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Just got a short reply. Both tech reps and a senior engineer is all over it. They are going through my most recent copy of my database right now. Funny they have a huge amount of my datbases because I send it to them several times amonth for the to use to work out things that are in beta for Shopify and Etsy. But both myself and them are changing stuff so much that I alwasy have to send a fresh copy almost with each question or issue that pops up.
Their message says, we got, both depts working on it. They said based on what they are seeing, they have to check to see if Ebay is in actually sending that data and WL is just not picking it up and posting to the correct columns or if for some reason Ebay’s API is haywire again like the Items on Sale glitch and not relisted at the original price. What a screw up that was and it took Ebay about 6 weeks to fix it.
They tell me that Etsy is worse than Ebay, if that is possible with internal software glitches and then getting back to the WL tea.
They end their message will be back to you ASAP with a reply. Now who knows what they are going to say, experience tells me it could be a case of each of them [WL and Ebay] pointing fingers at each other. but they didn’t seem to be argumentative about it so far. 🙂
mikeI have sent them two extra screen shots showing the “SPENT ON SHIPPING” Columns as all ZERO’s. I have had a couple of Questions back from them already. They are working on it right now. But I think you are dead on. The column saying ShHIPPING CHARGED” is what the customer should have or did pay, but the Column that says, Spent on Shipping I would think should be showing us what we actually did in reality spend on “True” shipping costs which may be either higher, lower, or spot on.
Will report back as soon as I hear more.
Mike
I can understand the confusion buddy.
It is interesting what you have brought up so, I did a little double monitor screen and I see something I have the tech guys checking into right now.
First, I never use the chat box because I have direct access to the tech support guys, the and the Owner and Senior engineer when they happen not to be too busy. I just shot my database over to them.They do have all of that data and it is being presented in a lot od detail, but just not where I think you are talking about.
If I click on the SALES Tab, I get a fairly OK Sales Report that does have a default view showing that is a couple of screen scrolls wide to the right. When I scroll right I think I see the vertical column you are referencing and mine too is blank all the way down. iIt’s header is Order Actual Shipping, nothing in mine.
Now while they explore this because that column I don’t think should be blank like that, so we will see when they send my database back. I want you to try something different.
First on the left side bar make sure you are in the system folder that says ALL SALES [you may have to drop the directory down by clicking the dwn arrow and highlighting the ALL SALES LINE. Now, Up at the far top looking across the main tabs, click on Reports instead of Sales. On the drop down menu, click on Sales Report. Now right below the Sales Tab there are 2 fileds that need to have you to put 2 dates in. Just use 01/01/2018 and in the second box enter todays date if not already there by default. The right beside that 2nd date box, click on “Show Report”.
Now you will be presented with 3 tabs. All Sales in this time frame by Date which you can filter like crazy to your hearts content, the next tab if you will click on it will show you all of your sales in that time frame by “Region” which is actually by state, and again you can filter by state, by highest sale per state, lowest sale per state, and again shows many columns of data to the right. Then the 3rd tab when you click on it shows you a Summary of all sales made during this time frame. Again about 17 columns of data showing but all compiled into just one line..total gross for those 17 column headings.Now back to the first tab called “Date Wise”. In my data base there are 42 columns across of data which includes a column for item sale amount, shipping charged, taxes charged [and of course this only shows for my state of GA. [I use this column to get my total for what I owe to GA for items sold within GA.] Adjustments, total receipts, ebat fees, final value fees, paypal fees our cost per item [COGS] Handling fees, then the column that says spent on shipping. Mine is blank all the way down, and that is what I am having them also check into. plus dozens of other rows to thr right, right on down to all of the buyers addresses AND PHONE NUMBERS!!
So while they are checking, would you also do what i just did and see if we are now, hopefully on the same page. That “actual”, “true cost” we paid for shipping not showing up? is that waht you are referencing and if so they are checking into this right now.
