Big Drop In Ebay Sales This Week

Holy smokes Don 10K is a lot of dough for ebay (or maybe not?) I simply don't know but that seems quite impressive to me! Good on you! -Cheers! _Jeff

I just amended my returns policy, apart from 30 days returns I made it free returns so if ever the returns option is used a buyer would not have to pay return shipping on any item. Haven't had any retuns yet, but once I made the change several new biders came. Its been around a week with very few bids so good to get some new ones. ebay keeps saying offer free shipping but I feel I would be loosing money if I did that.

From 20k + last year to $30 this last week! But my buyers are coming out on weekends! $350 last weekend! Very early days with the new changes we have made.

Sure glad I changed to a feature store but for how long?

Have BIN listings become more attractive over the last 3 years?

If not I am in a lot of trouble!

Hi KGV that is a serious drop in sales. But $350 on a weekend is not bad if you could get that every weekend then just do listings from Thursday to Monday and take a few days off. I find BIN is not so popular as the lots on BIN are usually at top dollar. I do mostly auctions these days. I see some terribly inflated prices on BIN lots I think this makes buyers loose interest as they want to bid and get the stamps for bargain prices. Some BIN prices on ebay UK 999 pounds for a 2d penny blue on a cover (keeps getting relisted and going unsold) and I have seen a 1d red stamp on cover at 10,000 pounds. Is anyone going to pay that BIN price for a qv stamp on a cover? Lets see 10,000 pounds is probably $20,000 I think most would not buy the stamp and instead take a holiday. Auctions on weekends seem to do the best. People get busy during the week to and may not have time to look through ebay.

I think buyers may be losing interest as a result of the decline in the quality of items for sale. As a buyer, I find it increasingly hard to find things worth buying! I'd say that by now almost every decent stamp in Australia has been found and listed on ebay. I think the sources have dried up.

Jim, if only someone in Australia would list the 25c Seychelles butterfly definitive with 1982 imprint date. I'd definitely buy it! Gibbons lists it, but I've never known a dealer or collector who's ever seen one mint or used.

I think more and more sellers are listing BIN lots because they're not getting fair prices with the auctions. I recently had to sell a 4R Queensland postmark - complete, fully legible strike on 1d red KGV pair on piece - for a mere $38. An item of this quality should have netted me at least $100 and probably much more. I'll never make a mistake like that again.

Jim, it's all about what the market will bear. There is no issue in listing BIN lots- as long as the dealer understands that they often won't sell. If bourses, internet, or mail order doesn't yield the desired price, why would ebay?

Something else I've noticed that seems worth mentioning is that the ratio of watchers to actual bidders has changed for the worse over the years in which I've been selling on ebay. Two or more years ago, I found that for every two people watching an item you would generally get one actual bidder. So, for example, if 4 people were watching an item you could expect two of them to bid. These days it's totally different. I've had items recently that were watched by as many as 11 or more people (I think there was even one with 14) but only one or two of them ended up bidding. I can't give an explanation for that, but it does seem that people are much more cautious these days about bidding and more and more are just interested in observing an auction than taking part in it.

I sometimes watch ebay lots to see what the market is bearing for an item that isn't too hard to find. Likewise, for a scarcer item that I feel is overpriced I will watch to see if I am underestimating the value of the item. If no one has bid (or bought) by the time the lot is 2 minutes from ending, it confirms to me the price is too high. By the same token, if I blow it I know I need to be more aggressive the next time I see one.

I've once had 18 watching an item and only a couple of bidders on the item, a lot of people watch items just out of interest to see if it sells and for what price it sells. On the other end of the stick I have had items with zero bids and zero watches sell in the last five seconds for a good price. Justsnipeit being used no doubt. Okay so are we in agreement that majority of stamp / postal history buyers don't take the time to look at most BIN lots with high prices? Does the postage cost on an auction lot affect if you will bid or not? Whilst my postage is $2.60 worldwide from Oz, I have seen some hefty postage fees on ebay.uk and ebay.com which puts me off buying. Anywhere from $18 to $46 on ebay.com for a single letter size, and some 9 to 15 pounds or more on ebay.uk. I assume many of you would not bid on items with higher postage costs? If postage is free however would this encourage you to bid if the auction price is cheap enough?

