Letter to ebay---fees too high

[tpodwdog]

HI FRIENDS..I have decided to write Ebay and bitch about their seller fees. I am not sure whats going to be done about it but heres the letter i wrote and mailed :

Feb 20. 2012

Dear EBAY.

Firstly I would like to congratulate you on coming up with a great way for the general public to sell . I have been an EBAY member for quite some time now both buying and selling items that are of interest to me. You definitely have the best game in town….however… the seller fees are just getting out of hand and are quite expensive as compared to the past. With your purchase of PayPal I am sure that you have your bills to pay also and that’s understandable. I do love the services and I do realize services cost money but with the increase of your fees, the items I am selling just are not worth me doing anymore. I will continue to buy items but as far as selling…I am entertaining the thought of moving to EBIDS or the like.
If you will look at my purchase records, I do buy a lot of things for my classic car. Members of the B-Body mopar forum are having the exact same thoughts as I am concerning this, and the over 7,000 members all agree that your fees are out of hand and just are not worth selling on EBAY any longer.
I have been selling a lot of guitars and musical gear on eBay and when I get the bill for the fees, they are astronomical and my immediate thought is “ why am I doing this ?” I can sell this stuff on Craigslist or the local paper free of charge, the only downfall is the protection and getting payment to a buyer a long distance from me. But that is a chance I am willing to take.
Many EBAY sellers I know have the very same concerns and I am not sure who this letter will reach and what can be done about it, but I am willing to try.

Bottom line is EBAY IS JUST TOO EXPENSIVE TO USE ANYMORE !
David L***** daveydavey42264

 

[tpodwdog]

anytime marla. i have just had enough. i sold 1000.00 worth of stuff and my fees were200.......wheres the advantage???

 

[Al K]

Marla;could you amend this letter to include ALL of our names? I'm planning on a serious downsizing,but it won't be with Evilbay. I'll take my chances with CL and will check into E-bids as well.

 

[Bruzilla]

I hate to say it, but I have a hard time finding sympathy for most eBay sellers when it comes to fees, especially those who sell parts for our cars. While looking for a set of sail panels recently, I saw one set listed for $30, a couple sets listed at $75-$100, and four sets listed for $300-$400! The $30 set was being sold by a guy parting out his own car, while the more expensive sets were sold by preofessional parts houses.

When I discuss this issue with fellow merchants, I hear the same things... "it's supply and demand"... "things are priced at what the market will bear"... "if you don't want to pay the price, feel free to go somewhere else"... etc. What's ironic is that these people are the same ones who rant about what eBay is charging. I had a lengthy discussion about how high eBay and Paypal fees were getting with a local junkyard owner right before he quoted me a price of $60 for a kick panel! So, he had no problem charging me the market price for his kick panel, but didn't feel it was right for eBay to charge him the market price for their services. Seems to be some flawed logic there.

I sell on eBay, not many car parts though, and what I sell is in the $100-$200 price range. I don't like paying the fees either, but I have to factor in what it would cost me in time to sit there and post CL ads all over the country. I've also checked out ebids, and there's very little there. eBay isn't free, and isn't cheap, but for the ability to list my items where they'll be seen by anyone in the world with a computer and an interest, for just a few minutes of my time, I think it's still the best marketing bargain out there.

 

[99ss]

For ebay store its 10% of the sale including shipping charges. 10 F#$%*&$ percent on top of $15/mnth and 20 cent listing fees.. That is rape.
For a person who has a few things to sell its great for them, they dont worry about overhead per month costs and dont buy to re-sell. For a retailer its out right rape to charge 10% on the sale including the shipping charges... Outright RAPE !

 

[Stumper]

I suspect the letter will accomplish nothing but making you feel better - if it actually gets to a human. I agree their fees have gotten outrageous in the past few years, but the only thing that will get their attention is a significant drop in business. It has gotten to the point that there are less and less "individuals" who sell there. Most everything is being sold by Ebay Companies or other online "companies" that have marked up their items to cover the fees and apparently make it work some how. There are no true "deals" to be had on Ebay anymore. They really need some serious competition!!

