eBay just charged me a $1.02 fee on an item I sold for $0.99 | Hacker News Reader

eBay just charged me a $1.02 fee on an item I sold for $0.99

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35 pointsnfriedly7 comments

If 3 cents is the most you've ever lost by shipping an eBay sale, you're doing great.

Historically on eBay, 'shipping' charges were whatever the seller said they are, and so were very often used to pad profit of the seller. So, all the more reason for eBay fees to be a function of price+shipping.

Today, eBay is often the middleperson for purchasing the shipping service for an order, so eBay knows exactly how much the seller is paying for that. Although eBay could exclude these actual shipping charges from their fee function, I mostly see disincentive for them to do that. (eBay does offer discounts over USPS list price for shipping, though, so that helps.)

Last time I tried to sell something on eBay, they wanted me to ship the product, BEFORE sending me any of the money the buyer paid. They told me the money "could be" released in 10 business days AFTER I have shipped the product and the burden of proof would be on me.

After I called them and told them I wasn't comfortable taking 100% of the risk, after having an account for over 20 years that is all positive, they refused. I asked to cancel the transaction, and still ended up being charged a $100+ fee they wouldn't refund. I disputed the charge with my bank but eBay even won that by sending the bank a printed out copy of their terms of service that went on for over 40 pages, and the bank just agreed with them I must have been in the wrong.

Never again I will sell or buy anything on eBay if I can avoid it.

I have to agree. I've just had a buyer intentionally damage an item and ask for a return a month later which eBay granted. The buyer always wins in a dispute and they often abuse that. eBay takes all leverage from the sellers much like Paypal did back in the day. By withholding funds, taking banking info they refuse to delete and making a ToS longer than the Declaration of Independence. I won't use them to buy or sell.

This seems to be a lack of communication on fees. Ebay should communicate estimate when you set the price. I know http://reverb.com does this, they show you exactly how much they will take in a chart during the posting wizard before you hit submit.

When I first started selling on ebay, I wondered why they always seemed to charge buyers a bit more for shipping then what they charged me. Eventually I realized that the difference was their fee and it looked odd but actually worked out fine. Apparently enough other people were confused by this that they stopped doing it. So now it looks right on the surface, but ends up worse for sellers.

Also, one time I sold two items for the exact same price + shipping, and noticed ebay charged slightly different fees. The buyers were in different states and paid different amounts of tax. That's when I realized ebay charged me a fee on the tax. I suppose they're paying the credit card processor a fee on the total amount including tax, so maybe that makes sense, but I wish they were a bit more upfront about it.

Likely Unpopular Opinion Alert:

Ever see a minimum required purchase for using a credit card? Same kind of deal. You might not be able to make sales below a certain threshold on their own and remain profitable. Is that eBay's fault or yours?

That's eBay's fault, if not their problem.

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