'eBay Best Price Guarantee': What does it really mean to buyers and sellers?

[momcqueen]

Is this new? I'm a bit perplexed by how it will work, and also how it affects sellers. I have assumptions and theories but I'll throw it open to the floor......

Found on my Facebook Newsfeed

[lady.stark]

They increased and increased our fees to pay for that?! Really upsetting to say the least! I don't want my fees to pay for those promos. This is SOOOOO stupid of eBay to promise something like this!! I'm so upset right now...

[femmefan1946]

It's 110% of the difference.

So if you find it $1.00 cheaper, you get something (eBay dollars? a Paypal payment?) of $1.10.

Ah. It's a coupon you can use on future purchases.

With minimum wage at about 18 cents a minute, probably not worth it for most people.

But I read "notalwaysright.com" and some people will get shirty over a dime.

[hlmacdon]

At this point it seems mostly meaningless and lame attempt to counter Amazon's Prime/Daily/Lighting deals.

Rather than a policy this should be viewed as a promotion with many qualifying asterisks. Essentially the unnamed retailers (anyone who works in national retail will know who they are) that use alternatively named accounts to promote many of the products under the ebay deals banner have teamed with ebay to offer a price match feature on that limited subset of products. It is qualified as  "Top 20 best selling products across thousands of categories"  and ebay deals products. It is further qualified by only applicable to approved competitors which means the usual big box/ecom multinationals that any self respecting retailer references when they actually want to promote a deal.

So basically ebay will cherry pick a few high volume products in conjunction with select sellers and has introduced a caveat for their ebay deals retail partners to ensure that the promoted products are actually competitive. It is sort of meaningless as huge swaths of products are MAP price restricted anyways and the named retailers follow fairly scheduled promotional pricing where sell through rebates apply from the manufacturer/brand, so outside of refurbs/factory seconds this isn't going to introduce a new pricing paradigm. You might see a small difference in prices but I'm not going to get excited about 110% of a $5 difference given in the forum of a coupon that needs to be redeemed.

I'd file this under stupid marketing executive tricks. You can see the direction ebay is trying to go to attract customers: free no questions asked returns, free shipping, price protection (14 day rule kicking in), price matching, etc. When you don't control the inventory these are hollow promises as they aren't universally applied across the site. One day some exec will have a light bulb go off in their head and realize they should have launched a premium ebay experience separate from old ebay where these things were mandatory across the board with direct retail partners (selling in their own name because the whole fake name thing to dump product is lame) and brand partners. That would actually accomplish what they are trying do without cannibalizing their existing platform. Fake Marketing. 

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

How long before eBay buyers will purchase a sellers item, item including free shipping and the buyer being able to qualify for eBay Best Price Guarantee and receiving the credit and then when the item arrives asking for a remorse return/NAD and then being able to keep the item for free. Hey, it could happen!!! Oops, another conspiracy theory to eBay improvements going forward!!!

-CM

[pjcdn2005]

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@lotzofuniquegoodies wrote:

How long before eBay buyers will purchase a sellers item, item including free shipping and the buyer being able to qualify for eBay Best Price Guarantee and receiving the credit and then when the item arrives asking for a remorse return/NAD and then being able to keep the item for free. Hey, it could happen!!! Oops, another conspiracy theory to eBay improvements going forward!!!

-CM

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Unless the seller didn’t want the item back, why would they be able to keep it? I suppose they could  probably keep the coupon but that will just be for the price difference + 10%.  

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

Really would all depend on the items value and if it was worth the return shipping charges and aggravation.  Mostly that last post was tongue in cheek.

-CM

[retroman_studios]

This is just marketing that makes investors happy because eBay is embracing change and aligning policy to match most brick and mortar stores.

Once customers realize how painful it is to claim, we will most likely see lots of posts here complaining.

Innovate or die. Except in this case it's not the brand it's the team that has to innovate or they more than likely fall short of certian internal metrics. I used to work call center and we had stuff similiar to this, meaningless policy changes that came from some team that never even put a foot in our work area nor did any of the work but figured they know how things should go.

In theory it sounds good, but I can see it being redacted once they realize how much human time it consumes.

[cumos55]

The most important words in this situation are...... New Item...

This process  can never apply to used items, mainly because different people have different views of how to describe the condition of an an item, and then the price asked for that item.

Over the years there have been situations where my used item sells at a higher price because, my gallery photo was an actual photo of the  item being sold  and not a stock photo.

Sometimes it has been what was presented  in the listing, specifically a description of the content of the book, with my words of understanding included.

But then... there are times someone will say... new... or more specifically  brand new when it is actually "used".....  It is because of this last situation  that  the definition of "new" must be carefully applied by a seller..

[mcrlmn]

It's either new or isn't new.

I don't understand how there can be any confusion.

I do understand an item listed as new, that isn't, being a lie, a fraud or misrepresentation, and an 'Item not as described'.

[e8group2007a]

"

It's either new or isn't new.

I don't understand how there can be any confusion."

Item is in original box, never opened but sat on a shelf in the store for 4 years. Some such items will be perfect, others perfect with faded printing on the box, others will have degraded over time. There is lots of room for confusion.

[femmefan1946]

It's either new or isn't new.

I don't understand how there can be any confusion.

In sewing patterns, the package may have been in someone's 'to do ' box for years, have a 'not for resale' stamp on the front, and even notes about what was intended to be done.

But the actual pattern is uncut, unused and factory folded.

There is a "new old stock" description available for some items. And an "Unused" for others.

But it is not consistent.

Then there is the "New in Box" item that has been removed from the box to be photographed. For some collectors that is a no-no, and there it would be useful to use a mixture of stock photos and actual photos of the unopened box.

[pjcdn2005]

There is more info about the program here:

 https://pages.ebay.ca/best-price-guarantee/index.html