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eBay's seller fees are officially OUTRAGEOUS!!!
I've been a member of eBay for over 25 years and have educated myself and dealt with all the ups, downs and ridiculous changes.
I have known/opined that the seller fees have been getting more and more unacceptable. My latest transaction involved the sale of a book for $2.35. I did have a promotional/add fee of .35. BUT, the transaction fees were $1.40, over half the value of the sale price!! This made my NET earnings a whopping $0.85 after paying for shipping (and this doesn't include the cost of time and materials involved to ship the item). That translates to a "commission" of 65%!!! (or 54% w/o the add fee).
I know eBay won't give a hoot about this but this is more of a "heads-up" to fellow sellers...
If you sell ANYTHING for, I believe around $1.50 (even w/o the add fee...haven't done the math yet, just guesstimating), you will earn NOTHING on the sale and possibly even lose money which would definitely happen if you sold an item for less than that...even if using eBay's cheapest shipping method of the "standard envelope". Selling pretty much ANYTHING at ANY price will (again guesstimating) will end up costing you at least 30% of the sale price (again, not including cost of time and materials to ship).
monroe67
Mentor8 months ago"My latest transaction involved the sale of a book for $2.35. I did have a promotional/add fee of .35. BUT, the transaction fees were $1.40, over half the value of the sale price!! This made my NET earnings a whopping $0.85 after paying for shipping . . . ."
Could you have forgotten that eBay's Final Value Fee (FVF) in the Books category is 15.3%? That percentage is applied to the total paid by your buyer*. eBay also retains (keeps) a per-order fee of 30 cents on every sale that totals $10.00 or less. (That per-order fee goes up to 40 cents when the total sale is $10.01 and over.)
* The total paid by your buyer will usually include the price of the book, any sales taxes charged by the state where the book is delivered, and the shipping price shown in your listing. There is a chance that the buyer's state might also charge a delivery fee as well.
eBay does not require you to use their Promoted Listing feature, but you have chosen to do so. If you had not agreed to pay eBay 35 cents for the sale of that book, your net earnings would have been $1.20. You might want to rethink using that Promoted Listing feature on any of your other low-priced listings.
You did, apparently validly, ship that book via USPS Media Mail, so you were able to save yourself (and your buyer) a dollar or two there.
"Selling pretty much ANYTHING at ANY price will . . . will end up costing you at least 30% of the sale price. . . ."
My selling ID routinely estimates 70% of my listing prices as a rough estimate of my net earnings, meaning an estimate that eBay will retain 30% of the listing price. Sometimes eBay keeps less and very rarely do they keep more than 30%. That calculation helps me make decisions about pricing the items I list.
(BTW, I do not use any level of eBay's Promoted Listings.)
gundy
OP8 months agoThank you for the reply.
Yes, I understand all of the fees that are included in the final sale; fixed price, final value fee, ad fee, and if there are any other fees. All these fees are included in my total seller fees that I stated. Ebay used to charge the final value fee that included the sales tax and shipping charges but not sure if they still do. If they do, that is COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE since the seller NEVER sees any additional benefit from those charges.
The shipping charge is automatically deducted from your buyer's payment regardless of the method. The seller is required to state in their listing the shipping method with weight and dimensions which automatically determines the ACTUAL cost of the shipping. So this ends up being a "wash" as the buyer pays the stated shipping charge which the seller then pays to whatever shipping company they selected for the actual amount paid by the buyer. It doesn't save the buyer or seller anything.
No state charges an additional delivery fee, never have, what you pay for postage for SHIPPING IN THE USA is the actual cost (don't even get me started on international shipping charges, fees, etc....).
ALSO, the seller of the item determines the amount of the add fee from 1% to whatever. I always list my items with a nominal add fee of 5% (even though ebay always "recommends" a much higher add fee, of course). I don't mind discounting my item price by 5% since I get most of my sales by using the promotion and it probably increases the chances that the item shows up near the top in the default "best match" search when a buyer does a search.
And you did confirm that in general, the seller fees are 30% of the selling price which I stated.
jacbarcollectibles
Mentor8 months agoYes, there are a few states that charge a separate delivery fee for items delivered to their State. They have some very creative names for the fee. Right now Colorado and Minnesota charge a Retail Delivery Fee and there are several other states that are considering the imposition of these types of fees. Theses fees are charged on top of any Sales taxes on the item.
gundy
OP8 months agoWOW!! THAT'S CRAZY!! WHY!!
I looked it up and you are correct (my apologies to the previous responder).
So Colorado charges an additional .29 fee on all deliveries of taxable items.
Minnesota charges .50 additional for taxable items over $100 (with some exceptions).
And several other states are currently evaluating doing the same.
"Legislators in Hawaii, Indiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Nebraska, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington have introduced or discussed similar fees, often to offset declining fuel tax revenue."
That's because the cost of gas (national average) is predicted to remain relatively low and maybe go lower during 2026 primarily due to the oversupply of oil.
Big Brother/Uncle Sam is going to get their $$ no matter what or how ridiculous the method is...
Maybe all those folks that threaten to move to Canada during every election year are on the right track?!?!