eBay Fee Changes Spark Revolt

14 Jan, 2005 at 9:13pm ET Article published in Tech

Numerous eBay Store sellers lit up the Web auctioneer’s message boards Thursday, railing against upcoming fee increases and looking for alternative ways to sell their wares online.

San Jose, Calif.-based eBay (Research) said Wednesday it would raise several fees for eBay Stores sellers Feb. 18.

Among other things, the cost of a monthly subscription for a basic eBay Store will go up 60 percent to $15.95. The cost of 10-day listings will double to 40 cents, and final value fees that are assessed when a sale closes also will rise.

Sellers complained that the fee increases will take a bigger chunk of their sales take. Some said it may force them to raise their own prices amid a weak economy, and others asked for feedback on other companies, such as Overstock.com (Research), that may be alternatives to eBay.

This leaves a startup company ripe to come in and undercut ebay. It looks like ebay has finally caved in to greedy stockholders. Will this be the beginning of their demise? -KF

Source: CNN Money

Comments

14 Jan 2005 ~ 9:18pm RWB I have never bought anything from eBay.... never trusted it. And after many things I have heard I hope it goes down in flames. Not that I hate them, they just rub me the wrong way especially after something like this
14 Jan 2005 ~ 9:38pm KingFish I have had great experiences with ebay. I was a bit miffed about the first hike in prices. That was a minor lift in prices and it discouraged me from selling much on ebay. This would put me way over the edge if I sold much on ebay. Ebay has lost sight of what it originally was to begin with IMO. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if overstock.com or yahoo auctions rose up now.

KingFish
14 Jan 2005 ~ 10:48pm celcho a ten-day auction is 40 cents now? that's still pretty cheap. they're only raising their prices because they have the largest audience, and therefore the largest number of potential buyers for your stuff.
15 Jan 2005 ~ 2:36am Camman Seriously, am I missing something here? 40 cents.... I mean come on. I suppose if you mass-post auctions and are used to paying 20 cents per...it's a bit of an increase, but really now, is that such a big deal? I have had great experiences with ebay and bought all kinds of stuff, it's a great site, although I have seen that many people are up in arms about this increase stuff.
15 Jan 2005 ~ 8:48am -Ben It's quite funny.

Most sellers don't actually have to pay taxes on there sales, ebay has protected them before against paying taxes.

40 cents big deal, who really wants to pay 17.5% on each purchase.
15 Jan 2005 ~ 5:44pm RWB From what I heard and read in the past people have constantly had to repost their auctions for various reason such as false bids of some sort.
15 Jan 2005 ~ 6:55pm fudgam Ive had nothign but good experiences with EBAY. I buy alot of.... stuff from there.
17 Jan 2005 ~ 10:31am maxanon Some people make a living off of ebay, so any increases would cut into their sales. Most profits are on the low margin stuff, so losing 40cents is a lot.

Looks like people are gonna have to look for real jobs.
18 Jan 2005 ~ 11:11pm dwb If you dont sell on eBay then you dont understand. The 40 cents is not the problem, it's the change of the final value fee from 5.75% to 8%. I sell laptops on ebay. If I sold a laptop for $1000, the final value fee used to be about $28, under the new rules it would be about $52. This doesnt include the other fees; listing, Buy-it-Now, Gallery, Pictures, Paypal, etc. These fees could now be pushing $100 for a $1000 transaction!!!