eBay

raphael@ebay.com · ‎03-18-2016

Hello Canadian sellers,

This thread is open for discussion regarding the recent announcement about eBay Canada retiring USD support from its selling flows. Myself and other employees will come visit this thread and do our best to answer any questions on this topic.

reel_to_reel_plus · ‎03-22-2016

What sales to US Clients. We sold NOTHING to us clients who are over 95% of our orders until we listed in US Dollars. Don't insult our intelligence. Call a turd a turd. and fire the one that made this decision. If it is a regulatory decision, we can accept that. And consult the government behind it.

westcoast_hoarder · ‎03-22-2016

I use venture one and UPS

lorraine_carol · ‎03-22-2016

Many current ebay sellers sell on Bonanza & ebay concurrently. Their listings fees are relatively lower, superb customer service and you can transfer your current listings directly over to Bonanza. A very user-friendly site. Great alternative.

hlmacdon · ‎03-22-2016

@pjcdn2005 wrote:
@hlmacdon wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:
@ferret-mom wrote:
Thanks for the clarification, Rodney.

If a Canadian seller chooses to list on eBay.com, I suspect that we will no longer be able to use the Canada Post shipping calculator, correct? If that is indeed the case, then sellers will either have to come up with a generic shipping cost for a small parcel (for example) or ask prospective buyers to email a request for a shipping estimate.

Either way, it will only serve to make the selling process more cumbersome and our offerings less attractive to US buyers.
Hi Ferret-mom

If you want to list using the Canada Post shipping calculator then you'll need to stay on eBay.ca and list in CAD. Calculated shipping is supported on eBay.com as well, but only for USPS shipments originating in the United States.
Does your agreement with Canada Post prevent you from allowing API access to Canadian registered accounts listing on .com? I'm sure you realize what a horrible kludge of a workaround it is to recommend Canadian sellers to list on .com without any functional calculated shipping option. If the goal is to increase conversion rates with Canadian buyers, my response as a seller who wants to stick with USD listings would unfortunately have to be to block Canadian buyers entirely for .com listings. What other choice does a seller have when domestic parcel rates vary as greatly as they do by destination?
I don't know what you sell but I rarely use the calculator on .ca and also sell on .com and it hasn't been a huge issue. The majority of my Canadian sales are in Ontario and Quebec so I base my shipping costs on those locations. If a purchase is made from the Nova Scotia then shipping may cost me more than what I've quoted but I make up for that when the buyer is closer to me.

Everything I ship domestically goes via parcel. As a retailer in a competitive niche I can't average out my shipping costs, compounding this I actually have to charge sales tax, so my costing needs to be spot on. I understand for the casual seller or seller in higher margin categories there may be room to do that, but not having accurate shipping costs is a no go for me.

jimbo_kw · ‎03-22-2016

@our*goodies*shop wrote:
With this **bleep** you are imposing our USA client a currency exchange to buy from us?

This is it exactly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A = the majority of Buyers accounts are in USA $

B = all Seller accounts required to be in home currency CAN$ (or other)

C = more money thorough gouging exchange fees !!!!

A + B = C

of course this was an eBay Canada decision

Spoiler

crazy_for_comics · ‎03-22-2016

good to know, thanks

crazy_for_comics · ‎03-22-2016

Thanks for the info. Might have to look for more options

momcqueen · ‎03-22-2016

I am not against it. I list in CAD and have achieved greater success doing so. There is NO reason to doubt eBay Canada staff when they say CAD is a better choice for most Canadian sellers based on their data. If, however, after a long hard level-headed look at your own specific sales you are absolutely certain that you must continue to list in USD, eBay has developed a tool to assist in the modification and migration to USD on eBay.com. Please READ THE WHOLE ANNOUNCEMENT and all the associated information for complete insight.

pocomocomputing · ‎03-22-2016

@lorraine_carol wrote:
Bonanza is a great site to sell on. Their customer service reps are very quick/enthused to help. Substantially lower fees. Thousands upon thousand of ebay sellers also sell there.

And thousands and thousands of eBay buyers do not go to Bonanza and buy.

Bonanza does not have the traffic and sales of ebay and never will.

Anonymous · ‎03-22-2016

Hi folks. I'll spend some time and try to respond to some of your posts this evening,

Let me first say that it's never an easy decision to remove features from our software that a portion of our customers enjoy using today.

I appreciate that this is tough news for many of you and that you are upset.

I'll do my best to help out with some of your questions. There is quite a bit of information available on the pages linked from the announcements as well and I encourage you to have a look.

Anonymous · ‎03-22-2016

@armandmusicshop wrote:
Will canadian buyers be able to list on ebay.com even if the shipping adress is in Canada? Thanks

Yes. Canadians have always been welcome to list on eBay.com, using the same account and login credentials as you use on eBay.ca.

