eBay - 1 step away from being 100% free to list?

[asiamiles]

"List up to 5,000 items free--Dec. 6-8" - presumably eBay have decided that letting sellers list for free is the way forward and it can't be long before it's free 365 days of the year.

 

[ciddu]

Ebay Italy already allows us to list 100 auctions every month free of charge. It is intended only for the aucion-style listings: Buy it Now / Make an Offer and everything else is still subject to the usual fee.
It is very good for the cheap, hard to sell stuff anyway.
This seems to be the general trend: you pay - and it's a quite substantial fee - only when you sell.

 

[asiamiles]

Ebay Italy already allows us to list 100 auctions every month free of charge. It is intended only for the aucion-style listings: Buy it Now / Make an Offer and everything else is still subject to the usual fee.
It is very good for the cheap, hard to sell stuff anyway.
This seems to be the general trend: you pay - and it's a quite substantial fee - only when you sell.

EBay US currently allows 50 free each month...but that restriction seems likely to be lifted. I guess eBay are finding it makes (financial) sense to get sellers to list more. And yes, final fees are too high at nearly 10%.

 

[John Lever]

Surely it's the sellers and PP fees that are the main cost for users ?

 

[asiamiles]

Surely it's the sellers and PP fees that are the main cost for users ?

Yes, the listing fee is now the least signficant of the 3 fees sellers have to pay, which is why eBay are letting it slip. Of course, if the economy and their business were healthy they'd be jacking that up as well!

 

[RCSignals]

EBay has grown its seller base to the point it should be able to drop listing fees and lower final value fees while still making a huge profit. That would only result in greater use by sellers and greater profit.

 

[asiamiles]

EBay has grown its seller base to the point it should be able to drop listing fees and lower final value fees while still making a huge profit. That would only result in greater use by sellers and greater profit.

Yes, if the final value fees were not so high sellers wouldn't feel the need to cancel listings and sell off-site. That said, I don't know the operating costs of eBay; they seem to spend a lot of money on totally unnecessary things.

 

[John Lever]

I suspect it may not be too far away when governments feel that they are missing a nice source of taxes here and we all have to register PP accounts with Revenue and Customs.

 

[ciddu]

I suspect it may not be too far away when governments feel that they are missing a nice source of taxes here and we all have to register PP accounts with Revenue and Customs.

_________________
John

that sounds quite scary, but I'm afraid it's not far from the thruth, judging from what's happening around these days...
It would raise some issues, too: the whole sale price will be considered taxable income? I should detract at least what I paid for the sold item when I bought it. but oftentimes there's no way to prove it, or they won't believe our declarations... that wold be OUR problem.
Anyway ebay canceled the listing fee, but actually increased the final value fee, and I remember I read somewhere they were planning to apply the fee to the shipping cost too ("to encourage people to list items "free shipping", they say).
And paypal takes fees not only for the payment (shipping included), but on the conversion from different currencies, too (and that means and extra fee for every payment coming from abroad).
It all considered together makes BIG money - and a hefty fee on each and every sale.

 

[dmar836]

I sell infrequently but in the US it's always been relatively cheap to list - like $1(seller/insertion fees). IMO, it's the newest seller's commission(final value fee) where they get you. It's not as easy to find info on the site about exactly what that will be.

 

[asiamiles]

I sell infrequently but in the US it's always been relatively cheap to list - like $1(seller/insertion fees).

The listing fee has always depended on the starting price.

 

[dmar836]

That explains it. So if you start high and sell high, you pay a lot more than starting at .99? I have almost always started low and let the market decide. Good pics and descriptions tend to help things reach their market value.
I just love those who "know nothing about these things" but start bids at $2000 or so.

Dave