Any other way I could have done this?

[sharingtheland]

Talk about an all-day wrangling ...

Had a buyer who wanted all 10 lots of similar widgets.  One lot was very large and priced accordingly more than the others.  We went back and forth all day on price for buying all I had.

So, many ebay messages plus having to know where she lived, to figure shipping, without asking for a zip code that could look like - horrors! - I was attempting an off-ebay sale.  

So, after all was agreed I told her I'd adjust the prices of the lots so that all would add up to the final number but I had to know when she was online because almost all of the lots had watchers and I've had other people snatch private sales before.

She suggested I just put the one big price on the one big lot and I really, really wanted to do that and not mess with revising all listings and worrying about someone else swooping in to purchase...but...I told her if I ended the other 9 listings all at once I could be severely spanked by ebay.

If I did just one lot, it would have been the large one and the new price would have been higher and ebay would get the fees on the adjusted higher number and we were communicating (a lot) through the large lot listing, not any of the others...but...I was very concerned about ending 9 very similar listings at the same time.

Am I too paranoid?  The price we agreed on was of course less (not by much, but less) than the total of the 10 lots originally.  I know I've confused everyone already but just think how it would have gone trying to explain to CS that yes, I ended the listings but yes, ebay still got fees.

And this is a different buyer who wanted to buy all I had of another category of widgets.  (I must have good widgets.)  That buyer has faded off, of course, after hours and hours of working with her.

And my daughter doesn't believe me when I say I'm retiring ... sheesh ...

[castlemagicmemories]

---

wrote:

The 'bots are ambivalent about my presence but as an experienced (TV) criminal lawyer I ensure that I never say, write or do anything that could be construed as "illegal".

---

[theshoppingmom2]

---

wrote:

Add best offer to the listings, with the buyer making the agreed upon offer for each lot, which you would accept. Send a combined invoice for all  with any shipping adjustments made to the invoice.

---

^^^^ Love this

[sharingtheland]

Thanks all for the ideas, everyone.  (I'm not retired yet).

I felt like I was about to lose the sale after all-day negotiations and communications and buyer really wanted to do one single purchase, not 10.  So, adding Best Offer and buyer going through all that and then adjusting invoice - wouldn't that take as much time as just adjusting prices on 10 listings?  

As stated, I'm an IPR Gal and Invoice Novice.

Jimmy, I've done some purely-innocent-but-in-the-eyes-of-ebay-naughties and never ever received a warning about anything.  There's always a first time, though.

What infuriates me is even having to think about all of this.  

[craftysandy1961]

If your initial listings are BIN, then I think you could end them with no repercussions.  I have had a similar circumstance and I just end the listings, create a new one that says FOR PUT YOUR NAME HERE and then send them the item number so they can find it easily.  

I thought that you could end BIN any time, but it was auctions that you can't end within 12 hours and if you ended a bunch of them before that I suppose you may fall under scrutiny.  

If I have a couple hundred BINs and ended them all due to a family emergency or something -- or going on vacation for three months, say (I like that scenario), would I be in trouble with ebay?  I really thought you could end BIN items anytime you wanted.  

[myangelandmyprincess]

I do think you were being too paranoid.  If these were fixed priced listings then ending them wouldn't have done anything.  I cancel fixed priced listings all the time when I go out of town.