barnieg Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 At the moment myself and the wife don't ebay "professionally" we buy and sell hobby stuff as either clearouts of stuff we don't want or sometimes to get a bit of emergency cash. Ebaying has to fit around work, life kids etc. Because of this we state in our terms that it can be up to 5 working days after payment before we post, despite this we occasionally get irrational buyers who don't read properly and moan about delivery. Recently I sold an Atari 800XL which was posted on time and I eventually received good feedback, however the buyer was extremely rude demanding(!) that they get their Atari pretty much immediately. I've not paid much attention to the other feedback items on ebay just trying to focus on keeping our 100% rating, however it appears vindictive buyers can mark you down in other categories which will effect your standing with ebay. What can I do about this? as I feel the email from ebay was both rude and insulting, we also ship within our stated time limits and don't think the postage we charge unreasonable (sometimes taking into account ebay+paypal fees and underestimating we have lost on postage) Barnie "Dear giltrapbj, Your seller performance is below standard under the UK seller performance standards programme. We noticed that you've improved your seller performance--that's great news. However, you'll need to continue improving to avoid limitations. Based on your ratings, we recommend that you focus on charging reasonable postage & packaging, and dispatching your items promptly and informing your buyers. Charging reasonable postage & packaging In today's online market, buyers expect to pay actual postage costs or to get free P&P. To meet buyers' expectations: - Charge the least amount you can for postage, or offer free P&P. - Once you've set your postage cost, stick to it. Don't add to or change any fees after setting them. Get more tips on setting reasonable P&P fees. Dispatch your items promptly and inform your buyers Dispatching your items promptly allows buyers to receive their items more quickly, and leaves them more satisfied. - Give realistic dispatch times in your listings to set buyers' expectations. - When possible, post within 48 hours to fulfil standard online shopping experience expectations. - Update buyers once the item has been sent and upload tracking information to My eBay straight away. Get more tips on dispatching your items promptly. Visit your Seller Dashboard often for specific details about your performance and areas where you can improve" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lumbee74 Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 Sounds like horse shit to me, but that is just my opinion. I don't sell, but buy stuff on EBay and always read buyers full description. If it states a time period for shipping then I know that in advance and still give good feedback. Some people are just stupid. I don't know what you can do about that. Maybe put in big bold red letters your 5 day shipping window. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amiman99 Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 As a buyer, I read estimated time of arrival, so I don't usually complain about delivery time until few days after the last delivery date. Some people just don't read the description, like "I ship on Tuesdays Only", they win on Wednesday and are expecting to be shipped within 48hrs. You can't please everyone. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bennybingo Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 Pretty soon, eBay will just skip the whole auction thing and just ask us to pay the buyers to take our merchandise! 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HatefulGravey Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 I sold my first large chunk of things on eBay recently and almost instantly went back to other methods. There are somethings you just can't sell in other ways, so I just gave them away. It is really just a mortal pain in the ass to deal with those jerks. Buyers are very often completely unreasonable. I try to be easy about it, but it would seem most people don't. Benny has it right, eBay and FreeCycle will soon have a lot in common at this rate. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cebus Capucinis Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 Well, even if you do sell it in this day and age, you get a fee on the sale, then a fee on SHIPPING (Really eBay? WTF?), then if the person pays via PayPal there's another third party fee to be added in there.... It's getting pretty ridiculous. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpaceDice2010 Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 Well, even if you do sell it in this day and age, you get a fee on the sale, then a fee on SHIPPING (Really eBay? WTF?), then if the person pays via PayPal there's another third party fee to be added in there.... It's getting pretty ridiculous. The new fee structure does suck about getting charged on shipping, but sellers really did it to themselves by excessive shipping fees to avoid Ebay's fee. I remember once paying like $32 shipping for 5 or 6 Xbox games and they came all crammed in a $4.95 flat rate envelope. The total price that I paid was a fair price: cost of games + shipping. This has happened to me time and time again, so I guess I can see where Ebay is coming from. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vaughan Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 It's really just another form email they've sent out. Not that I use Ebay. I hate Ebay. My gripe with Ebay was - I was living in Germany for several years, and while I was there I registered an Ebay account. Being in Germany it routed my account through ebay.de. Okay, I can live with that. However, I got tired of dealing with the German pages for log on when I moved back to the UK. So I wanted to switch my account - and the 137 positive feedbacks - to the UK site. No go. Their advice - start a new account. Huh? What about my feedback? "Well, you'll soon build it up again." What rubbish! I quit at that point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homerwannabee Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 Here is my advice. On half your items incorporate the shipping costs into the price. Do this with all your cheap items. Like single video games where it costs like a pound(U.K. Term) to ship the item. On items where it will cost you 10 pounds, than charge shipping. That way Ebay only dings you on the cheap shipping, and you can maintain your star ratings up to Ebay standards. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rex Dart Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 I don't understand this "visibility bonus" that eBay wants you to work for. I always search for what I'm after & sort the results by ending date, and as far as I can tell, they get sorting by their ending dates... not any arbitrary visibility rating. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hydro Thunder Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 I despise how Ebay is being anti-seller at this point, especially with all the power going to the buyer and how many asinine buyers there are out there... But I still use it. I don't sell a ton, but my recommendation for your selling issue is.... Raise the price and give free shipping. People go nuts for free shipping. And raise the price more than significantly, factor in your shipping, packing, ebay and paypal fees. And if it doesn't sell, relist it, it will at some point if you're not selling the item completely unreasonably. Also consider the "Buy It Now" and "Make an Offer" tags. With Make and Offer, you'll get a lot of crap offers for $0.01, but you can filter those out by having it auto-deny offers under a certain amount. I've found that if you let people have even 5% off the listed price they're often happy and feel they've gotten a deal. But good luck! Use Ebay as a tool, don't let it use you as a tool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Uzumaki Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 Set the estimated shipping time to a lot longer than just a few days. Buyer are often blocked from dinging on shipping time if tracking shows the item arrived before estimated delivery. Also offer free shipping on everything (raise auction price to off set shipping), and you're automatically protected from poor shipping charge. All that's left is hope the buyer doesn't ding your as-described rating and and communication rating. Unfortunately DSR doesn't work well. High volume seller can afford to screw a few buyers and still retain all 5's because 100 good review nulls a bad one or 2. But for low volume sellers like you, one bad rating by a hostile buyer every few good ones could easily send your rating all the way down past 3's and get you suspended. I don't like how eBay works for seller at all. It's too easy for buyer to win case against seller. Buyer's remorse? Just claim the item is SNAD (not as pink as pictured for example) and buyer gets money back. And if the buyer returns a brick or even an empty package, seller can't do squat about it on eBay. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kroogur Posted August 11, 2011 Share Posted August 11, 2011 (edited) sorry lost my train of thought Edited August 11, 2011 by kroogur Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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