P.S. If haven’t used the Reports Tab and the Sales report from within that tab, it does have a lot of info. and if you right click anywhere on the page you can save the whole kit and Kaboodle as a .CSV file and open it up in excel, create your own formatting and headers and write a few formulas to get all the columns with num,bers to total up for you at the top of those columns. But you already know that.
mike
Hey Mark S. I shot your post off to the guys at Tech. Support.
here is their answer, which I got back within minutes.
Hello Mike,Yes, Mark S. created a ticket in our system in which he asked the following:
“I see the shipping cost paid by the buyer, but I don’t see my shipping cost in the sales Reports.”We responded like in 1 minute after this was posted:
The shipping cost you paid, is a cost you have to manually enter, for example, if you went to a FedEx store and shipped, naturally, WL has no way to know how much you actually paid unless you enter it in the system.Thanks
So reading this it reminds me that WL and SixBit both pulls data directly from EBay. They don’t pull data from PayPal. If PayPal reports info. back to Ebay and Ebay is allowed to share it, then I guess it maybe could be captured. But as the tech rep. states, if labels or shipping took place another way as FedEx or FedEx Smart Post they probably don’t get that reported to them and in turn not reported in their reports.
I also have to remind myself that WonderLister and Sixbit are not finacial / accounting programs and operate like FreshBooks, QuickBooks, Quicken or GoDaddy. Those are stand alone as you already know and tie into your bank accounts, PayPal, credit cards and the such and I personally reply on reports generated from those apps for financial reports.
So maybe those costs can be better captured by the accounting programs. Personally i try not to manually enter data in most apps.Dont know if any of this is of value, but thought I would toss it in.
Mike in Atl.
There are five listed on worthpoint. You can see the phtos and read descriptions, which may help but not the prices. The lowest one is $250 and the highest is $2,167 it is 23-1/2″ high.
Also it must have been interesting for the roadies to haul around a Hammond double keyboard organ. Think they were Hammond B3??? and with the Lesley speakers.
Goggle Hammond organ solos and just listen to those for a short while. Boy what a sound and great solos by very famous musicians.
I hear you Dbl.thumbs: I have not seen anything McIntosh or Marantz in years and years. My high school friend had Mac equipment way back, speakers, equilizer, receiver, turntable and a reel to reel upright tape deck. And that also wired into [Wait for it!}, a hanging, egg shaped 60’s fall into type of chair complete with multiple speakers embedded all around the inside of that thing!. If you know what I am talking about then I can pin point your age. We would do, you know what [suffice it to say it was a smoke filled room] and then everybody wanted him to crank up the “system” as we called it and the whole house was engulfed with the vibrating bass and of course whomever got into the surround sound egg chair first, ended up staying there for hours. [So it seemed of course :-)].
Ok, now I have given away some of my youth vices, But “none of us inhaled”!!!! LOL 🙂
Doug from Whodunit Galleries in Baltimore … 🙂 see you don’t even know who I am!
Actually that is sort of the way it already is now. Ebay changed the wording from “Best Offer” to “Make Offer”, then changed the amount of times a seller and potential buyer can go back and forth from 3 times to five times. So, if used correctly that is sort of a mini-acution in “reverse”. I say $100 in my listing, the buyer says $50 [1st offer], I counter offer and say half off is too low how about 20% off at $80 [2nd offer], they then say, still too high how about $70 [3rd counter offer], then I say let’s meet in the middle at $75 [4th offer] and that usually does the trick, every now and then I get a last counter at a dollar less, [5th offer], OK you win and I take it.
So the new 5 Offer status has allowed us to really offer discounts but convert a lot of sales. If it was “Make A BEST OFFER”, then only one price is offered by the buyer and it is a take it or leave it situation for the Seller. Now with the 5 opportunities to make everybody happy we convert a lot of first offers into Sold Sales but at an amount higher than the first offer they come out of the chute with.Here is an antique booth axiom [technique used many times]. The tag price sets the ceiling [you won’t get this a lot of the time]. “He who says a number first, usually looses. So by putting a price on your listing or on a tag, count on probably not getting that. Then the buyer throws a number out, that sets the floor. That takes two manuevers. With these parameters set, Ceiling and floor, we now do what I call “the dance”. We then come down 15-20%, they come up 10-15%, in other words we come off the ceiling and they come up off the floor [we are dancing]. Then one or two more downs or ups and we have ended the dance and both parties are happy. I am going to guess we have about a third of our items come in with an offer. Then I engage them in the dance and maybe convert, 75% [guessing] those into Sales.
