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I’ve been selling actively since last August and upgraded to a store in January. I’ve had issues from the beginning, but the glitches and errors seem to jump around.
I’ve never had a correct Listing Frame…the logo and store categories do not show even though I’ve selected both options.
My business policies were created when I started the store in January. I set it up initially how I wanted it, but I am forced to constantly monitor and change things back.
Just today, for example, two new shipping policies were added. This is common. They seem to match the standards of the default shipping policy I have, but is named differently. I frequently have to open the listing affected and move them into the correct policy. I then delete the policies created by eBay. This is a weekly thing I’ve just had to get in the habit of doing.
I also noticed today that the excluded countries list in the international shipping preferences I have set in my account settings does not at all match what buyers see in my listings. For example, I do not exclude Australia or New Zealand from shipping, the box is unchecked, but they show as excluded in my listings. Reverse that, I have checked to exclude the Russian Federation, but currently my listings show that Russia is a country not excluded. I just got off the phone with eBay and once again “they will look into it”.
My business policy settings for returns are set how I want them, but I’ve noticed that randomly when I go to look at those policies that I will frequently get the old options…setting a restocking fee for example. I have sent screenshots of this to eBay and never hear back.
Best offer being added to listings just happened today as well. I noticed the error and had to go back in and turn it off. Not only was best offer added, but automatic rejection numbers were set for anything below half my asking price. That ensures to me that it wasn’t just an error on my behalf to turn it on in the first place, because I even on items I do accept offers on, I never use the auto reject feature.
So ya, it’s a constant struggle to keep up with all the bugs. I call, agents see the issue, and then they make a ticket and pass it on…where it just gets lost. I’ll call back weeks later and go through the process again. Thankfully this hasn’t created any big issues yet, and at least I’m on record of having brought it to their attention, but it all just creates this “itchy” feeling in the back of my mind that things aren’t right. I am growing as a seller and hoping to turn this into a full time gig in two or three years. I absolutely love the entire process. I also know tech has issues sometimes. I used to work in IT and have seen plenty of weird things. I just wish I could worry more about sourcing and shipping than about whether the website is working or not…or if my policies will be changed and stick me in a negative situation.
There isn’t anything anyone on a forum can do. I guess I shared to point out that these issues do exist and people should monitor their policies and listings closely to make sure everything is set how you want it to be.
Plus, whining is a little cathartic. 🙂
I’m experiencing similar issues with eBay randomly changing my business policies and listings…and it is getting very frustrating. They change my shipping options, they add best offer to items that I don’t want that turned on, my international shipping restrictions list in settings does not at all match what the buyers see in my listings, categories don’t show in my store, my logo doesn’t show in the listing panel, etc, etc. Even my business policies for returns randomly changes to the old version where there was no distinction between domestic and international returns and restocking fees are allowed.
Thus far it hasn’t caused any issues, but it takes so much work even with my small store to constantly be vigilant about the random changes. I don’t have the option to just quit, but it really destroys the trust I want to have with the platform. The service agents don’t seem to understand or care. “We’ll make a note” is the best I ever get out of them. Sure, fine, make a note…but FIX the darn issue or get me to someone who can!
Listings cost me 30 cents apiece, but your point is taken. The 90 days though is the source of my question…I’m not sure if winter coats will sell in Spring/Summer. Jackets have actually been slow sellers for me. Hoodies do well, as do sweaters, but my heavier coats haven’t really moved at all.
I’m very small time…total of roughly 25-30 sales per month. If I could sell 10 or 20 jackets, I’d be ecstatic. 🙂Alrighty.
Seems to be the consensus. I was definitely leaning that way because as I said there is a 100% chance of not selling if not listing. I just wasn’t sure if it was a wise use of my listings…I’m right on the border between jumping to the next store level. I’ve got about 130 items so I’m paying for extra listings every month. I’ve had a bunch of sales the past couple days so I’m down a little and trying to list more before heading to work. I’ll do my golf shirts first and then get around to the coats…similar to you Sharyn…but definitely before July. 🙂
Thanks.
