Reply With QuoteThis is definitely new news to me...that is crap, but I guess people do advertise on eBay, and do a deal outside ? Still, in your case seems rather harshOriginally Posted by paneristi372
Quite how they have the ordacity to do this is beyond me. Listed a watch with eBay with a starting bid of £2500, I usually do buy it now but it was beyond my seller limit, had lots of interest, bids shot up to £3600. Was selling the watch in order to fund something else. Anyway as often happens the watch I was wanting sold so whilst out with the dog I thought I'd just End Item, a box popped up on my phone asking for what reason, I click no longer for sale.
I then get another popup saying you MAY be charged for this item, not thinking too much about it I clicked end and thought that was that!
Noooooo! My seller account is now £250 owing!
Had a long live chat only to be told they can't refund charges, yet another eBay rule that ostracises sellers, they gave me some crap about buyers being let down by such auctions ending midway through. It gets me how it's only ever the seller that pays fees yet eBay will always see with the buyers.
That have given me an address to write to, yes write to an internet based company. But other than cancel my automatic monthly payments from PayPal I'm not sure what else to do.
I think it's absolutely scandalous.
Has anyone else been stung for similar charges?
I certainly won't be selling anything else via them!! 14 years of hassle free selling and buying ended!!
Rant over.
This is definitely new news to me...that is crap, but I guess people do advertise on eBay, and do a deal outside ? Still, in your case seems rather harsh
First time I've heard of this. eBay are a law unto themselves I'm afraid and they won't change until either regulated or a serious competitor emerges.
I guess the next thing will be people seeing auctions through but never sending the goods to the winning bidder.
It's the intital listing fee isn't it? They've been doing this since about 2010 or so.
Initial fee is pennies, it's the cut of the sale price that's the big hit, so for 250 quid it would be the sale price when the auction ended. Would be interesting to hear how ebay can claim that without an actual sale.
I tend to avoid selling on ebay anymore, it's just set up to hit you with fees unless you auction it at a low starting price without reserve.
This has been in for quite a while now, and I agree that it's not on at all, however there are no fees for ending a "Buy It Now" item early. That's all I list on now unless it's something I'm not arsed about selling for next to nothing.
I've been made aware of this. I'm sure you'll find it will be hidden in their T&C's. I reckon eBay have got fed up of people listing only to sell elsewhere or off eBay and then end item and miss out on their sellers fees.
As previously stated dealing with eBay on issues like this is a nightmare and they are conveniently registered in Switzerland to make it almost impossible to legally challenge.
I try to use eBay as little as possible these days, they've become too big and all far too much in deference to buyers regardless of the circumstances.
Last edited by sevvy; 16th August 2016 at 23:02.
If you end the auction early if you say there was an error in the listing you should be ok I rarely do auctions now only bin and seems to work better with a best offers acceptable not had any problems other than buyer remorse wanting to try before they buy but so far so good good luck
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Cancel the bids before ending?
That said, you listed on ebay, had a lot of interest and then removed it as it sold elsewhere. List elsewhere and if it doesn't sell then let the auction run its course as an auction generally should?
This has been the case for a while, though and I'm unsure whether removing all bids to get the final value down before ending it would help, it might still charge based on the highest bid it reached. Maybe worth testing, although it might take a while removing all those bids.
Ebay final fee is capped at £250.
I just will not sell anything through eBay anymore. You either end up feeling ripped off by their fees (charging commission on postage which they don't even supply..... Come on) or you get no end of hassle from the con men and endless buyers who are willing to lie through their teeth to claim an item wasn't as expected, got lost or damaged in transit etc, always wanting to come to an agreement about a partial refund rather than returning the item. And through all this, you have absolutely no rights as a seller as the agreement is so one sided.
I can't imagine the heartache and hassle you would have had selling a watch at that price on eBay. With such an item the condition etc is so critical to value. The £250 charge borders on theft but you still had a lucky escape. eBay needs to be consigned to history as something that was once good.
It's a tough thing to stomach for you, not being aware of the T&Cs, but generally it's fine. People just try to use ebay as a free advertising board, ending auctions early and pocketing the full sale price.
That's digusting!
This. It's been the same way for a couple of years now and you need to be really careful with how you end auctions. If you say there was an error (no-one ever checks) then you won't be charged a fee (or at least I never have been).
Get your mate to bid it up to a big figure so he ends up winning and then in a day or so mutually agree to cancel the sale and thats it, fees refunded. Probably too late for you this time but in future.
It's been like this for ages... stops people using ebay as a free advert
Is that definite? If so, seems a better way to sell
OP, did you get any joy getting the fee cancelled ?
You have used their systems to advertise your watch. It's not their fault that you then decided not to sell it - why would you think that you could do so free of fees?
The debt collectors that PayPal use are reputed to be among the more aggressive that are available, so if you try cancelling your payment you may well be receiving a knock at the door.
Just came across this hence the thread revival.
Am I right in thinking a BIN auction ended early still results in no final fees? I read it that the difference in the OPs position was that he had received bids. Just wanting to check actual treatment chimes with my reading of fees guidance as I don't sell often via ebay.
Last edited by deepreddave; 7th February 2017 at 15:17.
No one is forced to use ebay, if you don't like it, go elsewhere.
First I've heard of this (havn't sold on ebay in many years).
While I think it is annoying, I can in a way see some logic to it, especially given the OP's example.
OP lists watch because he's got his eye on something. The watch he wants then sells so he pulls his listing because he still needs it.
Flip that around though, potential buyer sees OP's watch for sale, decides he wants it, so sells his own watch to fund it. Seller then pulls listing leaving the potential buyer without the auction watch, or his own.
