Another stupid ebay rule - rant

[Abubu]

I've just put on some old uni text books. They are quite heavy and I calculated my postage properly by using scales and checking the royal mail website.

Both of the books came to over £4 postage.
Anyway I'm happily putting the first one on and then get to the bottom of the page...

Apparently I am only allowed to charge £2.85 maximum postage because "this is what buyers have fedback as reasonable and is the average for this category".

What the f!?! I've never heard anything like this on ebay.
So what if you are selling 10 books at once in 1 listing? Are you still only allowed to charge £2.85.

Absolutely ridiculous.
So now instead of starting my listings as 99p I have put them on at £5. Sod it.

I bet no one will buy at that price. Good thing it's free listings week.

I only discovered that the other day as well when I tried adding postage for a huge fat heavy book.
Grrrr So annoying.

More annoying though is the no postage on dvds. Why shouldn't I charge postage on dvds, particularly when I'm trying to list a bundle of childrens ones. No one will buy them individually, but probably would do as a set.
Grrrr. Rant over.

Totally with you on that one...stupid rule! I notice that some people put 'freight' as their postage method...not sure if this is a way to bypass the minimum postage by not stating the postage until the sale is completed. Might be worth looking at a few other auctions or asking sellers who have 'freight' as their postage method?

What? That is really stupid, I've never come across that before when selling on ebay. Books....come in ALL shapes and sizes??!! It doesn't make any sense whatsoever.

If it were me, I'd probably put a note in the description listing to say how much postage actually costs, so therefore you have to start bidding at £5.

How annoying. Ebay just keep making it more and more difficult for sellers, for some reason.

I wonder if there's anyway round this? Try posting in the ebay community forums, I've done that before and you get some real ebay (helpful) nerds that know everything there is to know about ebay.

I didn't even know about the DVD one!
Ridiculous!

in a few weeks postage will have to be free on books

a lot of people i know use amazon to sell books instead.

and sites like play.com or game to flog DVDs and games.

amazon do exactly the same, its a capped postage rate (and about the same price as ebay, maybe slightly less!)

The "freight" thing means you have to send them by courier. If you dont, you can get kicked off ebay. So only put freight if you are going to deliver by that method.

I think that before long sellers will be told to offer free postage on everything, becasue after all, we couldn't possibly have the buyers forking out too much or any postage

"I think that before long sellers will be told to offer free postage on everything, becasue after all, we couldn't possibly have the buyers forking out too much or any postage"

No, it will be because Ebay are banking on people including the P&P in the listed price, from which they then take a % fee.

I came across this recently trying to sell a big book that by weight was going to cost double the maximum to post
Ebay is a clever enough tool for them to have a system where you can put in the weight of the item and it calculates the postage for you.
Would be far fairer that way.

That is ridiculous.

Amazon is capped at £2.75 I think.

Is it really free postage for dvds? How strange.

I'm all for honest p&p costs, but the buyer should pay whatever it costs to post the item, same as they do for all other sights.

How come no one caps the delivery charge for Tesco? That's far more ridiculous imo.

Long live Ebay altneratives and boot sales, IMO!

I used DH's Ebay account to buy some things on Ebay that I can't get anywhere else around here, usually shops and BIN but I wouldn't sell on it anymore for love or money.

They just want to you to add the P&P to you start price (as this makes them more money) they dont really want you to post for free!

Ebay says that "other companies often charge free P&P for the sale of DVDs, so they are trying to bring Ebay in line with other retailers". Or words to that effect. So people trying to raise a bit of cash while clearing out their house are obviosuly on a par profit wise with big companies

That's the thing isn't it saltire - ebay have forgot just what made ebay so good; people selling their unwanted weird and wonderful stuff. There is no way an individual can compete with big businesses who get discounted courier/postage. Ebay will end up being another venue for the big boys who only sell the 'popular' stuff. Just like Supermarkets Vs the good old fashioned record shop; supermarkets can sell cheaper therefor record shops can't compete, therefor whatever Tesco choose to sell will hit the charts.

It's wrong for ebay to word it 'Free P&P' because it's not free, it is 'inclusive' - Just wait until you start listing books after the compulsory 'free p&p' kicks in and you try to work out what postage to put for the rest of the world. Or.... discounts for multiple purchases? How do we do that?

sigh

I know this thread is a week old now but just had to come on and RANT too!!

I have 20+ DVDs to sell, I always start at 99p (as free to list) then £1.50 P&P. This includes my jiffy bags and time to go to the PO (walking with a two toddlers so not a quick job!!).

I came on here to see if what I was reading was true.....and it obv is! So cross. I agree with whoever said that this is a way for ebay to get more money out of sellers as I will have to charge £2.50 per DVD now and this isn't as attractive a starting price?

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

P & P is postage and packing
not walking - you can't really charge for walking to the PO - that's ridiculous

Me too, selling about 7 old uni textbooks and very heavy- would be £7.07 by standard parcels but only allowed to charge £2.85 also. So increased my starting bid from £5 to £11 to cover postage, didn't sell first time but did after relisting- just another way for them to get a bigger FVF- after all they only get a % of the postage money when paypal is used. Also I a bundle of 4 boys hats- tried to put them under Boys Accessories- Hats, but that category means you have to offer free postage so put them under Boys clothes- Bundle/Mixed lot. Alson had to charge free postage on a memory card. Most private sellers will bomb ebay off if they have to offer free postage as its simply not worth you selling some things- would probably end up owing them money.

Well I can't post it without walking to the PO .

Sorry I bothered