Transaction Fees

[beacha-84]

First of all, I am having a blast selling my unwanted items on EBAY.  This is my garage sale without giving up full days and keeping items out of the landfill.

My question, is.....with the postage rate hike, I can definitely see any money back to me, less and less. I would like to propose for those items that are posted under 10.00-15.00 (which includes postage) that we get a reduced transaction fee.  I totally get posting fee, but the transaction fee really bites with the postage fee included...or another option, only administer the transaction fee to the item price and not include the postage.

Would like to send this idea forward to EBAY, but, not sure where to send this.

[luckythewinner · Accepted solution]

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@beacha-84 wrote:

Would like to send this idea forward to EBAY, but, not sure where to send this.

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There is a written policy about submitting unsolicited ideas to eBay: they do not accept them:

"At eBay, we appreciate comments from our members on our products and services. But we have a long-standing policy of not accepting unsolicited suggestions, ideas, or proposals."

https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/member-behavior-policies/unsolicited-idea-submissions-policy?id=4...

That being said, I suspect eBay constantly hears from sellers who want to pay less in fees.

[gb58]

This topic has been discussed many, many times on this board. 

The FVF is based on the total amount of the sale... item price, shipping, and also sales tax.

One of the reasons ebay began charging a fee on the shipping, was because some sellers used the "no fee on shipping" as a way around paying any fees to ebay.  They would sell expensive items very cheaply ($1 for example) but charge a very inflated shipping charge ($100 or more for example).

If you find the fees are cutting into the profits on your sales, either raise your selling prices, raise your shipping charges, or add a small handling fee to every item. 

If you are offering free shipping, remember, nothing is free, and you need to figure into the selling price, how much the shipping will be to the farthest destination. 

[dbfolks166mt]

     You only have 11 items out of the 402 that you have posted that have free shipping where I am assuming the shipping cost is baked into the price. This is one of the down sides to using free shipping unless you have rate tables setup you have to adjust your pricing every USPS makes a price change or be subjected to lower returns. The advantage to using calculated shipping is the increase is automatically picked up and passed along to the buyer. 

     EBay is likely going to do nothing due to the overhead and cost to implement a change like this.  How long would they leave it up for, who would it be applied to (consider the entire eBay seller community) and are you expecting them to do this time every shipping service changes their rates? 

[chapeau-noir]

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@beacha-84 wrote:

First of all, I am having a blast selling my unwanted items on EBAY.  This is my garage sale without giving up full days and keeping items out of the landfill.

My question, is.....with the postage rate hike, I can definitely see any money back to me, less and less. I would like to propose for those items that are posted under 10.00-15.00 (which includes postage) that we get a reduced transaction fee.  I totally get posting fee, but the transaction fee really bites with the postage fee included...or another option, only administer the transaction fee to the item price and not include the postage.

Would like to send this idea forward to EBAY, but, not sure where to send this.

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@beacha-84  They used to have a 5% FVF tier for media but got rid of it and rolled media into everything else which was tough on people selling cheap media, like myself. That's the only time I've seen any real price mark-down on anything (they have different rates in their byzantine rates table, but they're all within 0.5 or 1%). So many items here sell for so little that I'm thinking eBay won't want to let go of those pennies.

The popular solution (which I have used here) is not to sell cheap, heavy items and save them for local online sites, craigslist, etc. (to avoid the yard sale hassle).

[1786davycrockett]

@beacha-84 

You mean -- you want eBay to cut into their PROFITS?!?

Bite your tongue.

[albertabrightalberta]

@beacha-84 

If you're not making enough money with your item and shipping prices, you need to either raise the prices of the items or the charge for shipping enough to make up for the increased postal fees. 

[adkhighker]

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@beacha-84 wrote:

First of all, I am having a blast selling my unwanted items on EBAY.  This is my garage sale without giving up full days and keeping items out of the landfill.

My question, is.....with the postage rate hike, I can definitely see any money back to me, less and less. I would like to propose for those items that are posted under 10.00-15.00 (which includes postage) that we get a reduced transaction fee.  I totally get posting fee, but the transaction fee really bites with the postage fee included...or another option, only administer the transaction fee to the item price and not include the postage.

Would like to send this idea forward to EBAY, but, not sure where to send this.

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Be careful what you wish for.  By proposing your idea to have lower fees for items for items "under 10.00-15.00," knowing how the great minds at eBay think, they would probably realize that they are making less money on sellers with cheaper transactions than they make on sellers selling expensive items.  So, after they go hmmmmm, instead of lowering your fees, they'd probably double them and lower the fees for more expensive transactions.

[johnrj1226]

My suggestion is don't sell low priced/low profit items - like stuff in the $10 range and don't start your auctions at 99 cents - 'cause you might have to ship it at that price or you could not ship it and earn a defect on your seller performance - collect too many eBay will put you in their history book.

[mam98031]

@beacha-84 

Why would it be Ebay's responsibility to pay some of your costs of sales, shipping?  It is not Ebay's responsibility.  So Ebay needs to make less so you can make more??

You need to raise your pricing to accommodate the rate increases or move away from Free Shipping and go to stated shipping.

The $5 price you have on some of your items with Free Shipping will not even cover your costs between shipping, packaging materials and Ebay fees.  They should be $5 with stated shipping IMHO.

[chapeau-noir]

I think OP is working on the concept of microtransactions which, if memory serves, used to be done here, but at a much lower dollar threshold in certain categories.  And fees are already scaled at the top end ("What??? eBay makes less just because you make more???"), so this isn't a bad question at all. It's probably not feasible, though, with eBay's current monetization strategy ("Every Pixel Counts") - they probably prune the top end because they'll lose that business if they don't.

[susanb1872]

I see you are selling a DVD without a case and will ship it in an envelope for 87 cents shipping. The post office will not like that since items in envelopes must be flexible to be go through the sorting machines. Seems like it will get broken in the machines and it should go as media mail in a stiff envelope or box.

[beacha-84]

Thankyou for passing the policy info to me.

[beacha-84]

Thankyou for the history...and understanding how people abused and got around  the fees in earlier times. I most certainly will adjust my look at pricing, just trying to give customers the best in shipping.

[4pawsup*]

Me too, i am having a blast selling on ebay as well. As for the increase in shipping on $15 and $10 items the cost is negligible.