mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999
OMG you do realize that we have been paying this fee now for about 13 years, right?!?!?! It is standard in the industry that the FVFs are calculated on the shipping a buyer pays to the seller. Other sites have been doing it longer than Ebay has.
Ebay does NOT take a fee on the cost of the label. Ebay has never done that and they don't do it now.
Ebay's FVF is on the TOTAL amount the buyer pays to the seller, period.
Keep in mind that if Ebay did not charge the FVF on the shipping when stated separately, it would be very unfair to sellers with Free Shipping that have to roll the cost into the price of their product. They would be unfairly paying more in fees than those that stated shipping separately.
@ed8108 wrote:
They need to pay themselves salaries to afford the lifestyles promised by the American dream.
How is the Ebay opportunity for wealth creation doing for you these days ?
Are you of the opinion that this is an Ebay specific / only type of fee?
"An alternative could be they don't pass along the eBay discount at all and we pay full retail on shipping." Unlikely they would do that as Ebay is not the only site we can purchase electronic shipping from. There are plenty of places we can purchase labels. But lets remember Ebay does NOT charge their fees on the amount WE as sellers pay for shipping. We are charged on the amount a BUYER pays us for shipping. Often those amounts are different.
"The fees might be high, but the alternative might be even higher." Higher than what exactly? What are you comparing them to in order to judge them as higher fees?
"In reality we all should be charging buyers a handling fee for cost of boxes , packing marterials and the eBay fees on taxes and shipping...but we don't in order to keep our cost competitive. " I do and I have for years. A small handling fee that sometimes doesn't cover all the costs you outline, so I have to throw that in the price of the product. But I do account for those costs in my pricing.
"Interesting question, lets say to avoid paying fees on shipping cost, we forego the eBay shipping discounts and charge full over the counter shipping costs, how many of us would go the more expensive route for buyers in order to save our portion of the FVF?" I do not pass the shipping savings onto the buyer. That discount and the small handling fee I have on the shipping is what covers me on those fees you mention in the previous paragraph.
@sakic92710 wrote:Simply because they are just another greedy corp. who, long ago, found a loophole to take more money from people without having to provide any service to "earn" that profit. They will not change it no matter what. It is the same way with the Canadian PO. To make up for lost income, they wanted to charge people for sending emails. Instead, they worked it out by adding fuel charges to your cost.
No one found a "loophole". All or most sites like Ebay charge their FVF on the shipping charged to the buyer. This isn't a new conversation. You are correct, they aren't going to change it.
I always find it odd that some sellers call Ebay "greedy". They are a for profit corporation. It is why they exist. It is the American way, we are a Capitalist country. Now what is odd here to me is that Sellers come to Ebay for the very same reason. To make a profit. So that would mean Sellers are "greedy" too. It is the same thing.