The buyer goes low because the good lord says you have not because you ask not. So most seasoned buyers, ask. I also do the same when we buy. Last day of an estate Sale, everything is 50% off marked, well I engage, haggle and usually get 75% off. Just last Sunday, $600 of items for $150. My cost.Also ask, always try for a discount, expect, your buyers to do the same, dance with them and then close the deal.
Following AdvenE comments, it is just a cold line of SOP’s [Standard Operating Procedures. Learn the drill, recognize when they will dance and close the deal. Online or in person, buying or selling.
AND ALWAYS REMEMBER, “he who mentions a number first always looses”. That is why we price so high on our store listings and used to on the tags at our booths.We run 15-20% off sales frequently, so that is the first and second offer, so to speak, we list at $100, then auto. discount at $80, [perceived value and bargain, we dance and are happy with 40% off, WHY.. We had that built into the price in the first place. Some times we sell at listing price and smile all the way to the bank. Too bad they didn’t use any of their 5 “Make Offers” Ebay now let’s a potential buyer use.
Standar Operating Procedure.. always have your dancing shoes on.
Mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art in Atlanta
Yep.. dead on as to how I do it. PayPal.. is just a commission/fee just like a bank fee. Actually it is a credit card merchant processing fee, but a fee is a fee.
Pull same type of reports from WonderLister.
All expenses run through the business credit card and I just pull them down into Quicken and they are by now all memorized by Quicken and just fall into the correct categories. I prefer the Quicken P&L rather than any type of report from Ebay. I also use the percentage column so I can what percentage of our income each category is representing. That way if I wish to lower a category then it shows up easily by doing it this way.
Also I know you know, but there are national averages by percentage that represent different industries. I could easily see in mfg. certain categories that were 2 or 3 percentage points higher then national averages and also our historical averages. I call the president of the company and all he wnated to know were what were the flags I saw. I would report our Advertising has moved from 6% of our gross Sales up to 9% of our gross and that is 2% over average for companies of our size in our industry. We ran 18 million dollars per year by watching those averages. If payroll went up by 8 to 12%, then who hired who and at how much? Then I would have to reun the numbers to see what impact those hires had on our productivity and if they carried, then they were good to go. If not someone was going to be let go. But all done by categories and percentages.Man we are so closely aligned it is spooky sometimes when you post.
Mike in Atl.
Here is something to digest first. Then my answer:
The average inventory shrink rate has increased to 1.44 percent in the retail business
Inventory shrinkage definition includes:
1. Shoplifting/external (including ORC) = 36.5 percent
2. Employee theft/internal = 30 percent
3. Administrative and paperwork error = 21.3 percent
4. Vendor fraud or error = 5.4 percent
5. Unknown loss = 6.8 percentBased on these numbers-averages is why we just went with Hassle Free Returns a few months back. First think of the overall national average.. it is only 1.44% TOTAL that includes all of #1-#5. I assume we aren’t any different.
So we grossed about $25,000 last year x 1.44% = $360 dollars total. So if we fall into the about average category, to us mind you, $360 isn’t worth me writing any emails to agrue the point. Only when it is going to get us a negative or impact our rating or status.So, 1 and 2. Our stores do not have to deal with internal employees but our online buyers replace this nemesis. Some buyers will and do try to “beat us out of something” in so many ways. We just tired of sorting through it all. Answering false claims, weird questions, or inspecting returns with swapped out merchandise. Call it what you want, it is going to be a part of your business.
