Ebay is taking more than 50% in fees on some of my sales
Summary: The discussion revolves around concerns regarding excessive fees on sales conducted through an online platform. artistauctionsintl initiates the conversation mentioning that the platform is taking more than 50% in fees on some of their sales. Several participants join the thread, including femmefan1946, intimewithmusic, and recped, expressing similar encounters and frustration towards the fee structure. The thread consists of multiple back-and-forth responses, but no concrete resolution or advice is provided by the participants regarding how to address the fee issue.
eBay is taking more than 50% in fees on some sales. This has to be addressed and corrected, it is predatory and in violation of fees outlined in the user agreement.
23 comments
hansatrade
·5 months agoEbay has introduced the FVF on both - item and shipping - because some "smart" sellers started to list $100 items with $5 S/H as $5 items with $95 S/H - expecting the FVF will be based on the item's value only.
mrdutch1001
·5 months ago"has introduced the FVF on both" >that is ancient history>>>eBay has been charging fvf on entire transaction for many many years now...(like about 10 years or more!)
recped
·5 months ago15 years! and everyone that was around then has forgotten that regular FVF's were reduced at the same time.
While the "fee avoiders" get mentioned often very few comment on how this change leveled the playing field for sellers who wanted to offer "free shipping" (shipping included) who had always paid fees on shipping.
The change to fees on shipping with overall reductions in the percentages had almost no effect on the eBay Take Rate, eBay's total revenue from fees went up but not because of fees on shipping but rather the, at the time, steady increase in Gross Sales that were happening in the following 5 or 6 years.
marnotom!
·5 months agoOn a somewhat different note, but more related to the original post, I can't help but wonder what direction this thread would have taken if the OP had complained that they'd been charged $2.39 in eBay fees?
mrdutch1001
·5 months ago"This has to be addressed and corrected, it is predatory and in violation of fees outlined in the user agreement."
The only thing that needs to be addressed and corrected is your understanding of fees and how they are calculated as has been shown by other comments here, as well as the understanding that not everything is a good fit for selling on eBay...not everything is worthwhile to list on eBay. Some things are best sold on other sites and/or locally.
recped
·5 months agoThe way to adress and correct this is to not sell $5 items with $10 shipping.
Maybe you need to study the fee schedule a little more closely, what they charged you is exactly what they say they will charge you.
ricarmic
·5 months agoJust a side note to recped's comment, which is true EXCEPT when you sell a $5 item with free domestic shipping and a $10 shipping international charge and it is purchased internationally. In that case the FVF is ONLY on the $5 because the FVF is based on the item price plus the (free) domestic rate (noting that because it is free shipping the domestic shipping is built into the item price). This is why I've favoured free shipping (even up to bankers boxes sized lots) for the domestic market ever since this rule came into place likely over 10 years ago.....
femmefan1946
·5 months agoCharging fee on the customer's ENTIRE payment has been the financial industry standard for payment processing since Diner's Club invented the credit card in the 1950s.
It's one reason why you sometimes see small businesses with signs "no debit or credit cards on purchases under $X.xx . The fees on such sales are higher than the profit.
intimewithmusic
·5 months agoHi.
I'm not sure you're comparing apples with apples. Moneris for example will charge a small smoke shop a higher processing fee for the same sale amount than, say the Dollarama next door. Retail credit card processing fees are based on volume and whether or not the merchant negotiates a better deal.
When I had the music store I paid them 3%. They raised it to 4.5% and we settled on around 3.5%. Some but not all of the reasons stores put signs up limiting credit card amounts is because they're cheap or they may have been banned by their processor or possibly they want to encourage buyers to pay cash that goes underneath the cash register drawer not in it.
I can't say for sure if it was provincial or federal pressure back in the day but there was a time processors forced you to remove purchase amount limiting signs. I don't know if they are permitted any more but I do know you don't want your card processor to ban you which is why most honour a sale of any amount.