 

['69Net]

Vote with Your feet...walk away and don't use it...it's not Rocket Science

 

[Budnicks]

My 2 cents for what it's worth... I have stayed away from buying or selling on E-Scam for a while now, I had way too many bad experiences, getting screwed by crappy, lying, over priced, sellers {not actually selling what is shown/described/listed or just idiots & don't know what they have}, shill bidders & dead beat buyers... I'm sure anyone that has been on E-Scam for any period of time, knows the types of issues & what I'm talking about... The main issue as I see it, is they are kind of the "only game in town" {that works, well known & is world wide, plus successful}, so your kind of stuck "if you want to play, you need to pay" or play some were else... I have had some luck with www.RacingJunk.com but they do not have any were near the same type of exposure/customer base that E-Scam has, it's a little more time consuming to post or even buy, much less fees & your dealing with honest people, so far anyway... "Screw me once, shame on you, screw me twice, I'll get even"...LOL...

 

[tpodwdog]

Vote with Your feet...walk away and don't use it...it's not Rocket Science

yeah i know its not rocket science....but usually the squeeky wheels are the ones that get the grease. Not saying that my letter is going to do squat, because im under the realization that it wont. but I would like to let EBAY know how i feel and how my peers feel also.. (THATS YOU GUYS ). I have read about many of you bitchin' about the very thing that my letter states but yet nobody has done anything ( to my knowledge ) about it so I figured I would . who knows,,,,something may get done about it but chances are they wont and i know this. the rich get richer and us poor bastages are the ones paying for it. i did some research and from what i understand it only costs $125.00 to sell a car on ebay. also in there it says something about the buyer also having to pay some kind of fees. unless i read it wrong thats what it said. i sold a bass guitar on Ebay ( a 4001 Rickenbacker ) i got 1425.00 for it and paid 200.00 in fees. THATS 14%( most credit cards aint that high ):angryfire:.....PLUS LISTING FEES AND WHATEVER PAYPAL FEES WERE SNUCK IN THERE. I have just had enuff of the BS. I like using Ebay....its a great place to buy stuff but a terrible place to sell stuff. all with me on this i ask you to write a letter to them also. theres power in numbers and i know theres over 7000 members on this site. heres Ebays address incase you would like to write them :

EBAY
2145Hamilton Ave.
San Jose CA. 95125:blob1:

 

[happyjackdaddy54]

I don't sell anything on Ebay. My complaint is, when I'm looking for parts for my 64 Fury, I have to look at fuzzy dice, dead man steering knobs, and all kinds of parts that have nothing to do with what I'm looking for. For instance,. You could put a pile of poop in and just say fits 64 Fury and they will put it on! I't gotten very annoying searching for parts there any more.

 

[packerman16]

tpodwdog
great job i'm sure u got some one attention,and thats a start.
i'm sure everone will back u up.

 

[QTR MILE]

Great Thread, and although you are 100% correct, the owner of E-Scam also owns Paypal who charge you 9% of the shipping costs you receive to ship an item. Not only do they get a peice of the item, they get the shipping too which has nothing to do with ebay. As another member said here, just walk away and when they see buisness decline, they will revisit the fee's. F*ck Ebay.

 

[1967_Joe]

I don't sell anything on Ebay. My complaint is, when I'm looking for parts for my 64 Fury, I have to look at fuzzy dice, dead man steering knobs, and all kinds of parts that have nothing to do with what I'm looking for. For instance,. You could put a pile of poop in and just say fits 64 Fury and they will put it on! I't gotten very annoying searching for parts there any more.

AMEN BROTHER...what is the deal with the fuzzy dice anyway?? Did all Mopar owners have those things back in the day?

