Beware of the International fee! An Aussie buyer used Buddy's USA address

[sell-more]

Beware Ebay sneaks this fee in on you & it can happen with any sale that looks to go to USA address..

Its is actually a money exchange rate which should be paid for by a Buyer but we get TUCKED with it as our partner ebay loves to do.  The hard part is you don't see this unless you dig down into each & every transaction.  Kudos to Ebay as a nice way of sneaking it by sellers..  Now I know there are those who will retort how great ebay is BLAH BLAH..    I had gone into my site preferences / shipping to try to stop this last year but somehow it became UNDONE.  I swear they do this on purpose.  So now yet again you have to back and really re check every option you click.. Just another day in Ebay funland to keep your butt in front of the computer longer than you need to be. 

[she-sells]

OH yeah I got NAILED $5 bucks international fee  - Buyer showed USA address that was freight forwarding co to middle east..  The tip off was the Arabic name & the screwball address in Maryland.. I looked up the address and it was a house lot..  Everything went  went fine I just don't like the idea EBAY puts the cost on seller.. Calling ebay which I did was a mute point - the CS reps don't care since they are the berlin wall to the policy makers.  You are correct CHECK EVERY FEE in your transactions not matter to what USA location especially the port cities.

[nocoolnamejane]

Most international buyers pay a conversion fee as well unless they have a credit card/bank account in USD.

eBay are only passing on to sellers the conversion fee imposed to them by banks and CC processors (not saying they don't take a cut, I don't know if they do or not, but that's how a business makes money so I wouldn't hold it against them).

It's the same as if I was travelling and going into a brick and mortar store to make a purchase. The store would pay a fee and I would pay a fee. I've travelled a lot in which seems like a long distant past, and I've never been refused a purchase because of that.

[sell-more]

Thanks,  Interesting not being overseas & a buyer  I would have never known they pay a fee as well...  Still I wish Ebay would warn us the fee is there at the time of sale so I can decide if I really want to proceed..   Just making you now look at every transaction means more time at computer 😞   

[eunster1313]

The International Fee has nothing to do with Currency Conversion fees.
If eBay has to convert the currency there is a separate fee for that.

Selling fees for managed payments sellershttps://www.ebay.com/help/selling/fees-credits-invoices/selling-fees-managed-payments-sellers?id=482... 

[sell-more]

I am just a US mainland seller.  I dont know why these sales are allowed to go through.  Any ideas?

[slippinjimmy]

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@sell-more wrote:

I am just a US mainland seller.  I dont know why these sales are allowed to go through.  Any ideas?

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Because the buyer......

1 - Has  a US shipping address from where their packages are forwarded to their home country.

2 - Lives (or is visiting) in  the US on a temp basis but they are still registered in their home country and using a non-us credit card.

eBay blocks on buyers are based on there you are SHIPPING to, not where the buyer is actually a resident.

The block is against the SHIPPING location not the buyer's nationality!

[klhmdg]

With PayPal sellers used to be able to block non US funds and not have to pay a conversion fee...

MP doesn’t let sellers do this and just takes the extra $ without notice that there will be any extra besides the 12.35%+.30 of the sale. 
Sellers should be able to choose  but we all know how that goes.

[slippinjimmy]

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@klhmdg wrote:

With PayPal sellers used to be able to block non US funds and not have to pay a conversion fee...

MP doesn’t let sellers do this and just takes the extra $ without notice that there will be any extra besides the 12.35%+.30 of the sale. 
Sellers should be able to choose  but we all know how that goes.

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Sellers NEVER pay conversion fees. If you list on .com the price MUST be in US Dollars and the buyer MUST pay in US Dollars, if they don't have US Dollars in their PayPal account they have to buy some from PayPal and pay a conversion fee.

As far as the International surcharge, PayPal has ALWAYS charged a similar fee, on PayPal it's currently 1.5%, on eBay under MP 1.65% (an extra 15 cents on a $100 sale).

As far as blocking buyers who have non-US PayPal accounts, are you aware that this block will also block the 20 - 30 MILLION temporary residents and visitors that are actually in the US at any given time (less during Covid of course).

[sell-more]

Agreed   I don't like the end around game ebay plays.  Its there way to get us to sell overseas in a round about way.  Using friends or relatives US addresses to have item shipped to is the way they get around this.  But if ebay wanted they could KEY off the payment address ( in my case it was Australia) and could shut it down so this would not happen..  But we know the Motto at ebay Its all about the buyer experience & the sellers pay for it some way shape or form.

[sell-more]

I do not care about the 20/30 million illegals.

[alcoforever]

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@sell-more wrote:

I do not care about the 20/30 million illegals.

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It is not the illegals you are blocking as they don't have credit cards.   It is the wealthy world travelers that are visiting the US that you are blocking.

If a business can't take a 1.65% hit on sales now and then, something is wrong with that business plan.

[pburn]

@sell-more 

The "temporary residents" and "visitors" referred to in an earlier post are not illegals.

[divwido]

I got hit with that once too and I don't ship outside the US.

[bimm_corp]

That's not the worst of it. Australia now levies a 10% Goods and Services Tax on all Aussie purchases from abroad. Your buyer was probably trying to avoid that tax by having his buddy send the item to him as a gift.