Yet Another Ebay Slap At Sellers?

[VTAndrea]

I was just perusing Alan B's latest ebay offerings and noticed that he is no longer offering insurance on his marbles, saying that ebay doesn't allow sellers to charge buyers for it anymore. It's been so long since I sold anything on ebay that I'm way out of the loop on their rules. What are other sellers doing to cover their potential losses? This is ridiculous. I'd even call it the last straw except that ebay seems to manage to overcome resistance to their constant rule changes because they're the only act in town.

[moremarbles4me]

I brought this subject up about a month ago when Ebay first announced this new policy but I did'nt get much response. The simple answer is for sellers to raise their prices on shipping. The question is how much do you have to raise it to cover your butt. LOL A seller would have to adjust the shipping price for every auction he/she lists based on what they think the final selling price would be. They are forcing sellers to insure every item sold on Ebay even if the buyer would not want insurance on a $10 win. Pay Pal gets a cut from these increased shipping fees. It may not sound like they would make alot but over a years time it's a chunk of change.

Charles

[Scoop]

I was really upset about this..... At first..... Then, I realized that it may not be so bad.

I never listed insurance as optional... I always stated that insurance was included in shipping cost. If I felt an item would need insurance, I included it as handling. If not, I let it go...

I felt it was MY responsibility to make sure my buyer properly got their package.

There were always a few items that I'd added insurance to, that didn't go that high, so I didn't use it... Those incidents payed for the ones that were either uninsured, or DID go higher than I expected and I added it in.... Over the course of a year, I found I broke about even....

So, the bitch would be... The people who didn't GET insurance paid for those who did???

Well...... Isn't that the way insurance works???

The way I do it, EVERYONE is covered... Whether I buy insurance from the PO or not... It's not the buyers problem... Nor should it be.... They pay the shipping I feel is appropriate for the item and I guarantee they get their item. If they don't, or it's broken, I refund them AND, I refund their shipping, too (a better deal than the PO) I take the gamble out of the buyer's hands. Since this new ruling, I've lessened the amount of actual PO insurance cost and tacked 31¢ on to each item (an even 50¢ since Paypal automatically adds 19¢ delivery conformation to each online shipping label, unless it's priority)

If buyers want to complain about 31¢, so be it.... But, by self-insuring, I can dramatically cut the cost of shipping insurance, give better coverage, NEVER buy PO insurance and actually MAKE money on that deal!!!

I'm beginning to sense / fear that ultimately, ebay would prefer to have Free Shipping and have sellers include it in the opening bid. Of course, that means higher opening bids and ebay gets a cut of that too..... And, the final bids are not likely to change that much, yet the seller will have to pay shipping...

They are SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZING us to death......

[MC Marbles]

$2.00 shipping on small lots of marbles is now a thing of the past.

[bubba1]

$2.00 shipping on small lots of marbles is now a thing of the past.

i keep almost all of mine under $2....but i've been really lucky with my ebay clientele!