In practice, I don’t think it’s anything as considered as stopping DSR (or feedback) manipulation. I think no one thought the policy through til last week when various people on eBay boards were asking for an answer. I think it came off-the-cuff from somewhere in eBay Towers with no real consideration as to the implications for anyone.

I sell low volume high value.
To keep my DSR’s up and reduce the impact of a neg or two in a slow month I’ve been listing 50 of 1 item at 25p on BIN that other sellers sell for a pound. Sell the lot in a day or two and then wait a month and do the same again.
Doesn’t cost me anything much apart from my time.
I imagine other sellers could be using a similar strategy to maintain powerseller status levels as well ???

This change will pretty much kill off the sale of individual step by step (non die cut) decoupage sheets on ebay, which was until now a thriving market at around 70 – 80p a sheet. Rather a shame for all the ebay buyers who like decoupage.

I’ve just written up and printed an extra little flyer to go in with all ebay orders containing an under 99p purchase, to let my customers know about ebay’s decision and my future plans.

I hadn’t really promoted my Amazon shop previously, but I’ve made sure to mention it in the flyer for those buyers who feel nervous about buying direct from an independent website

Secondly, the free gallery and listing fees are amply counterbalanced by the hike in FVFs to 10%.

Believe it or not Chris, the majority of business sellers are non VAT registered small businesses.

To come out on top with the new pricing structure you need to be shifting roughly in excess of £6000.00 per month in takings in relatively high value stock.

Many businesses use ebay as a sideline and do not have that turnover and will end up paying more to ebay to sell the same proportion of goods.

I think you will find the majority of business sellers (absolute numbers) will actually pay more, not less.

Ebay is cheap…

Mark

My biggest issue has always been visibility.

Now with some clever listing, I think I will break even (but have not done the maths), but am listing on .com, so different scenario altogether.

Even where I to pay more in listing, I finally have the visibility I crave for as a seller of antiques.

When shop used to be in core, our business boomed.

Last month when we had a 2 week bin on .com for $0.35 per listing, our business boomed.

When I have visibility, I have sales.

So even if I pay a little more, it will be the difference between a backstreet store and a high street store.

That is assuming that best match does its job properly…

So the fees are not the only consideration with the changes.

As a business we are excited about the future months on Ebay, lets hope it is left alone long enough for us all to relax and get on with selling rather than keeping pace with change…

Mark

Previously sellers would list the same item multiple times to appear as often as possible in ending soonest search. From 24th they’ll only need to list once. Previously sellers would have been paying 15p for gallery on multiple listings. Now gallery is free.

Casual and smaller sellers may pay more in fees. Sellers of low cost, low sell through, unique items may pay more. The majority of business sellers will pay less.

Realistically new fees are a huge hike for the vast majority of business sellers and will enivitably lead to less competition between sellers and a generally bad buyer experience. Sellers will also need to recoup some of the additional fees through higher pricing and this will be the most likely business strategy to deal with these changes.

Still can’t fathom the logic behind these changes other than to advantage a minority of very large business sellers.

Would have thought ebay would have wanted to have a compettive edge with sites like Amazon and benchmark their fees/charges that way.

Seems like another very poor decision that was ill thought out and would have been far better judged had it been subjected to the most basic consultation with sellers/customers prior to implementation.

Will be interesting to see how it pans out after 24th Sept. The main thing we will be looking out for is the whittling away of some of our smaller compettitors through the paint that will be caused by the new fee sructure – which is in reality a seriously bad thing for all!

The second and separate issue is the so far unannounced (at least officially) change to introduce a minimum price for fixed price items of 99p which at a stroke removes getting on for half a million listings from the site. That’s a pretty bad own goal and yes I do think it’s about the worst change I’ve ever known happen on the site.

Great for eBay to boast over 10million listings available to buy, not so great for them to lose something like 4-5% of them in one fell swoop. That’s not going to increase customer choice in the slightest.

In BBC4′s “You and Yours” consumer programme today on the same issue you stated that this change “great for business” and would “save sellers an awful lot of money”. So it seems that you don’t know your own mind on the issue from one day to the next.
It must be clear that in any “flat fee” system there will be winners and losers. To give a rough analogy – supposing Royal Mail were out of the blue to state that in four weeks time they would introduce a universal stamp -say value of £1. Most people would think they were mad. Those users that mainly send letters would be protesting about the huge price hike. Those users who mainly sent packets and parcels would probably also think Royal Mail were mad but would keep rather quiet about it whilst laughing all the way to the bank.

Well that is basically what is happening on ebay at the moment. It is fine for you and Jody Ford ebay marketplace manager to state that some sellers may have to look at ways of changing their business. Yes I could start listing consumer electronic items for 1p which is seemingly the market Ebay is going for, but I prefer to stay in a field I know something about which is vintage collectables. And I guess the seller whose situation was discussed in “You and Yours” and sold secondhand records would prefer to do so as well. -Dennis

One last thing DO NOT COUNT ON THE DASHBBOARD too give you a warning if your customer satisfaction is failing! This week i had NPS and the stupid thing said customer satisfaction was GOOD(that was before and after NPS notification)

Neutral’s STILL COUNT AS PART OF A NEG ON NPS. I have an a/c that has 2 neuts and 4.1 for postage dsr and it has an nps breach on it(81 POS this month).

The only rip off merchants left on ebay now are ebay.

But a lack of simple common nous I find much harder…

depressing.

See what you mean…

#46 John

Bet their only 99p BIN each, and you can collect…ha..!!!

I have some Asprins left, If you want a Grooss or so!!!.

The way ebay is going we’ll all need them.

Today it is 99p next year there is nothing stopping eBay changing the goal posts yet again and making it a £5 minimum.

Seanie2288

Cant imagine what would be said if nothing priced under 99p were allowed
in your local high st

ebays stance is that daft