On May 1, eBay lowered its monthly allotment of "free" listings from 50 to 20. After that, listings and relistings alike cost 30 cents each. That means for sellers whose items have a low profit margin to begin with - such as most video releases, LPs, books and such - the effort to sell on eBay is more like charity now and less like a part-time hobby.

What eBay managers don't grasp is that the less items listed on their site, the less items sold, and the less sold, the less us sellers have to spend in PayPal bucks. So the downward spiral accelerates.

eBay wants to offset profit losses by forcing dealers to open stores and provide it with guaranteed monthly rents. It is extremely short-sighted. The only question is how long will it take for them to realize the damage they are doing to themselves.

Meanwhile, I would much prefer to sell on LDDb — to fellow collectors who appreciate quality and good packaging. I have been lowering the prices in my shop, and will be glad to entertain all reasonable offers.

"J"

G and J Rarities

i think Ebay killed itself when they took away the feedback to buyers.

it used to be a buyer would also sell on ebay and keep the machine running.
when they made it harder and removed that feedback it also removed part time sellers.
so no more sellers and no more buyers etc.

in the past 1 1/2 years I've lost about 85% of sales.

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the rein-o official signature:

Yep, I don't understand that one as that is what seperated my Laserdisc Player sales from the others because the Feedback...

Honestly, I feel pretty much the opposite. eBay went to hell when it started being too good to sellers. That copy of Phantom Menace with a BIN of $300 that's been re-listed for free 14 times? That would make the seller broke real quick in the old days. Now it's just considered Gouging 101, standard practice for profiteer scum who's main goal is to increase prices constantly.

Btw, G&J is one of my favorite sellers on this site and in no way am I accusing them of this sort of behavior.

Hi,

ebay UK now have dropped to 20 a month "free listings" for sellers here (non business sellers) & 30p per listing thereafter.

Selling low value items really is not worth the hassle any more.

Sadly ebay is, for a number of reasons, not as much fun as it used to be.



I hope all works out for you.

Cheers

SOZ,

Thanks for the boost. I'm not sure your experience with eBay is the opposite at all. There have always been a few maverick sellers listing grossly inflated prices, hoping for the occasional moron to pay them. eBay has no interest in stopping such practices, because they get a percentage. The real pressure on sellers comes from the marketplace, and if they (we) want to sell our stock, we have to be mindful of what the market will bear. eBay has no idea of what lase discs are. When I post the WS "The Keep," for example, the helpful pricing guide pops up to recommend listing it for 99 cents "if you want to sell it." Uh, thank you? LOL

"J"

I've started selling regularly on ebay the past few months so I'll offer a few thoughts. I haven't sold any Laserdisc but do sell a lot of Videos and vintage toys.

I think last on the UK site it was actually 100 free listings, or at least it was up to Christmas. Ebay still gives private sellers 100 listings on top of the 20 per month its just you have to find them.Then it's actually 35p after that. Usually they give these away on a sunday and they have be used up that very day unless its a bank holiday weekend then you get a bit longer. Finding them isn't always easy, sometimes they send you an email and you click to activate and then other times you only find out if you scroll to the bottom of your sellers page (and then activate). I've been toying with the idea of upgrading to a basic store but really don't know if its worth it. You get 200 listings and i think slightly less fees. But it's about 17 or 20 per month so I don't really know if its worth it at all. Plus finding info accurate info about this seems to be a challenge as different pages on ebay state different prices and fees.

Ebay tries to take as much of the sellers money as possible, on top of listing fees, there's 10% of the profit once the items sells (less for business sellers but this has recently increased) as well as paypal taking another 3 or 4 %. The worst of it I think is ebay taking 10% of the money you receive for postage! The higher the postage costs the higher the fee. Meaning that if you offer a higher costing postage that happens to be faster, signed and has a higher insurance then ebay with charge you more. This will no doubt discourage some sellers from offering these services and will affect customer service. It also means that effectively sellers could actually lose money selling something. If I sold something for 99p in auction and it receives one bidder and it cost 10 pounds to send it aboard, then it will cost me £1.00 of my money to send it plus 10p ebay fee and maybe an extra even 35p listing fee.

Not being able to give customer negative feedback is terrible which basically makes even having feedback for customers pointless. Anyone can have 100% feedback until then try and sell something. I've had several people bid, buy it now, give me best offers and not pay or acknowledge my emails. I can still report them but that doesn't stop them from doing it again.

To good to sellers ? Dont think so man. Maybe if you like relisting overpriced stuff that no one buy then yes.

Have a store and pay them 20% for a sold item, then 10% of the costumers claim back their money, after taxes and vat paid there is 0 left. And then people complaining about your high prices.

Ebay killed them self when they stopped being an auction site, and gave all the rights to the buyers, your 100% positive feedback means nothing facing a scam buyer for some reason.

Ebay definitely needs better selling tools in my opinion. Last minute bidders ruined the E-bay experience and I agree its becoming seller thrift stores. They should have something like Hidden Seller Reserve for 100% feedback sellers. Non paying bidders should be suspended 6 months or made to pay.