I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s angry. It’s about the “final value fee.”
So… let’s say I sold an old record. LP. Let’s say I get $50 for it. The buyer pays for the shipping; I only ship priority for items like that. So the buyer pays $8 to ship. Now they pay tax. I’m in Chicago, so it’s pretty high. But I’ll say 10%. So the buyer pays $5 in tax. That’s a total of $63 dollars. But…of course, the $8 is going to postage. And the tax goes…well, I won’t speculate. But obviously, that’s money I don’t see. Fine.
Then what’s the item’s final value? $50. That’s my earnings.
But when figuring out my seller fee for this (and everything I sell. Everything. Every time.) do they take their fee from the $50 it sold for? NO!!
Their “final value” figure that eBay uses? It’s taken from everything the buyer had to pay. 12.5%-15% is their “cut.” And the sum they use is $63. So I’m paying a commission on the taxes paid, that I don’t get. And the SHIPPING, which goes to the shipper.
So their “take” (using 15%) is $9.45, instead of the REAL final value which would make their cut $7.50.
They’re charging commission on the TAX PAID! (and the shipping charge that does NOT go into my wallet.)
When I called eBay’s ridiculously complicated customer support, (“support,” That’s a good one), after literally 8 minutes of listening to their ‘helpful” automated voice, I finally get a guy. I’m not even going to go into how rude he was, or even WHERE he was answering my call from. So I explain my problem. I said “You’re charging me a fee on a tax! That’s like taxing tax! You can’t do that!”
I swear, his response was “Yes. We. Can.”
Wow.
I cannot believe sellers, small sellers like me, are okay with that. The final value should be, and IS, what the item sold for. Not what the buyer pays. In my estimation from my example, they’re taking $1.95 TOO MUCH.
Really eBay. You guys need that money?
Am I the only one angry about this?