 

[696pack]

You people are just beating your heads against the wall. Small potatoes as far as Ebay is concerned.

They have become another Amazon.com that is set up to be online stores for retailers.

What we have used it for in the past is just that, MOSTLY a thing of the past. The only GOOD thing about it is that it is a tremendious international marketing tool. You just have to price things to cover the extra marketing cost that ultimately get pasted on to the buyer.

How many here know how Ebay started?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EBay#Origins_and_history

Before reading the link above I too had heard the Pezz despenser story.

 

[bigmanjbmopar]

Nice letter Top, you all know my feelings. Sold my last ALT to a member here through ebay and lost my ***. I have since puled the rest of my small stuff off and have it on craigslist which I suspect it will never even be seen unless some one browses to page 128 lol.

Ebay can kiss my *** too they have new management and new philosophy's that are nothing like what they started out to be. Now they are just a faceless corp douche. The fee's between eripoff and paynotmypal are out of this world for a flee market type place that used to be a fun place to sell stuff quick and easy now just a take your cash and bend you over. I literally watched my seller fee's one day at $4.00 go to $15 the next day with NO activity! sell one thing and they go to $28! one freaking thing man it's BS.

 

[Bruzilla]

Dealing with eBay and Paypal fees is simply a cost of doing business, and the same as if you were having to pay rent on a building, advertising costs, electricity bills, etc., for a bricks & mortar company. Those fees for selling on eBay means you don't have to pay for advertisement, you don't have to pay to get access to global customers, you don't have to pay for your own credit card payment processing, you don't have to pay for your own IT support, etc. When you factor in everything eBay does for you, that fee is really pretty small when compared to what you would be paying for all that access and support on your own.

Which brings me to Craigslist. There are no fees, but you're greatly limited to how much you can charge because the buyer access is so limited. Parts are cheaper on CL because they have to be. Some cost-is-no-object guy on the other side of the country who desperately needs the part you're selling, and will pay through the nose to get it, has no idea you're selling it. That guy ends up paying top dollar for the part on eBay, while you end up staring at your part, wondering if it'll ever sell. In reality, that's no bargain. Unsold inventory is always a liability and an expense no matter how cool it is.

 

[Cranky]

Vote with Your feet...walk away and don't use it...it's not Rocket Science

Voting with both is what I usually do...

Nice letter Top, you all know my feelings. Sold my last ALT to a member here through ebay and lost my ***. I have since puled the rest of my small stuff off and have it on craigslist which I suspect it will never even be seen unless some one browses to page 128 lol.

Ebay can kiss my *** too they have new management and new philosophy's that are nothing like what they started out to be. Now they are just a faceless corp douche. The fee's between eripoff and paynotmypal are out of this world for a flee market type place that used to be a fun place to sell stuff quick and easy now just a take your cash and bend you over. I literally watched my seller fee's one day at $4.00 go to $15 the next day with NO activity! sell one thing and they go to $28! one freaking thing man it's BS.

If you use a few key words like 'mopar dodge plymouth' etc, people like me can fine your CL ad easier. I cruise CL a lot and find pretty much what I'm looking for. Also, another board I'm on has a forum just for ads on CL, Egag and RJ (Racing Junk) and many post links to neat stuff. When I absolutely can't find what I'm looking for, then I'll turn to Egag...like recently I was looking for a 'sub C' ni-cad battery and found what I needed there. I found a battery web site that had them for about the same price but shipping was 14 bucks! Wasn't about to pay that for a 3 dollar battery. The one on Egag was free shipping. As for selling on Egag...never have and probably never will.

 

[tpodwdog]

Dealing with eBay and Paypal fees is simply a cost of doing business, and the same as if you were having to pay rent on a building, advertising costs, electricity bills, etc., for a bricks & mortar company. Those fees for selling on eBay means you don't have to pay for advertisement, you don't have to pay to get access to global customers, you don't have to pay for your own credit card payment processing, you don't have to pay for your own IT support, etc. When you factor in everything eBay does for you, that fee is really pretty small when compared to what you would be paying for all that access and support on your own.

