and act NOW.

[pbis9782]

As the extra buys protection fee is automatically added to the seller listing price.

It directly affects what the seller receives from the final sale price.

Private sellers are already charged ebay selling fee’s so this is an additional 4% cost to the seller.. Not the buyer. 🤨

I am very disappointed, I have always been a loyal ebay seller. 

Also as a buyer if there will be far less 2nd hand bargains to be found.. 

[buffster1963]

Private sellers no longer get charged selling fees and have not for quite a few months. 

[maujohwai]

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@pbis9782 wrote:

[...] this is an additional 4% cost [...]

---

Don't forget the 75p!

[maujohwai]

I've found another anomaly, besides prices being shown with or without BPF in different places: while looking at one of my listings for a book to check how much BPF was being added, I saw that the "Similar items" shown underneath included another copy at £145 + £17.43 postage, so I clicked on it, and it turned out to be in fact $145 (approximately £115.34) + $17.43 (£14.11) postage.  What a shambles!