3. This is on us and if we make a mistake in listing, shipping or packing. Just accept it quickly [like in 30 seconds] and move on. Even if you know that the items was described perfectly, just tell them to send it back. And as Jay has mentioned and has been our experience, this weeds out those just fishing for a discount. Nope. Many people believe what the good lord says, “You have not because you ask not”. So many try to get a seller to discount after the fact. But our standard is just like Jay says, Nope. We shoot a short quick email through Ebay messaging that says, “We want all of our customers to be 100% satisfied and am soory to hear that you are not”. Please request a shipping label through the Hassle Free Program and once we receive the item back we will at that time issue you a refund”. That is it. We have only had 3 or 4 returns in years.
#4.. Doesn’t apply because we only buy used items, [mostly]. But occassionaly auction houses will pass something off on us that we didn’t see and end up discovering it right before photography and we just throw it in our to donate pile-bin. Again, easy peasy and we will watch more closely when we preview auction items we will be bidding on later.
#5. We let anything we break, drop or misplace fall into this category.So all in all, we think of it as a cost of dpoing business. I consider my administrative time valued at $40 per hour. That is $.66 per minute. When you think of that, you won’t spend much time on dealing with any issues like returns, or customers fishing on you or trying to scam you out. Just don’t worry about it, tell them you are soory to hear of an issue and please, by all means send it back. In your case, if it was damaged, how many times does that happen at every retail store in the world. Accept it and move on.
Now that $40 bucks an hour I value my time at, wonder what my cost has been over the years, reading and responding to things here on SL. I think I may be at hundreds od replies. Think that time may add up to months, think how much I could have gotten listed or the value added of those replies.
So see, don’t get caught in the weeds. If you are going to run a business, then remember that businesses have a category for all of this, it is called “shrinkage” and it is just a matter of fact. Make sure you have your profit margins set high enough to cover this Chart of Account expense category.
So dump that stuff in the donate pile, and go list 5 more items. It is refreshing to remove the fears of running a business off your shoulders.
Also don’t get me wrong, ask any of us here on SL your questions. You will get a lot of varieties of answers all aimed at helping those who have helped us. I had to ask a question just the other day. That is the community J&R have shaped here at SL.
Good luck on your part time endeavor and hopefully one day you will announce to all of us that you quit your job and are going full time. 🙂
Kindest Regards,
Mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art in AtlantaThat was just a short response to T-Satt talking about detailing the COGS. One could crawl deep into the weeds if one wanted too and track the “real actual cost of an item” by being so darned detailed that you could take your “procurement costs” and even figure out what part of the procurement costs went into the cost of an item. But that is way too deep. So the easiest way is just track mileage for ALL buisness trips and use the standard IRS of $.56 per mile. That was all I was saying, in reply to T-Satt topic of being detailed and tracking COGS in Great, Great detail. I was mentioning it as to show how crazy and OCD [as T-Satt calls himself at times] can get if one wants to split hairs into a thousand pieces. Then mentioned the mileage allowance at the standard rate as a comparison and that it is much easier to do it that way and just expense mileage on your COA as an over all expense. That was all I was trying to say.
Please don’t do it that way, use the standard mileage deduction.
For those who don’t track mileage, get yourself an app like MileIQ or others and by allmeans track your mileage. it is a large part of our expenses each year and reduces your taxable groos profits, thus lowers your taxes. It is a great deduction along with your home office deductions. square footage and the share of utiilties divided into that office square footage]. it all adds up.
And as we all here at SL will tell anyone asking about these issues and are desireable of running an online business full time, here it comes Jay… Please seek out the help of an accountant or CPA. Not a tax form filler, but a person who has a degree in accounting and stays up on the tax laws. Ask them everything your heart can think of, and then some more. Ask how do I,… Why do I have to…, when do I have to …, how should I organize, do i need a license, why get a license. If you can ask it, do so. A CPA will be your full time business best friend.
Mike at MDC Galleries and Fine Art.