~ChristianInteresting, thanks.
I guess I’ll go ahead and list them. I can watch the views and make a future decision to continue them based on whether they are even being looked at.Hi.
Listened to the podcast yesterday at work. Welcome back.I commented in YouTube about the PayPal fees. I was scared I had missed another policy update and that they had increased the fees on us in addition to their money grab with refunds! Thankfully that was just a mistake. I am looking forward to managed payments, especially since the rumored fees will be lower.
A question about managed payments though. Each processor has their own fees and policies, so in managed payments, will we be subjected to the policies of the individual processor the customer selects or will eBay rules trump everyone? The 2.9% fees seem pretty standard across the board with credit card processors, so I’m not sure how eBay will be able to lower the fees unless they will be getting some sort of “bulk discount” from the processors and then pass the savings on to us. Fees for returns and buyer protection (chargebacks, etc) also seem to come into play. Curious how eBay will handle this.
You also mentioned crypto currency in the podcast. I am a huge proponent of crypto and would love to see eBay offer such payments as an option. As the industry matures, there are more and more companies offering payment platforms that will accept various types of crypto. It wouldn’t be hard for them to incorporate. It certainly isn’t yet mainstream, but if large companies like eBay will start allowing acceptance of crypto, that will help in encouraging use and adoption.
Cheers all.
~ChristianHi all.
Sorry for the delayed response.
I really appreciate the feedback. It helps put my mind at ease a bit.I do find it funny how so many of us are self admitted perfectionists and “obsessive”. I wonder if that personality trait has something to do with drawing us to this eBay reselling thing.
Antarestar, the rain was just terrible. My mom even had some hail at her house, but thankfully no real damage. True though, it definitely washed the pollen away. A blessing sure enough.
Indysales, yes, I am using the pro mode on my Android to adjust white balance. I mentioned that even with that ability, it often still skips the actual color and jumps several shades too dark to several shades too light. I have one shirt that’s a fine yellow and blue “plaid”. The close up pictures look fine, but when I try to photograph the whole shirt, it looks like a solid gray no matter what I do. So frustrating!
Temudgin, yes, I agree completely with the diminishing returns principle. I just figure the more I can learn and the better I can get, the faster I’ll be able to do it with the results I’m hoping for.
Again, cheers all.
~ChristianThanks for the feedback.
Ya, I am a perfectionist. I see so many awesome photos on Ebay and I’d like to get to the point I can match those. Sure, some of mine may be good enough, but as you all know this is a cutthroat competition! (Grr. Argh.)Even some of the ones that look really good aren’t exactly color accurate, which is concerning to me. You know how picky customers can be.
I’ll see if I can find some LEDs that fit my units. I have a feeling what I have may be proprietary.
Actually, the hanging pictures on the door are new. I know they look terrible, but trying to photography those the way I did the others was impossible. The color was significantly off. These at least look right, even though the overall picture quality is poor. A trade off I guess.
For the white background I use https://burner.bonanza.com/background_burns. It’s free and was a literal Godsend. I highly recommend it.
PS. Where in SC are you? I’m in Fort Mill.
Thank you Sharyn! I knew that list was available but I had no luck in finding it. That’s a big help. Cheers.
I suppose it is. LOL. I don’t even necessarily need a perpetually replenishable item…maybe just a few dozen of the same thing to make advertising a specific unit realistically worth the time and expense.
My one experience buying a bulk lot was a lot of 50 new clothing items from a Florida based company. I won’t name names here. They did correct one issue when I discovered one of the items received had a hole in the crotch. The assortment was just very poor and given their generally good reviews I must have just gotten a dud. It did teach me that I’ll likely avoid buying anything if I’m not 100% certain of what I will receive.
After shipping I ended up paying $6.28 per item. The majority of the items, though new, were of brands that were so oversaturated in the market that the expected “race to the bottom” made it nearly impossible to break even. I have yet to even sell through the lot after 6 months.
