Late payments after best offer has been accepted

[stickybeeapiary]

I'm currently having an issue with buyers making best offers but taking a very long time to pay. Sometimes I even have to open an unpaid item case due to this. Last week alone I have accepted 3 best offers, one decided to cancel two days later and the other two have yet to pay.  I normally send messages to these customers asking if there is any issues with the payment process that they may need help on? But I have yet to hear back. This prevents me from relisting and selling said items to other potential customers that would otherwise have paid on time until they either pay or cancel.

Would like to ask a more experienced seller if there is any way to require payment immediately after best offer has been accepted as this a long time issue for me?

I feel E-bay should hold the amount the customers are bidding for in escrow in case the seller accepts to avoid any delays in payments.

Any advice would be appreciated!

[silverpinups]

You can change your settings in your listing by checking off the box "immediate payment required". 

Also in your description you can state a payment time frame, ie; "Payment is due with 7 days of auction ending" and set your unpaid bidder assistant to activate on the 8th day or on whatever day you decide payment is due on.  

[reallynicestamps · Accepted solution]

You can add Immediate Payment Required to any Fixed Price listing.

Since you specifically are having problems with Best Offers, you could stop accepting Best Offers and not add that option to your listings.

You can send a polite note about payment on Day Three after the sale, and open an Unpaid Item Dispute on Day Four. The UID can be closed 96 hours to the second later.

You can opt to Block bidders who do not have active Paypal accounts.

You can add the deadbeats to your Blocked Bidder List.

And this one is more chancey. Go for Free Shipping.

DON'T PANIC.

Free Shipping means adding the cost of shipping to your asking price. This means the buyer has no sticker shock when she sees the total price.

This also means doing some number crunching to decide what the average price you have been paying for postage - to all destinations- is.

What you lose on the coconuts, you win on the roundabouts. You want to cover your monthly postage and packaging costs, not your individual costs per sale.

Normally, I wouldn't suggest this on items that have to go package rates, but think about it.

I would certainly advise you to go with just ONE shipping rate.

Giving your young impulse buyer (based on your product line) more to think about is not a good idea.

I suspect it is also a good idea to use only tracked shipping. Tracked Packet USA and Expedited Parcel Canada.

Drop the cheaper, less secure (for you) shipping service.

If she can't afford it, she can't afford it.

I'm assuming your know that shipping is not a part of a Best Offer?

A lot of buyers don't.

So when they offer $45 for your jeans, they think that is the bottom line.

And when they are billed a further $8-$17 for shipping, they disappear.

Get her while she's lusting after those jeans and has her credit card in hand.

[ypdc_dennis]

offers do not come with the option of "immediate payment required" -- that's BIN only. An offer is treated like an auction.

[kotonline]

One thing I find helps is I counter a best offer by 1 cent - with the condition that payment is immediate if accepted, I have had no issues at all and 100% success rate (30+) in the last few months . It doesnt guarantee it but it seems to work.

[stickybeeapiary]

Shipping costs in Canada are a bit on the high side. Offering free shipping as well as a best offer option seems like it would invite low baller's to kill any sort of profit I could make. Will have to do some research on the free shipping option as the Americans are kicking our butts when it comes to having the cheapest price. Having a best offer option kinda helped with that but at the same time created a few headaches. Thanks for the insight!

[silverpinups]

offers do not come with the option of "immediate payment required" -- that's BIN only. An offer is treated like an auction

Yes, I know I wasn't very clear in my reply.....

[reallynicestamps]

Again the thing with Free Shipping is that it isn't.
The shipping cost (in your case a massaged and averaged shipping cost) is added to the asking price.
Which is cheapest?
$40 jeans with $15 shipping?
$55 jeans with Free Shipping?
Free Shipping does not go well or easily with package rates,which is why if you consider this, work out the cost of shipping everything you sold in the past month (and then the month before and then the month before that) and divide by the number of shipments.
It is tricky. One reason why personally I sell stuff that mostly goes LetterPost/Light Packet. But we are trying to move outside the box of exact shipping cost for every sale.
And of course, it is perfectly valid to refuse a Best Offer. A polite refusal may even turn into a sale at full price.

[reallynicestamps]

Another thought (I buy them wholesale from a Chinese supplier).
While there are a lot of bargain hunters out there, there is a definite group who believe that the more you pay for something, the better it is.
Some say this is true of us Mac users, for example.

[silverpinups]

One thing I find helps is I counter a best offer by 1 cent - with the condition that payment is immediate if accepted, I have had no issues at all and 100% success rate (30+) in the last few months . It doesnt guarantee it but it seems to work..


Whatever you can due to prompt the buyer to pay is good... having a clear statement in your description on your payment expectations or communicating through the "Best Offer" process will always help.

Setting up your unpaid bidder assistant to your payment specifications is the best way to ensure payment is promptly received.

[i.am.vivian]

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@silverpinups wrote:

One thing I find helps is I counter a best offer by 1 cent - with the condition that payment is immediate if accepted, I have had no issues at all and 100% success rate (30+) in the last few months . It doesnt guarantee it but it seems to work..

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That's why some people do that. It came up on another board why some sellers only counter with 1 cent or 1 dollar. There had to be a reason, obviously not the money.