Buyers sending offers on fixed price listings, what do you guys do?

[birdsflowersanddogs]

Hello all,

i am getting more and more people sending email offers on items that are fixed price. Often it starts with asking a question and after I answer the question they ask if I will take $35 for something I am asking $50 for in a fixed price listing. Some of the offers are insulting they are so low. It is one reason that I don’t do many obo listings. Do you guys have any good ways of dealing with this? Sometimes I ignore them. I am getting irritated between this, non paying bidders, crazy dumb/picky questions and international buyers that think they are the exception to my no international shipping setting. Maybe I just needed to vent.

[greg_kurtz]

This is when the lowest of the bottom feeders slither out. Tell them you're not a charity, your price is the price and get lost if they don't like it.

[lewisburggold]

Looks like doing just fine.  We just humor them for the most part.  Most of the time you can tell if there are going to be too much we block them right away.  Best regards

[pingpong517]

if you don't want to add offers to the listing.. best is to just say no or delete and block them

if you add the offers ..you can set an auto decline price...and/or aut accept.... it will do most of the work for you... if they simple send a message.,..delete!

[a_c_green · Accepted solution]

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@birdsflowersanddogs wrote:

i am getting more and more people sending email offers on items that are fixed price. Often it starts with asking a question and after I answer the question they ask if I will take $35 for something I am asking $50 for in a fixed price listing.

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The first question may be a test to see if (1) you're going to respond promptly enough to make a round of haggling worthwhile, and (2) you're going to post your first Q&A exchange with them publicly in the listing by checking the box for that when you reply. That option is only offered to you for the first question from the buyer, not later replies, so they might burn it off by asking you some innocuous question first, to get that out of the way.

Their lower price doesn't obligate you to respond, accept or counteroffer, but since they know from your first respone that you're likely to answer somehow, I would just cut things off before they start with a short, polite reply such as "Thank you for offering, but our price is firm." That's it. No explanation is needed and none is owed. Repeat the same reply if they persist. I doubt they will. 

[dabunk2000]

Block and ignore. Low lifes are part of doing business on eBay

[lex-talon]

Just mention your price is non negotiable and block, rinse and repeat if you get more messages asking to lower your price.

[pargran3]

All of this is just part of doing business here. No need for it to be irritating or a cause of stress. Polite replies should be standard procedure.

There are, of course, exceptions. If a first communication is confrontational or snotty then the block and ignore function is useful. 

Radine

[lindyslucky]

We have had the question, then a question then an offer.

Did not realize it was "a thing".

Most buyers do nit understand how ebay works, or how high the fees can be, how thin the profit margin.

It would be nice if ebay educated the buyers a bit more.

But, we agree, just decline, thank them for their interest, say price is firm.

Never try to explain why. Doesn't matter.

[birdsflowersanddogs]

I had never realized how common this was until I started selling on eBay. Thanks for the responses. I try to respond politely, while gritting my teeth. I didn’t consider the sharing the reply side of it or the response time. I need to get better at not letting people irritate me. DH says it is the anonymity of the internet 😏.

[jerzee908]

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@lindyslucky wrote:

We have had the question, then a question then an offer.

Did not realize it was "a thing".

Most buyers do nit understand how ebay works, or how high the fees can be, how thin the profit margin.

It would be nice if ebay educated the buyers a bit more.

But, we agree, just decline, thank them for their interest, say price is firm.

Never try to explain why. Doesn't matter.

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Ebay could easily fix this, but choose not to.  If they can scan messages for stuff like selling outside of ebay, if the word "offer" pops up in a message on an item that has no best offer, they could have a window pop-up saying "Are you sure you want to message this seller about offers when they don't offer offers?"....or something along those lines.

The worst is the unwanted offer with the ever popular "and I want free shipping".  I don't have a Post Office fairy visit me at night that waves a wand over my packages and POOF, a label appears on all of them.

"Best Offers" are fine for those sellers that want to sell that way and have the time to entertain offers.....I don't have that time.  If I wanted to haggle over everything I do sell, I would just sell at flea markets, garage sales, swap meets, etc.......... 

[chrysylys]

I see these threads

I see the 'why are my sales down?'  threads.

I think ...  if sales are down, why not take these more seriously?  Or, if sellers took these more serioulsy, maybe their sales wouldn't be down.

But that's just me.

[syracusesemiconductors]

I have the "Best Offer" on most of my Fixed Price Listings and very often I get ridiculously low offers. Those buyers don't have a prayer with me. I won't lower the price for them at all.

A funny thing happened on a "Best Offer" I received on a listing I had a few years ago. 

I had something listed for $3 (count it: 3 bucks!) for an item that normally would sell for $6 or higher. I had the "Best Offer" enabled in hopes of selling multiple items to a buyer since I had a large stock of the item and I just wanted to sell off the inventory. I had no intention of reducing the price for just one item.

Sure enough, some clown offered $1 on - you guessed it - ONE item.

One dollar! Wow, now I can afford to retire!

I declined the ridiculous $1 offer.

True to greedy form, the so-called "buyer" came back and offered $2.

Aggrivated, this time I did more than merely decline. Not only did I refuse his second ridiculous offer, but immediately upon declining his second offer, I edited  the listing and RAISED the price to $5.50 for the item.

And guess what? The "buyer" sends me a message wanting to buy the item at $3 (the initial price of the listing)!!!

I told him NO!

I then thanked him for sending his offers because it made me realize I put too low of a price on the item and had he bought it at the $3 initially, I would have been obligated to honor the price. But now, he would have to pay the $5.50 price.

He didn't buy it (thankfully, because he would have been a feedback nightmare).

But I sure had fun tricking him!

How would I answer the offers you get? If they offer a ridiculously low amount, tell them you can sell it at 25% MORE than what the price is in the listing.

Believe me, it makes it a lot of fun.

[whatmorefabric]

Fabric runs a small profit margin and my prices are as low as I can go and make a profit.

I had one lady offer 5.00 a  yard  and free shipping for denim that is a pretty good seller.

I did my standard,  sorry but I do not take offers reply.     She came back with the single mom sob story about 1 page long.   I  wrote back that I can understand her pain.    I too was a single mom of 10 and every penny counted.

Of course,   I am single because my husband has his own house out of state and my kids are all grown.   

It is hard not to take things personal.   Just ignore or say no.

[cherry*fizz]

I just ignore them. Then I secretly smile when it sells for the full price I've listed. I try and be very competitive in my pricing, and I put a decent amount of time researching pricing, etc... I have to kind of admire them going for it, because I am guessing it works for them sometimes, but I ignore them because if I wanted to wheel and deal I would have "best offer" in my listings.