eBay

bottlerocketrecordsbooks · ‎10-04-2023

I sold 5 items last week for 92.23... eBay fees plus taxes collected were 59.17 which left me with a net of 33.06... I charged 4.90 for shipping for each item: 4.90 x 5 = 24.50.

With postage backed out (33.06 - 24.50) that left me with a total of 8.56. COGS was 5.00.

Pretend profit: 3.56 --- doesn't include gasoline used to find items, nor the time value.

Yeah, I don't think this is gonna be working for me... lol

mtgraves7984 · ‎10-04-2023

If it's any consolation, your buyers paid the shipping costs. That's all I got.

susanb1872 · ‎10-04-2023

Does the $92.23 include the sales tax?

bottlerocketrecordsbooks · ‎10-04-2023

I don't know if you can see that photo or not...

lakefor94 · ‎10-04-2023

Might be a serious problem with your business model. I did notice the buyer pays the shipping costs. Are you charging the buyer enough to cover all those costs?

The math in your post needs work. Other than that, selling items for $20 is not going to create much profit especially if your buyer is not paying enough to cover actual shipping costs.

Make sure to investigate the total, broken down costs in All Transactions under the Payments tab.

Posting ID

lisa5768 · ‎10-04-2023

Your selling costs include any postage you purchased through eBay labels, any subscriptions you have like store fees and your eBay FVF. If you scroll further down the page to below the bar graph to Selling costs you can expand the entries and see exactly what is included in that number.

With postage backed out (33.06 - 24.50) that left me with a total of 8.56.

Your net is the $33.06 not $8.56 You subtracted the shipping labels from you net twice.

lisa5768
Volunteer Community Mentor

asset_liquidators · ‎10-04-2023

Your seller fees are 57.8%? You are doing something seriously wrong!

bottlerocketrecordsbooks · ‎10-04-2023

But, what?!?!? I mean, I'm not buying shipping labels from eBay, so it feels like I'm just getting GOUGED by eBay for fees... I don't get it...

12345jamesstamps · ‎10-04-2023

Most of my items are $1.98 with free shipping. I am not complaining.

I don't need tracking for something inexpensive or repeat buyers. So a .66 stamp works for me.

Every now and then I sell an expensive item.

And I have "Express Payouts" which I get if there are "available funds".

I also buy under retail for postage which I buy on eBay and can use.

If you sell similar items...your business model should be "repeat buyers".

I do it for extra cash and for fun....not to make a living from it.

Never give up.

dbfolks166mt · ‎10-04-2023

I am unsure if the $92.23 is the total cost paid by the buyer or just the total of your selling prices. Looking at your most recent sales for most of them you accepted an offer so I can't run the numbers but for the following item I was able to do so. One thing I did note was the items ship media mail. What the buyer pays for media mail is what the seller is going to pay to purchase the actual label since there is no discounted shipping on media mail. With calculated shipping the buyer generally sees full retail shipping costs but the seller gets the discounted rate when they purchase the label and the difference is usually sufficient to cover the FVF's on the shipping and the packing material. You may want to consider adding a handling charge to your items that are shipping media mail to cover those fees.

The following shows one of your items and a cost breakdown of the fees and your net payout from eBay. Of course out of that net comes other costs, COGS, Federal and State Income taxes, sourcing, etc.

ci1000 · ‎10-04-2023

I just clicked on a similar report in my seller hub, located under "payments/reports" My report shows the same insane figures you are seeing in your report because my store fee of $59.95 is include in the summary along with all of the standard fees. This will definitely skew your percentage.

In the report I accessed, under the expenses category, you can click on "fees" and see exactly what is included.

isaiah53-57 · ‎10-04-2023

@bottlerocketrecordsbooks wrote:
I sold 5 items last week for 92.23... eBay fees plus taxes collected were 59.17 which left me with a net of 33.06... I charged 4.90 for shipping for each item: 4.90 x 5 = 24.50.
With postage backed out (33.06 - 24.50) that left me with a total of 8.56. COGS was 5.00.
Pretend profit: 3.56 --- doesn't include gasoline used to find items, nor the time value.
Yeah, I don't think this is gonna be working for me... lol

@bottlerocketrecordsbooks

I dread to think of how many sellers there are out there in the same boat you are in. Not accounting for their time and expenditures and in return not having a clue as to how much true profit they are generating for themselves

That aside, I'm going to do a a little speculating and try to find more profit for you based on more realistic numbers because the numbers on that sales record page are accounted very strangely...

You show total sales of $92.23

The tax is collected separately(you still pay a fee on it though), so for now,

your Top Line is still $92.23

Looks like you paid $5 for the items and $33 for shipping = $38

Line adjustment of $38 for Shipping and Acquisition costs = $54.23

ebay fees are 13.25% of the ENTIRE 5 SALES($92.23) + 5 separate .30 cent Transaction Fees = approx $14.50

Line adjustment of $14.50 for fees = $39.73

So your Bottom Line after the costs of your Product, Shipping and Fees is $39.73....Right?

In order for you to be left with only $3, you would have needed to promote your listings at over 30% to incur an additional $36 in fees to end up with $3 profit.... Did you even use Promoted listings?

dbfolks166mt · ‎10-04-2023

Without more specific details and making some assumptions that the $92.23 was the total value of all the sold items not including sales tax. Taking an average 10% sales tax rate and assuming your actual shipping cost was $24.50 the numbers look somewhat like the following. Are you using promoted listings?

greatmidwestcoin · ‎10-04-2023

Sell coins. Lower eBay fee, smaller shipping packages, less shipping costs, consistent size inventory. Real simple. I've been doing it for over 23 years. Over $2 mil in sales and $150k in eBay fees. And yes, I started out with nothing. This is not my main selling ID.