Ebay: A Lose/Lose/Lose Situation
Ebay. The ingenious concept that allows anyone who wants to sell something to not only a national but an international pool of potential buyers. The Ebay success stories of sellers making six figure yearly income just staying at home selling on Ebay have been touted far and wide. At one time it was great, however if you listen, you will hear lots of grumblings how Ebay has raised their fees over the years, and if you do a simple google search, you will find a plethora of reasons why sellers feel Ebay is really harming them. Among them:
Illegitimate feedback
If a buyer gives you a negtive feedback for no reason, you can’t remove it. There goes your entire reputation and sometimes your entire business.
Annoying rules
For example in the last 12 hours of an auction you can’t change images. A potential buyer emailed a seller to notify they had put the wrong picture on the auction page. There was no bid but because there were only 10 hours left, the seller couldn’t change the picture, and what do you know, no sale.
Bogus buyers
No more negative feedback for bogus buyers, meaning that buyers who don’t pay for their winning bids cannot be penalized by the seller. This too destroys the entire feedback system.
Fees
Ebay’s sale commission is a good chunk plus you have to pay for every listing detail practically. Subtitle: $.50, picture: $.25, bold title: $1, etc.
PayPal
If you use PayPal, which is very handy for eBay selling, you’re going to be ripped off. They continually take more and more commissions. Plus eBay owns PayPal so you are charged 3 times, listing, commission and PayPal!
Refunds
Someone can buy your item using PayPal, receive the item, and then lie and say that it was not shipped. PayPal will then refund them the entire purchase amount.
Shipping
Everything relies on shipping. The postal service once lost a small expensive package that was sold; the buyer had not paid for insurance. So the seller had to wait for weeks to find out what happened, and then reimburse the item from their pocket.
Terrible customer service
If you have a problem with a sale or purchase, you have to go through bots and finally days later receive a humans actual help.
Ebay also has a dark side no one wants to talk about. I am going to relay a situation to give an example. Follow along, and feel the tension grow...
Imagine you buy something for $450.00, your needs suddenly change, and you no longer need the item. It is in perfect new condition, but you can't return it where you bought it, so you think, "OK, I will list it on Ebay". Sure... simple enough.
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