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I know you already know the following but please forgive me if I clarify this for newer sellers;
The credit processing service eBay charges us for (Master card, Visa, Amex etc) is non negotiable to sellers and it's included in their final value fees. In 2011 eBay extended the final value fees from being based on the widget's sale amount to also encompassing the total sale amount including shipping and taxes. It's actually only since 2011 our fees encompassed the "total sale" unlike those nasty processors like Moneris and Amex. We never got anything more we just paid more.
For new sellers this is why eBay said they made the change; (from AI)
"Before 2011, eBay only charged fees on the item's sale price. This led many sellers to use fee avoidance tactics, such as listing a valuable item for $0.99 while charging an inflated shipping fee (e.g., $50) to keep the majority of the profit fee-free. By applying the fee to the total transaction amount (item price + shipping + handling), eBay closed this loophole. Today, the eBay final value fee remains a percentage-based fee calculated on the total amount paid by the buyer, which typically includes the item price, shipping, handling, and applicable sales tax."
All eBay would have to do to "close the loophole" is cap or maximize a seller's shipping charges to the same price EIS charges which are already set up in their system. They could add a simple listing rejection like "Hey you, you're shipping charges exceed ours (EIS)!" ...something like the rejection you get when you list but choose a wrong service or forget to fill in the weight.
That said I think it's clear we all know why that will happen only when pigs can fly! 🐖🐷😉 wink wink nudge nudge...
transtraders
·5 months agoWhen I list a heavy DVD box set on ebay.com in the DVD catagory, it rejects me when I try to put shipping higher than, I believe, $20 USD. So ebay is already able, and has in fact implemented, a cap on shipping in some catagories. There is no reason they cannot do a hard cap on shipping fees across the board. So that excuse to use the total sale amount for fee calcualtion is TOTAL BS!
ypdc_dennis
·5 months agoOne way that ebay could provide shipping fee relief (and not have fee avoidence) would be to give a FVF credit for shipping purchased through eBay Labels. Of course, that would be of no help to those of us who use other shipping methods -- but it would allow eBay to know what the seller actually paid for shipping versus what the seller charged the buyer.
A hard cap on shipping fees will not fly, there are lots of sellers who are willing to game the system by having low product price with high shipping cost if that will save them fees.
Side note: ebay.com's cap on shipping for books/dvds was brought in (20 years ago?) as response to amazon's flat rates that amazon's 3rd party sellers (at the time) had to use when selling media products. One of eBay's dumber responses to the amazon empire.
femmefan1946
·5 months agoThere is no reason they cannot do a hard cap on shipping fees across the board.
And that cap is why I list on dotCA rather than dotCOM.
Selling books limited me to charging (as I recall) $3.50 maximum for shipping.
But my books ranged from thin 1950s paperbacks to 300 page hardbacks weighing over a kilo.
Same cap on shipping fees.
And I could not ship by letter rate to the USA from Canada. So my minimum for shipping was going to be (again as I recall) $8-10.
Same with AZ, who also put a cap on shipping. My prices there were much higher than on eBay to cover my costs. Oddly this did not make me the most expensive seller on any given title. Because my books were in short supply, they were often the cheapest even with the price raised to cover costs.
intimewithmusic
·5 months ago@femmefan1946 The increased FVF to 15.3% on Books and Magazines slipped under my radar. As you say their weight generally requires a high shipping cost and often more expensive packaging because the item is rare. Add to that Promoted Listings fees. All of that goes into the total value of the sale.
Ouch!
flipistics
·5 months agoIt'll be interesting to see if eBay brings to the USA and Canada the new fee options they've introduced in the UK and Australia.
intimewithmusic
·5 months agoHi. Pretty sure you're referring to the "Fee Free" program.
FYI: For folks unaware of how it works I have stolen the following from a news site. I have no experience marketting from within these countries but my guess is It doesn't sound like a plan North American buyers would accept.
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Sellers with $25,000 or less in total sales over the preceding 12-month period will be eligible for “free selling.” All other sellers will be enrolled in a Pro plan by default, and their buyers will not have to pay for what eBay AU is calling Buyer Protection fees.