I share some responsibility because I knew some of the brands included in the lot in advance. I was initially under the impression that brands like Calvin Klein and Izod were “good” brands. It was a learning experience for sure. I’ve definitely become more brand conscious and as I said I think it best to know exactly what you order so that you can do your calculations in advance. I was just shocked that most reviews said the lots were easy money doublers. Not.
Oh, believe me, I’ve let them know.
They refuse to answer specific questions and only reply that “they are matching industry standards” and they “value my patronage”.It will have only cost me about 5 bucks so far, but the principle of the matter is infuriating to me. They have a transaction fee to cover their costs. (Even that is high given it’s all handled automatically by computers in a fraction of a second.) I’d have no problem with them charging that for a return. But keeping the 2.9% fee on a transaction that gets reversed through no fault of a seller I view flat out as theft. People with high value items will lose big time. Sadly we are under their control.
Ya, that’s really cool. I’ll be sure to watch for it. Interesting to hear that your customers don’t complain over it.
There are so many glitches in eBay it’s not surprising that CSR’s aren’t familiar with everything. Heck, as we speak I still have the ability to select a restocking fee for my returns in my business policies. That was supposedly eliminated, but there it is plain as day. I haven’t selected to use it though because I can just imagine the issues it would cause if something went wrong. My store has lots of bugs as well…logos not showing, categories not being listed, etc. Frustrating, but I’m patient because I know there is a lot of updating going on. It will probably work itself out in time.
Good questions.
No, I haven’t had any issues yet with tracking. That said, I’ve only had about 10 international sales thusfar. As I said, I’m also shipping mostly thrifted clothing…and a few novelty jewelry items. If I were to have a loss, it wouldn’t break me. I don’t ship electronics or items that are of such a price as to be significant if lost. When I get to the point I offer such things, I’ll reevaluate my shipping options.
Most of the international sales have come in with best offer as well. This gives me the opportunity to smell test the buyer based on their feedback left for others. I only turned down one offer because the buyer had left lots of neutral reviews.
I do limit the countries I ship to. I’ll do Canada and Western Europe, Japan and South Korea, about half the eastern European countries, and a handful of South American countries. I would never ship to Russia, Mexico, or any countries that have known issues with fraud and corruption. I also look for countries that have proper infrastructure where the mass of population is.
I’ve shipped to Canada, the UK, Germany, Belgium, Greece, Italy, and Brazil so far. The Brits and Canadians specifically were very grateful for my not using GSP.
No, I don’t insure the items. That would change if the value I was shipping went up.
This does all have me thinking though…I wonder if I can combine GSP with my own shipping, ie, offer shipping myself to more trusted countries and use GSP for the more questionable ones. There is probably a way to set this up but I haven’t yet taken the time to do so.
Retro Treasures, could you elaborate on that? I’ve only had a handful of returns so far, all for buyers remorse. (One INAD was thrown out by Ebay because the buyer had a history of fraud.)
I offer free returns on products that aren’t likely to be returned, but on clothing, I stick with buyer pays returns.
I offer free shipping for all first class items and flat rate padded envelope items. I do calculated shipping on all other items because the price disparity between zone 1 and 8 makes it hard to price otherwise.
Are you saying that if I charge for shipping, when I do a refund I don’t have to refund my original shipping cost? I’ve never seen that option and I would imagine it could lead to a lot of negative feedback. Could you walk me through the process? Cheers.
You are correct that Managed Payments don’t yet work with GSP. That could definitely be a downside for folks. I personally avoid GSP and ship internationally myself using eBay calculated pricing. It both saves the customer money (GSP charges a lot for customs and fees which aren’t actually owed) and raises my profits (the Simple Export Pricing at Pirateship is a huge discount for first class international. eBay charges the standard rate to the customer and I buy at a discount.)
That said, I’m mostly shipping clothing items. More complicated products, or things on which there would actually be customs issues, I can see GSP as being useful.
