Selling rebuilt parts....how do you handle the core deposit?

[autosol15]

I sell rebuilt auto parts, which require a core deposit.   If I add the deposit into the price, most buyers will scroll right past it since the price is listed as double what it should be.   eBay advised me (over a year ago) to set up another item as the core deposit and link it in the description, which I've been doing and it works relatively well, except when the buyer returns the core and I refund the deposit, eBay is logging it as an "out of stock cancellation" defect transaction, which result in 6% higher fees once my defect transactions get over a certain percent.  

Ebay doesn't seem to have any sort of resolution to this.   Any ideas?

[slippinjimmy]

When you do a refund/cancellation you are asked for the reason, what reason  are you selecting?

Buyer Requested would be the appropriate one given how limited the choices are.

[itscalledapostingid]

Technically a listing can't require someone to purchase something else. That would be a listing violation and grounds for the listing to be removed so I am surprised ebay recommended that.

[autosol15]

I started selecting "buyer return", and that issue seems to be better now. 

Another issue is that while there is a field to enter a core deposit in the listing...ebay doesn't do much with it past that.   They don't bill it, it's just there.  

I don't know why  ebay recommended I set up another item for the deposit, but I've been doing it for almost 2 years and aside from the fact that buyers don't read the description and I have to contact them (which is a good trick sometimes) to explain whats going on....it seems to work.   Very time consuming chasing down buyers to get them to read the whole description though.