At the end of the day though, they can run their business as they like and if we don't like it we just take our business elsewhere and they lose out, they will have done plenty of research to work out what the most profitable policy will be. Almost every business works like this. Get as much from the customers as you reasonably can without pushing them away and negatively effecting your revenue etc.
Yes, if you pull an auction after bids have been placed you are charged fees at its current price;
i.e. item bid to £100 they'll charge you around a tenner in fees. (they count it as bidders having entering into a contract to buy - therefore sellers being held to the same).
If you pull a Buy-It-Now listing all you pay is your listing fee of a few pence. The item has been advertised for sale but no-one has committed to buy it, so no-one loses out.
If you do it quite a lot they can take the funnies and threaten charges. I had an e.mail about listing then withdrawing too many items from sale, mainly items of jewellery. I had to inform them that as it was a business account and I also had a physical shop e.bay was just an extension of my shop window, so if the item sold there first then of course I'd have to withdraw it. I did offer to close my account but I suppose they'd become quite attached to the £500 a month in fees I was paying.
Last edited by kevkojak; 7th February 2017 at 16:04.
@kev - many thanks. Remember your constructive contributions on TWF every time I see similar here. Much appreciated.
Thanks. I'm aware of that hence it not being my question. See Kev's response for an example of something constructive.
Last edited by deepreddave; 7th February 2017 at 15:22.
Better than whinging.
Agreed, no whinge on my part and better you don't
I have never made a constructive post in my life, and no-one can prove anything!
No doubt this is one of the main reasons why so many item are BIN now.
If you end an auction on the German ebay site, with bids on it you can be sued by the highest bidder, to either sell them the item at their highest bid or, in case you have already sold the item elsewhere, to find the exact same item or compensate them to the full price of a replacement. This has happened very often, so often, in fact, that there are German lawyers specialised in this sort of thing, they put bids in, in the hope that the buyer pulls out, then they sue.
And the highest fee ebay Germany raise is € 150, regardless of the highest bid.
Interesting. So what happens if the item is genuinely no longer for sale (e.g. it has been broken, or stolen, or lost)?
How might something you're selling be genuinely 'lost'?
If you saw our house, you wouldn't ask that :-) (There's a Cartier chronograph here somewhere, but I don't have a clue where it is!)
Let's say you list something for sale on eBay, and then you bring it over to a friend's house to show it to them, but somewhere along the way it falls out of your pocket. Or your children - or cats - move it without your knowledge. Or...
That's interesting and not too surprising given that zee germans are sticklers for zee rules!
There are plenty of things I don`t like about ebay thesedays, but I don`t think this rule is too bad. If an item is being auctioned it's being auctioned....you couldn`t change your mind halfway through a normal auction, once the process starts it's 'game on'!
The OP put the watch up for sale by auction and in my opinion he should've stuck with it. I`ve bid on items and been very frustrated to see them pulled from sale. I don`t like people changing their minds in deals and to me this is no different. Someone may have passed over another opportunity to buy in favour of trying to win this example and they deserve a fair crack at it.
To me you're either selling or you're not selling. What would happen if you relisted it? Ebay can`t charge two lots of fees for selling the same item, or can they?
Paul
Because of the above I find myself using Gumtree more and more. I'm a keen golfer and flipperitis is just as rife in golf as it is with watches.
I've put my clubs on Gumtree first, give it a week or two, then use eBay if I've had no joy. I've only ever struggled to sell a couple of items there
They also put you on zee list.
as an example we listed and sold an old Bakelite Microphone recently, while packaging it up my wife managed to drop it and being Bakelite it broke. So not lost but broken. Luckily it only sold for a few pence.
Ebay owns Gumtree of course so make the most of it being free while it lasts.. :smilie:
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If you state "No longer for sale" as the reason for ending the auction you can be held to account by the highest bidder. If it´s damaged or lost the highest bidder can insist you send a copy of the Police Report (in case of theft) or Pictures of the damaged item.
I think Facebook were thinking about starting their own auction site, apparently free of all charges.
Maybe to start with
Obviously :)
BIN listings definately don't attract fees to end early. Listed 3 versions of the same thing a week or so ago but wanted to keep at least 1. Reason I listed them all is I didn't know which would sell best. After the first two sold, I simply ended the listing for the third.
Do usually list things on Gumtree first but hardly ever have any serious enquiries. I don't count offering £30 for a £150 item serious! I usually wait till EBay have a reduced priced final value fees offer to at least reduce the cost.
I find I have to list 2-3 times to get a serious buyer. But, I get cash rather than PayPal and the buyer collects, to save postage.
Ebay penalises sellers too much, but it's good as a buyer.
It already exists - As you'd expect, an ability to sell items with no fees results in the the most amazing tat.
"spider-man figures some with no arms or heads - 20p each"
Plus endless fake goods.
Well, I never knew that!
It's lasted 12 years so far so I wouldn't get too worried...
Face book market place is great if you want endless 15 year old bmws with 170000 miles on the clock and 2 months mot and I find anything that's not fake nackerd or stolen people want twice as much as somethings actually worth
We sell on there at work. It's all about volume, due to low profit margins and thieving buyers.
eBay accounts for around 8% of our online sales yet around 90% of our complaints and over 99% of the items not received complaints, dispute us sending stuff out via the same methods.
We just refund the complaints now, it's easier than spending time answering emails from numptys and trying to make eBay and PayPal see sense.
PayPal are worse than eBay currently we have an issue where they want to do a charge back for just under a grand it started as goods being delivered that hadn't been ordered. The customer had changed the colour via email so we had to send prove of shipping, tracking details, invoice and also correspondence to show change of colour. Case settled in our favour.
Fast forward a week and he is trying to claim from Visa for fraudulent use of his card, so PayPal again want to do a charge back so we have to show everything again, it's crazy.
I just wont sell on ebay at all, but did see they were going to charge for unsold/ended early items
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