eBay:
More diverse items & greater number of buyers
As a seller I list the item with:
starting price & postage options and whether I want to allow offers or buy now
eBay take their cut in fees as a minimum amount plus percentage of the final sale total & postage
Therefore I have to calculate in advance how much the fees will be on my asking price and postage. If I get that wrong or start with a low opening price then I could sell an item and end up with all the money gone
(This happened to me on a couple of occasions where I ended up with nothing or a loss when the packaging put the parcel cost into the next price bracket)
As it’s an auction then I might get a better price if more than one person is interested & bids go up
As long as you understand the fees eBay is fine
Then when sold an item I have access to my money pretty much straight away, I’ll do a printable Royal Mail or courier label if I’m home with my printer or take it to the post office and pay
Update the tracking, get & give feedback
On Vinted I’ve sold one thing
It was easy other than fate decided to attack me
No fees, and Vinted will provide me with a courier label so I just set the price I want to sell at - noting that it’s not an auction so I need to guess a good price that people would be willing to pay
(This means I can list things that might sell but are too cheap to bother with eBay fees)
My first sale should have gone smoothly, but I had a series of personal dramas :
I was away, hadn’t installed the app, missed the sale email and didn’t notice the sale until I opened the web page and found a notification
Then my printer died and I couldn’t print the free courier label - so off to the shop (no option to just go to the post office & pay, as Vinted we’re covering postage)
Setup kept stalling so I tried to print from both my laptop and phone - eventually multiple labels spewed out
Then a late evening trip to the shop with a Hermes desk, picking the nearest but they closed before the times online, and then I only had minutes to cross town for the next shop
I found that Tesco have 24 hours drop off boxes - so headed to Tesco
No boxes to be found, and asked the security desk who had no knowledge of them
We found someone who knew about them - the boxes were outside around the corner on the wall
Next problem - the automated scanner wouldn’t read my QR code, nor the barcode
Frustrated I was about to give up, but had the idea of showing the label on my phone - it popped open
Success & sent a message to the buyer, apologising for delay
I’ve since installed the app, so the notifications pop up - but so far I’ve had lots of people favouriting rather than sales
Then the money - on Vinted you don’t get paid when it sells
Vinted hold it until the buyer confirms receipt & they are happy
She received it & sent me the confirmation message
So wait 2 working days for clearance
It didn’t pay out
The problem was tracking - it was showing still in transit
So onto the automated help desk- and with a screen shot of the confirmation message they tagged it as delivered, happy buyer & then payment processed
The money sits on my Vinted account, I can request a pay out or let it sit for me to spend
Currently I’ve left it in vinted
Other than my dramas, vinted is a good option and has allowed me to list things that I wouldn’t bother with on eBay
I don’t know how Vinted get their cut, for postage they will be doing a contract bulk rate, so it will cost them less
I assume that my £5 sale cost the buyer more than £5
On eBay I would have had to add fees to the £5 asking price and added postage plus fees on postage