Yep. Spot on. And also include the procurement cost divided by the number of items per procurement trip. [the $.56 IRS per mile divided by how many items that trip] or use the procurement as expenses.
all expenses [expensed categories], are determined by setting up a COA [Chart of Accounts], and using GAAP standard line item numbers, a seller then uses these catgories to deduct against the gross profits. I am more interested in what my Corporation Makes than what I personally make. A corporation is an entity unto itself and one needs to run their business so their “business / corporation” makes money, then pay yourself as an employee of that corporation or take Owner Distributions”. Then expense any thing you can lay your hands on. Toothpaste is a great polish, toilet paper is good to wrap items in for storage, toothbrushes are good to scrub stuff, all allowable as an expnese under the IRS rules and categorized under your COA as Cleaning Supplies or Janitorial supplies.
By having a very detailed COA, which we set up in Quicken and then when we down load all of our numbers from all of our banks, paypal and all credit cards, they get automatically placed into the Chart of Accounts [COA] that we have assigned them to. Then from that we pull a P&L [Profit and loss Statement], every week end.
This way we know if our company is doing well and where we stand. In some years we want to make sure our company is actually running in the red, but that doesn’t mean we didn’t make money or that we didn’t get paid. And we can track if we need to pay quarterly taxes or by running in the red, we have had some years where we didn’t pay any taxes at all. And that was by design and under our control. Using a fully detailed COA and a P&L statement we can tell when it is time to maybe buy that $900 piece of equipment.
There is just no substitute for utilizing a full accounting approach to running ones business, expensing everything that you can and the COGS is just a part of it.
In my opinion. But that is what we do here, share opinions.
Just got an email back from the support team.. Ebay and PayPal ties into WonderLister and anything shipped gets pulled from those sources and should be showing in the Sales Report tab under the Shipping Column. Anything taken to FedEx or UPS and the label is printed through your UPS or FedEx account and you either scheduled a pick-up or took it in own your own and dropped off then those charges need to be added into the shipping charges column manually.
But if you printed the labels through Ebay / PayPal and it was a fedEx label then it is included in the “Total Amount”.Now not sure of the exact numbers you are seeing, but now armed with this feedback, I suggest you contact them and make sure WL is capturing everything correctly.
Oh and I am assuming you are on a paid level subscription and not the “Trial Version”.
good luck, take care..
Mike at MDCG in ATL
Mark: That is strange. So couple of comments. My version is showing “total shipping Costs” by the item and in “Sales reports” by the state, region, etc. And I see the “Total” shipping costs for the whole month [all items sold] and none are broken down by the carrier. These have to be my USPS charges because I hardly ever use FedEx and never UPS.
Next to go to the Tools Tab, clcik “options”, then scroll dwn to “Shipping”. Make sure WonderLister has captured all of your Shipping Profiles that you are currently using. If not, then do a complete refresh using the Refresh from Ebay Tab to make sure WL pulls in all of the current shipping policies you have on Ebay. In other words get them in synch.
Next make sure you have the latest version. They are making changes fairly quickly and you won’t also get an email update request. So go to their web site and download the newest version. Even if it is the same version, they sometimes make some small quick changes and leave the version number the same. remeber though the CHAT with us tab ties directly to the team in California, so they are on PST time zone. and are more closely tied to normal 9 to 5 type of hours and is sort of hit or miss. Also just shoot them an email directly. But I will ask when I am done here, because I usually get answered very quickly. Like yesterday I reported the Make an Offer Button went out and it was done before I got off the phone.
As a safety vale: The NEW.. “Chat with us” tab should be showing in the lower left corner of your screen Use this for a direct chat link to the tech support team and ask the question.
Short answer [unusual for me]. No it doesn’t. But it does pick up the fact that the listing has ended and moves it automatically to the Unsold Folder. If and when I see items there, I move it to a folder I and the engineers create called Sold Off Ebay. Was using that for some testing. But is a work around for now. I have so few sales on Bonanza, that later on; I may even kill the listings off of Bonanza.
But I just use the Sold Off Ebay folder for now. In up coming releases [revisions], there will be system folders created for the Shopify and Etsy stores with full tracking.