Which brings me to Craigslist. There are no fees, but you're greatly limited to how much you can charge because the buyer access is so limited. Parts are cheaper on CL because they have to be. Some cost-is-no-object guy on the other side of the country who desperately needs the part you're selling, and will pay through the nose to get it, has no idea you're selling it. That guy ends up paying top dollar for the part on eBay, while you end up staring at your part, wondering if it'll ever sell. In reality, that's no bargain. Unsold inventory is always a liability and an expense no matter how cool it is.

i understand the cost of doing business....and i know how passing the buck works also.........but...............14% is Ebays take on your item.......and paypal takes another 9%..............to me thats TOOOOOOO HIGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH..........theyre gonna price themselves right outta bizness the way i see it....may not happen tomorrow,,,,but it will happen because since i posted this,,,,theres alot more people just on this site alone that WILL NOT deal with ebay anymore. if you can afford these fees,,,,then more power to ya. i work too hard for my money to just give it away, and i wont do it any longer. once my items i have on ebay expire...i will not relist them...just for principals sake. theyre costing me much less to have them sit here than to give them away....WHOA BUNDY!

 

[YY1]

Dealing with eBay and Paypal fees is simply a cost of doing business, and the same as if you were having to pay rent on a building, advertising costs, electricity bills, etc., for a bricks & mortar company. Those fees for selling on eBay means you don't have to pay for advertisement, you don't have to pay to get access to global customers, you don't have to pay for your own credit card payment processing, you don't have to pay for your own IT support, etc. When you factor in everything eBay does for you, that fee is really pretty small when compared to what you would be paying for all that access and support on your own.

Which brings me to Craigslist. There are no fees, but you're greatly limited to how much you can charge because the buyer access is so limited. Parts are cheaper on CL because they have to be. Some cost-is-no-object guy on the other side of the country who desperately needs the part you're selling, and will pay through the nose to get it, has no idea you're selling it. That guy ends up paying top dollar for the part on eBay, while you end up staring at your part, wondering if it'll ever sell. In reality, that's no bargain. Unsold inventory is always a liability and an expense no matter how cool it is.

This is a great sumation, and very logical and business savy.

My wife is a much more frequent seller than I am, even though she has only been doing it for about 1 year where as I have been doing it for several more.

We had this discussion the other day, and she brought up that the fees were nowhere near the costs of doing business out of a brick and mortar store and the potential world-wide market was tough to beat.

Pretty sharp cookie, if you ask me!

 

[Bruzilla]

Let's look at in practical terms for a second. Last year there was a guy on Craigslist selling a nice Rallye dash with 150 MPH speedo. He was asking only $50, which was a very good price just for the speedo. That dash sat on Craigslist for months and didn't sell because of the size of the market he was selling to. Nobody needed a Rallye dash even for $50, so he paid $0 to advertise but made $0.

There are always a couple of these units on eBay, with prices ranging from $100 to $250+. Let's go the low route, and post the same dash on eBay and say it sells at $100, and we know it will sell because the market we're exposed to is a couple million times bigger than what Craigslist offers and we know there's a demand from drivers and parts resellers. So it sells in one week for $100, out of which we pay eBay 23% or $23. That still puts $77 dollars in our pocket, which is $77 more than the guy selling on Craigslist got.

In the grand scheme of things, having operating costs of 23% is pretty damn good. You look at overhead costs, advertising costs, support costs, and money handling costs for most companies, they would kill to be at just 23%. How much is exposure to millions and millions of buying customers worth? Is it worth spending $23 to make $77 instead of spending $0 to make $0? I think so, and so does eBay. They want to make all the money they can just like I do, and I don't see them lowering their fees to keep a few sellers when there are hundreds of new sellers joining every day.