mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999
@lifetime-deals wrote:I just sold an item for $179.99. Ebay took $12.5% and I ended up with $147, then I have to pay $15 shipping! Ebay is making it very hard for SELLERS (not themselves) to profit! I have a hard time selling even a blu-ray movie because Ebay takes so much, plus shipping and what others sell them for! Then, they have the nerve to charge us for taxes paid to each state! Who does that?
I am not even high volume and I now know that I can never be because fees are way too much to profit from. I guess I will have to make sure that I am very careful about what I buy so I won't have to sell. Raising prices to try to compensate for this rip-off makes it even harder to sell.
What are you talking about? Of course Ebay took 12.5% in fees. Did you not look at the seller fees policy before setting your pricing?
As for shipping, Ebay has NEVER made any claims that they pay for your shipping to your buyer. The seller is who gets paid by the BUYER for the cost of shipping, so why in the world would you think Ebay is going to pay for that?
If you are using free shipping and you aren't adding into into your product price to cover that, that is on the Seller, not Ebay. As we all know shipping cost real money. It is part of the cost of sales that has to be rolled into the price of whatever you are selling along with all fees, packaging materials, product costs, etc.
There are over 19 million active sellers on this site. It is likely that most sell at a profit or there would be no reason for them to be here. If you aren't making as much profit as you like, then you need to look at how YOU are pricing your stuff. The Ebay fees are clearly stated on the seller fee page, so there is no reason for them to catch you by surprise.
@lifetime-deals wrote:You must work for Ebay, trying to justify these crazy fees. Ebay says it can take from zero to (I think) 25%. There are other websites that people can buy from - namely AMAZON, with cheaper pricing, so Ebay's fees hurt sellers and will hurt Ebay in the long run when smaller sellers will have to leave or go to a pawn shop and get ripped off in person.
Who wrote that Ebay pays for shipping? I did write that Amazon chips in with shipping costs, but factoring in shipping and Ebay's outrageous fees can make the price way too high for a buyer, to the point that they might as well buy new - or from Amazon.
Ebay has 19M sellers, but I am sure that will fall after a while. I see some who sell on Amazon and sell the products for less on Amazon because they sell quicker and their fees are strong, but they chip in on the shipping which helps to cut down. So you stay arrogant and get your money, while sellers continue to drop. Ebay is lucky that Google has not come with their auction site.
I also noticed that you did not comment on Ebay charging FEES on state sales taxes that the buyer pays! Is that fair? Is that even legal? I understood charging fee on shipping since Chinese sellers would sell products for a penny and charge $5 shipping - even if it should have been on a case by case basis, but charging people fees for state demands? Good luck keeping this up.
Because someone disagrees with you does NOT mean they work for Ebay. This is such a ridiculous statement. ALL Ebay employees posts have the Ebay logo on it and are outlined in Blue.
This is a member to member forum and sometimes, but not often and Ebay employee with pop into help.
NOPE there is NO policy that says Ebay charges a 25% fee.
It would likely be helpful for you to review the Seller Fee Policy page for a seller that does not have a store such as yourself.
https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/fees-credits-invoices/selling-fees?id=4822#section8
As for Amazon. Sure some things are less expensive there to purchase and others cost more. It is a mixed bag. But as far as the cost to sell there for small sellers such as you or I, it is far more expensive to sell on Amazon in many categories than it is here. I sell on Amazon too, I have to sell for higher prices there due to the additional fee rates.
Amazon does NOT "chip" in on shipping costs unless you are a much larger seller that will use those services and likely have to have Amazon store your inventory for you as well. Ebay has no such programs. Because we all ship from our own locations. There is no way for Ebay to offer such a program like Amazon does until Ebay starts opening their locations to store our inventory and where they will ship our orders out.
Yes there has been many posters that have guessed that because of MP that the active seller count would significantly change. It will be interesting to see what the 4th quarter 2021 numbers will be now that just about all of them if not all of them are now in MP. But for the 2nd Q 2021 when we were likely to have about half the sellers onboarded, we gained over a million sellers. In the 3rd Q of 2021 we held steady at 19 million.
It is legal for them to charge their fees on the Sales tax, just as it was always legal for PayPal to do it. But I'm with you, I don't like it much. However overall, in a months time it does not increase my fees overall. And that is because not all sales tax rates are equal as well as for any sale you get without sales tax on it your FVFs are much lower and not just because there is no fee on the sales tax but because the primary fee structure is lower than it was before we went into MP.
If you compare your fees on a monthly basis since you have been in MP to what it would have been before MP you would likely see that it is a very neutral change to your overall costs. I did this for a six month period and each and every month it worked out this way. So I don't care much about how much it costs on individual sales but my sales overall.
The fees in MP have NOT increased overall fees. The following numbers represent those that do not have a store and the fee rate for most common categories [not all].
Fees BEFORE going into MP
10.20% FVF + 2.9% PP fees = 13.10% plus 30 cent per transaction fee.
In MP the fees are:
10.20% FVF + 2.35% money processing fee paid to MP = 12.55% plus a 30 cent per transaction fee.
Starting August 2nd, PayPal is raising their fees, so they will be as follows:
10.20 Ebay FVF + 3.49 PP Fee = 13.69% plus .49 cent Per Transaction fee
PP is apparently offering different fees to different sellers, likely depending on size. From what I've seen it is between 2.59% and 3.49%.
Because Ebay doesn't work for you, it is a bit unfair to wish it to go away for them MILLIONS of other buyers and sellers that the site does work for. A 12.9% fee on the total amount the buyer pays is not the biggest fee charged by sites similar to Ebay nor is it the lowest. Something to consider is what is most important to you. The amount you pay in fees or the amount you get in sales. Often times by going with a smaller less expensive site you also give up some sales too because the coverage just isn't as good.
