eBay not allowing partial refunds?

[westernstargifts]

eBay still has not fixed the combined shipping glitch. It is hit and miss as some auctions are combined and some are not.

I just sold 2 items to a very good repeat customer. For the second time in a row she paid for both together and was charged the full S/H for both items. To add insult to injury, I tried to issue a partial refund through SM and PayPal would not allow me to issue anything but a full refund.

"Note: You can only issue a full refund for this transaction. Please enter the full refund amount below"

I ended up bypassing eBay and sending the money directly through PayPal.

Is this another glitch or is eBay now not allowing partial refunds?

[pjcdn2005]

I issued a partial refund through Paypal earlier tonight without a problem. I didn't realize you could do a refund through SM.

[zarzuella]

If your buyer used some kind of promotional code on her payment (eg eBay Bucks) you cannot partially refund.

Back to the old cash-in-envelope!

Ann

[coxengines]

Every single day we get one or more of these:

23 bucks to ship 6 tiny-ass batteries.... no way! (this one was received this morning)

Sometimes, partial refunds are not possible because the buyer used a coupon.

In such cases we simply refund directly to the email associated with the payment, using the Personal tab so that the recipient does not incur PP fees.

Bernie

[momoftwingles2]

Hi Judy,

More than likely as already suggested, a coupon or some sort of promo certificate was used by your customer making it impossible to issue a partial refund in the usual way.

Like Bernie, I use the Personal Tab and send a payment for overages paid, however, I do not pick up the fees for it. I let the customer pay it because the way I look at it....they are using a promotion coupon or something similiar AND when we issue a refund through PayPal of any kind WE are supposed to get our fees back related to that amount.

Everyone does this differently. This is just my take on it.

Susan
momoftwingles2

[pjcdn2005]

That must be a "sometime" thing as the partial refund that I did last night was for an item that was partially paid for with ebay bucks. At least that's what the buyer told me.

[westernstargifts]

Thanks to everyone for the information. This is the first time in 4 years that I could not issue a partial refund. Coupons and eBay bucks wouldn't have crossed my mind. I will keep that in mind if I should run into this problem again.

And I agree with you Susan. We shouldn't have to pay a fee for the buyers to get a discount through a 3rd party.

Would these coupons have anything to do with orders not combining? I have never experienced a problem combining shipping either until now.

Judy

[canukadin]

First time ever - I ran into this tonight - something has changed in the last 48 hours. I believe this is Paypal and not eBay's doing as the title of the thread suggests. According to Paypal's help and policy pages there is no change in policy.

[coxengines]

The issue of not being able to issue partial refunds when someone pays with a coupon has been around since inception. Nothing new here but it is rare that someone pays with a coupon and even scarcer that a partial refund is warranted in such a case.

As for:

We shouldn't have to pay a fee for the buyers to get a discount through a 3rd party.

Technically, this may be the case but I have 2 rules in business:

#1 The customer is always right.

#2 See rule # 1

The 4% PP fee is petty cash for the very rare cases that I have to issue a partial refund via other means than the "refund" link.

Our eBay store is extremely lucrative and the few $$'s we may have to "eat" with such a refund are really insignificant. Should this ever bother me in the future I will simply reconcile such an amount with the aprx $500 in shipping profits we accrue every month.

Folks, you you need to see the "big picture" in business and harp less on the petty issues and $$'s.

Bernie

[momoftwingles2]

Hi Bernie,

I respecfully *partially* agree with you! However, when my buyers are asked to please let me invoice them BEFORE they pay so that I may fine tune their shipping to THEIR advantage and they go ahead and pay and I incur fees as EVERYONE DOES......Then, when I being an *ABE LINCOLN* person that I am want to partially refund the shipping that a buyer has paid....and PAYPAL won't let me...then I should not have to pay twice, especially when a buyer has used a coupon to their credit.

I've only been in business slightly over 10 years and only have 13 more days and 1 hour to go before I close my store but my customers have gotten only the best treatment in the world from me!

PayPal is WRONG in not permitting us to partially refund on any type of payment, however, I understand because they don't want someone *cashing* in on a coupon...but, sometimes there needs to be some way to do it. One evening, I called PayPal and THEY did all of my refunds for the day and credited me back my fees.

If 1,000,000 people wanted to refund and the refund of fees amounted to 5 cents per transaction....that's $50,000 in the pocket of PayPal PLUS another $50,000 in fees when refunds are made through the personal tab. That's $100,000 in income for PayPal. Adds up.

Okay....as I mentioned, I respectfully *partially* agree with you Bernie especially since I highly regard you and Xena as tops in my books!

Susan

[westernstargifts]

The issue of not being able to issue partial refunds when someone pays with a coupon has been around since inception. Nothing new here but it is rare that someone pays with a coupon and even scarcer that a partial refund is warranted in such a case.

As for:

We shouldn't have to pay a fee for the buyers to get a discount through a 3rd party.

Technically, this may be the case but I have 2 rules in business:

#1 The customer is always right.

#2 See rule # 1

The 4% PP fee is petty cash for the very rare cases that I have to issue a partial refund via other means than the "refund" link.

Our eBay store is extremely lucrative and the few $$'s we may have to "eat" with such a refund are really insignificant. Should this ever bother me in the future I will simply reconcile such an amount with the aprx $500 in shipping profits we accrue every month.

Folks, you you need to see the "big picture" in business and harp less on the petty issues and $$'s.

Bernie

The fee wasn't the issue. The problem was not being able to issue a partial refund to my customer which, IMO, is not petty. If you do not believe that fees are an issue, then why do you make a profit from shipping? My customers are just as important to me as yours are to you. That is why I wanted to issue the refund in the first place. It has nothing to do with whether or not the customer is always right.