“The Pro Starter plan is part of our suite of Pro subscriptions but will also operate as the default selling experience for sellers whose registered address is in Australia and whose annual total sales exceeds AU $25,000. The Pro Starter plan has no monthly cost and the same transaction fees as selling without an eBay Store.
“As part of the changes to our selling experiences, existing eBay Store subscriptions (Basic, Featured or Anchor Store) will be automatically moved to the respective eBay Pro plan (Pro Basic, Pro Featured or Pro Anchor).”
Buyers who purchase from sellers who don’t have a Pro plan will pay Buyer Protection fees calculated as follows:
A flat fee of $0.30 per item, and
8% of the item price up to $20, and
6% of any portion of the item price from $20 to $500, and
4% of any portion of the item price from $500 to $5,000
There’s a cap on the total fee amount you’ll pay. Any portion of the item price over $5,000 won’t incur any additional fee.
eBay sellers based in Australia who are enrolled in free selling will be required to buy a label on eBay when sending items, with the following exceptions:
Items sold for less than $20, or over $5,000
Items that may be sent in an envelope. These include: trading cards, comics, magazines, coins and banknotes, jewellery, CDs/DVDs/video games, patches, postcards, greeting cards, seeds, stamps, stickers and decals
Heavy or bulky items where a label isn’t available
Orders where the buyer selected local pickup
Sellers will be able to see if their items will require an eBay shipping label"
intimewithmusic
·5 months agoThat's interesting. That's possibly a recent change. I think most of the platform changes are reported and then rolled out in the US. In Canada there's a surprise everytime you list something.
hansatrade
·5 months agoDid you calculate correctly? Here an example of one of my recent sales:
PS. If you PROMOTE, the cost of selling can easily double or triple!
femmefan1946
·5 months agoEBay charges its fees on the customer's entire payment.
There is also a 40c service charge on every sale. This can be important on low value sales.
Your item sold for $5.00
You charged shipping of $9.02
There were sales taxes of 59c.
The customer paid $14.61
Part of the payment stays with eBay who pay the sales tax with it.
Part of the payment you give to Canada Post (or other shipper) to cover that cost.
The average rate, some categories are higher some lower, is 13.9%
In your category the fee is 13.6% of the customer's ENTiRE PAYMENT.
Not of the selling price.
The ENTIRE payment.
It is my experience that it is not worth selling anything that sells for less than $10USD /$15 Cdn.
Your labour to list, sell and ship a $50 item is the same as to list,sell, and ship a $5.00 item.
intimewithmusic
·5 months ago@femmefan1946 Bravo! You're absolutely right! What's next, a FVF on handling charges?
I'm raising my minimum to $15 from $13. I tried to compensate by eliminating my small handling charge to boost sales. Then I lost my shirt even more.
This is mostly due to Final Value Fees on shipping and taxes which have risen exponentially.
Instead of penalizing ALL sellers eBay should penalize the sellers who abuse their BIN pricing system thru profitting from excess shipping charges. This original excuse made years back has bled low value widget margins to death.
Low value widget margins, except in a case of massive turnovers in a multi quantity listing, are profitless. Using lettermail and paper envelopes may help but how much is your sourcing, research, photo studio and listing time worth?
In BC on June 1st, the minimum wage is $18.25 an hour.
marnotom!
·5 months agoWell, seeing as final value fees apply to the entire transaction amount. . .
reallynicestamps
·5 months agoWhat's next, a FVF on handling charges?
Since the eBay fee is based on the customer's ENTIRE payment, there is already FVF on handling charges.
intimewithmusic
·5 months ago@reallynicestamps
Ha ha, yes, I know. I'm just not sure if charging us a fee for our own handling is agony or irony...
When you print their label they have a new prompt telling you to use packing peanuts and profesional packaging methods and they charge us a fee for doing that.
What's next, charging us a fee for taking their fees?
artistauctionsintl
OP5 months agoTransaction breakdown
-$2.39
Total funds $2.18