I use BIN all the time if the item is priced agreeably. If I think the price is out of line, I won't even click. What I sometimes do is search for a stamp I want, find the lowest-priced BIN item, find an auction for the same stamp, then put in a snipe on that auction using that BIN price as a reference. I usually put a max bid at around 20% or so off that lowest priced BIN. I usually end up winning, and often at a price significantly lower than my max bid.

I do pay attention to shipping costs. I don't begrudge a seller charging appropriate shipping costs, but an unreasonable shipping cost will sometimes turn me away. Most of the stamps I buy are a few dollars to a few tens of dollars, and I'm often buying cheaper lots still to fill in holes in my collection. For that type of purchase, shipping ends up being a fairly high percentage of the total transaction. If I were shopping for $300 stamps, I'd be less concerned. In fact, a high shipping cost then might be a plus, because I might assume they were using "bullet proof" packaging, shipping insured, etc.

Interesting so sellers with overpriced BIN items maybe less likely to sell the item. Auctions have more chance if not started above BIN prices. I wonder how many others do not click over priced BIN items? I see some sellers on ebay.uk with postal history items over 600 pounds each personaly I don't click on them at all.

duncanvr, a great many items from the US do indeed have ridiculous postage charges listed. If you write directly to the seller well before the auction closes you can sometimes negotiate a more sensible postage price. (Not always! Some US sellers do not actually seem keen to sell their items and insist that the price given is the best they can do. One told me that the price was not set by him, but automatically by ebay, which seems ridiculous.) But if the auction is closing within the next day, and you have no confidence in the seller getting back to you before it closes, you're not going to bid for fear of being committed to paying $46 postage for, say, a $10 coin. I would never consider buying something if the postage is more than the price of the item. Postage charges must inevitably deter many other Australians from buying Australian items from US sellers. (Thus many quite decent Aussie coins remain unsold by US sellers.)

As a buyer, another problem that affects me and presumably affects others, inhibiting them from buying on ebay, is what seems to me an increase in the number of sellers who do not send you the item shown in the listing. This has happened to me 4 times this year (all cases involved coins).

Yet another problem is the difficulty one faces getting a refund for an item that has not been described correctly. I am currently struggling to get a refund for a $260 item I returned immediately, as it fell far short of expectations. Although the listing stated "7 days money back" the seller has refused to refund me my money. The matter has gone to Paypal to decide, and it seems a decision will take 4 weeks. You'd think when the listing states "7 days money back" you'd get a refund automatically, but it seems not. I know that this issue has affected other buyers, making a mockery of the whole buyer protection thing that ebay makes so much fuss about. I am sure this is deterring potential buyers, as it will deter me from spending larger sums in future.

I actually sell from here but list on .com and offer $2.60 postage worldwide, free postage to Oz buyers. I can't see why some sellers over there can't do the same. But Jimjamtwo you are correct, seller says they did not set their own postage price, ebay did automatically. This is sign if they don't manage their own postage rates that they are using ebay usas global warehouse to send their goods and this is most likely the case if the postage is $18+ for a stampless cover or coin. They have to use the courier chosen by ebay warehouse and this is usually the highest rate possible for the item. I once bought one and item was lost in the Kentucky ebay shipping warehouse. I have much more faith in sellers that posts the items themselves at a cheap rate (say under $5 for stamps & postal history) and not getting a third party warehouse to send the items. I read somewhere a complaint, buyer bought a guitar that was to be sent from eaby warehouse and he got charged $200 postage. I don't bid on any more when I see $18+. Also 9 pounds postage on an entire letter from UK is to high. This is nearly double in Oz dollars and a put off to bid in my view. Unless its a rare item.