[momoftwingles2]

Hi Judy,

My refunds ARE ALWAYS because of overpayment of shipping! I've never quite gotten it right with eBay so I have always taken the time to manually calculate out the shipping. Takes time, but that is what I always have done to help my customers out. Be it a 35 cent refund or a $5 or more one...they've all appreciated and acknowledged same.

Tick, tock....days are going by!

WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?

*LOL* Hope all is well your way, Judy!
Susan

[westernstargifts]

Hi Judy,

My refunds ARE ALWAYS because of overpayment of shipping! I've never quite gotten it right with eBay so I have always taken the time to manually calculate out the shipping. Takes time, but that is what I always have done to help my customers out. Be it a 35 cent refund or a $5 or more one...they've all appreciated and acknowledged same.

Tick, tock....days are going by!

WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?

*LOL* Hope all is well your way, Judy!
Susan

Hi Susan,

The majority of my refunds are also for overpayment of S/H for the simple reason that so many people pay with multiple payments. It's just a fact of life on eBay. It isn't only on eBay that people do not read what is in front of them. When I do craft shows I have my prices everywhere and people still ask what things cost.

The time seems to have passed incredibly fast since you announced that you would be closing your store. I can't believe it is so close! You probably won't miss eBay as much as you think you will. You'll wonder how you ever had time for eBay AND everything else too!

Judy

[coxengines]

Susan,

I respect your position. It is just how I do it. Life, and business, is not always fair and sometimes I have to give a few bucks and I would never have my buyers pay these fees.

Judy,

You can still issue a partial refund in any case; it's just via a different route, which may cost you the 3.5% Paypal fee.

If it becomes an issue to you simply refund the payment in it's entirety and have the customer pay again. But again, a 35 cent fee on a $10 refund should never be an issue. I only run into this issue a couple of times per year.

I make a profit on shipping because the account "shipping" is run as a profit centre. $$6,000/year not only looks good on the books but also pays for a nice little vacation each year 🙂

Bernie

[momoftwingles2]

Hi Bernie,

I make no money on shipping....only on my products!

Susan
momoftwingles2

[dipmicro]

I make no money on shipping....only on my products!

Susan, let's review something first: profit is gross income less expense ...

Example: I use approx 50% of my car to drive to PO. My insurance is $2400/y, my car amortization is $2000/y, maintenance and licensing approx $1000/y, gas 11L/100km and 20,000km/y @ $0.75/L = approx $1650/y and I spend approx 280h driving to PO (240x CanadaPost 20min + 100x USPS. That is approx $7000/2 expenses for car and reluctantly accepting minimum wage $2800 for wages = total $5800/yr expense to mail stuff out.

We expedite approx 10,000pcs of mail per year. Add 15c for bubble mailer and top everything with 2.4% PayPal fee, my expense break-even on shipping stuff to my customers is 75c above CanadaPost/USPS cost of mailing.

This 75c can come from two sources and two sources only - either is added to the product or is charged directly. Adding the portion of shipping expenses to your product markup will increase the eBay fees resulting in charging customer more than charging all shipping expenses through freight.

Bernie thinks he is running a $6000/y profit, but charging $0.95 for a lettermail with $0.57 stamp is no profit 🙂 Bernie is forgetting his indirect expenses of $6000/y associated with shipping and he is actually breaking even on shipping (gross freight collected - shipping expenses = 0).

[dipmicro]

I forgot to add shipping labels, laser printer + toner, packing supplies like tape, scale, etc. Considering this, Bernie is probably subsidizing his mail making profit only on his product.

[dipmicro]

My math at 2am sucks. 7000/2 is not 3000 but 3500.

I also forgot printing shipping labels - it takes me approx 1hr to print shipping labels and attach them on 50pcs of mail, but only 70% of mail need label, rest needs stamps. So add 140hrs of labour per year to shipping expenses.

Btw. I am walking distance from everything, so if I did not need to drive to PO, I would not need the car.

The good news is that if I expedite 10kpcs or 30kpcs of mail per year, the car portion cost increases just a little but (the gas portion), so one day perhaps I can start making some small profit from mailing.

[coxengines]

Roman,

The 6k yearly figure is actual profit.

Our vehicles are expensed through our main business (automobile export and wholesale) and we have to go to town every single day for the main business anyhow. The Xenalook stuff just rides shotgun for free.

The only costs associated with shipping the eBay stuff are packaging, a portion of the printer costs and Paypal fees.

The 95 cent Canada situation only happens about once a month. Usually it's the $2.95 deal ($1.22 cost = $1.73 profit), $3.95 to the USA ($2.54 cost = $1.41 profit) and $5.95 to International ($4.98 cost = $.97 profit).

On average there is a a USD 1.20+ markup per package. Deduct the 20 cents for mailers, printing, tape, etc and gross profit hovers around a buck per package, give or take some pennies.

I do not allocate any compensation for packing because it is part of the job and is compensated via what is called "profit".

Naturally, I could allocate 6k for wages (packing time is 2 hrs/day) and say I have zero shipping profit and then add it back to the merchandise profit but it's six 1/2 dozen or the other as I draw the salary from the other business.

The same would go for allocating vehicle costs to Xenalook and then having bigger profits in the other business. In the end it's just an accounting entry.

Now, having said all this, if someone ran the business of ours as stand-alone then, yes, you are absolutely correct in your assumptions and should probably even be charging a buck higher per package to break even.

Bernie

[dipmicro]

I had the lengthy response when eBay server error-ed after submit and I could not get back to it. I am not writing that stuff again, you get my point and who did not get it by reading this far will not get it anyway.

Cheers