Anonymous · ‎03-22-2016

@crazy_for_comics wrote:

This is Bad news. What happened to a democratic process in this decision? Like having a referendum like vote. It's simple.....Ask Ebay.ca users, Do you want to sell in Canadian Dollars?, Yes or No? I'm sure the vote would be 80% or higher that vote NO!!!! This is a mistake in the highest regard. This will cause mass confusion and anger, as we are already seeing here on this board.

I would probably change and sell on Ebay.com but I was under the assumption that if you sell on Ebay.com that you would have to be an American resident and/or have a U.S. address?

Hi crazy_for_comics.

You don't need to be a US resident to list on eBay.com. The same credentials you use to sign on to eBay.ca also work on eBay.com.

retro_thrift · ‎03-22-2016

Bonanza is a freaking joke. I sold 750 items in the last year on ebay and 10 on Bonanza where I have my items listed a few percent lower.

My stores are synced so its not an issue with more items listed where.

I realized I had done something wrong and when something sells on Bonanza my item ends instantly on eBay, but wasn't doing it the other way around and I sold something on Bonanza I sold the previous month on eBay.

When I wrote customer service at Bonanza it took them 13 days to reply to point out I had not checkmarked a box in my settings.

reallynicestamps · ‎03-22-2016

Thousands upon thousand of ebay sellers also sell there.

Thousands upon thousand of ebay sellers also list there.

Fixed that for you.

At one point we had about 15 000 lots on Bonanza. After a year, we had sold perhaps half a dozen items and spent most of our time there deleting the cross-posted items that had sold on eBay.

Same problem with etsy, in a different category and much smaller numbers. My two sales did not cover the listing and selling fees for four months (October through January).

Anonymous · ‎03-22-2016

@drcanadax wrote:

If I decide to change my listings to eBay.com listings, what effect will that have on my eBay.ca store? Will I need to apply for an eBay.com store?

Great question.

Absolutely no effect.

No matter whether you open your store on eBay.ca or eBay.com, you're good.

Your eBay.ca store subscription allows you to list on either eBay.ca or eBay.com. Or both. You get free listing entitlements on both sites.

Your store then works for buyers on all eBay sites. You can check this out by going to your own store and then changing the domain in your address bar from .ca to .com, or .co,uk, or .de, or ,it and so on. If you have items that ship to the USA, they already appear in your eBay.com store, and if you ship to Italy, you'll see those items in your .it store, etc.

It's worth noting that whenever the Canadian dollar is lower than the US dollar, you save money by subscribing on eBay.ca.

lorraine_carol · ‎03-22-2016

Perhaps it depends on the genre of items one sells. Also after this substantial change I am confident other online auction sites will fare well.

Anonymous · ‎03-22-2016

@zome2 wrote:

Let me start by saying that, in the long list of bad ideas ebay has had over the last 10+ years, this may be worst one.

I list auctions on ebay.ca and usually at $9.99US starting price for seven day listings.

If I want to keep that price when I'm forced to list in Canadian dollars, I will have to figure out every listing day what $9.99US is in Canadian funds on that particular day. Of course, it will never be the same amount, as exchange rates change daily. So my $9.99US photo will actually be $9.95US or $10.48US, or whatever amount depending on that day's exchange.

Do you honestly believe that this will help sales?????

Let's look at shipping. Due to the exchange fluctuation, I will no longer be able to offer a standard shipping charge for US customers. It will have to be adjusted for every batch of listings and even then, what I get paid will actually depend on which day the buyer pays me, as the paypal exchange rate, which of course is not the same as the ebay exchange rate, fluctuates several times a day.

This new policy removes all predictability from my sales and adds an extra layer of work to my already busy schedule.

You say that your numbers show that sellers do better when listing in Canadian dollars. I would like to see where you get these "numbers" from. Because everything in my 16 year experience on ebay tells me that that claim is a load of manure.

Normally when ebay comes out with a new rule to screw the sellers, I can see the reason behind it, as it usually means that ebay takes a bit more money from us. In this case, however, I don't see how this helps ebay in any way. This policy will undoubtedly lead to lower sales for Canadian sellers, which of course means less money for ebay. That in turn will lead to an increase in fees to make up for the shortfall.

So whoever came up with this bright idea, I salute you. You've just managed to anger a large segment of your sellers for no gain at all.

Congratulations!

Yes, we honestly believe this will help sales. Sorry this is upsetting.

slonik61 · ‎03-22-2016

Completely agree! Most Cdn sellers list in US$ and I am not sure no one requested such unreasonable change/novelty.

crazy_for_comics · ‎03-22-2016

I never sold on Ebay.com...........I may be wrong but I was under the assumption that if you sell on Ebay.com that you would have to be an American resident and/or have a U.S. address?