Ebay Global Shipping Program Swindle

Yes most low value items should be void from the "global shipping program" but they are not. The "global shipping program" is opted in by sellers who have the right to use the program or not. If they use it every item they list will be charged postage at the highest courier rate available. Some sellers don't even know that an international postage charge shows something like $41 to iternational buyers. The ebay third party warehouse who sends "global shipping program" orders are the ones managing the postage. They choose the highest postage rate in order to make more money. Seller pays them a fee in their monthly ebay bill. The cost all adds up in the end but sadly the buyers are the ones paying for rediculous postage if they really want the item. And there is no sure proof you will get the item if sent throgh the "global shipping program." I had two items lost and this was signed for couries. Once showed delivered but it was only delivered to Pitney Bowes warehouse and never showed up again I sell on .com and manage my own postage of only $2.75. I now plainly refuse to buy from sellers who have low value items on sale with a postage charge of $18-$60. You can be sure they are using the "global shipping program." There are still pleanty of good sellers on ebay that have low postage charges. I buy from them any day of the week if I like the item and they have around $3 international postage charge. In answer to the original question in this post s there anyone here who would pay $45 for, say, a $2 stamp? Not me no way hosay.

$45 shipping for a $2 stamp is absolutely insane. The USPS charges $1.15 for a 1oz shipment between the U.S. to any country in the world and $1.36 if cardboard stiffeners are used and the 21 cents non-machinable surcharge kicks in. One to three average covers can be mailed internationally for $2.34 (still $1.36 to Canada or $2.19 to certain regions like Latin America).

Not only should low value items be exempt, but also anything mailed at letter rates like those I stated above. There's no reason for anything that weighs so little to be treated like a parcel for the UPS. There's also been reports of shipments being repackaged, damaged and seized by the third party shipper under the GSP program.

Personally, ebay needs the GSP program to go away completely, but I don't see that happening. It's too much a cash cow for ebay now. At least they need to make it completely transparent to both sellers and buyers. ebay also needs to make sure sellers can always opt out of the GSP program completely and won't turn it on behind their backs through acceptance of an user agreement. Buyers should also be allowed to opt out of a GSP shipment and deal directly with the seller if both parties agree. Most stamp dealers are pretty efficient with mailing items and usually know more about shipping than many postal clerks. If anyone is wondering if they have been opted into the ebay GSP program, check you shipping preference settings under the account tab in "My ebay". You should be able to turn it off from there although there were previous reports that sometimes the setting would not stick so check often.

Jimjam - Auction sellers in the U.S. do not need to make BIN an option. As for Amazon, they can undercut prices and offer larger selections of new consumer goods than any brick & mortar store. They can also deliver it to your door usually in a few days or less and often with free shipping. For many shoppers that saves on gas, time, money and you don't have to slug it down to a retail store and muddle with the rabble.

Sellers of $2 items (should) quickly realize that GSP is not for them and opt-out. Those who remain in the program deserve the results & realizations they're bound to receive...

FWIW, I know several sellers who use ebay's GSP and are very happy. They almost universally sell large (heavy) lots, and the pricing they get from GSP beats what they can get (even with volume discounted rates) from shippers like FedEx, UPS, DHL, etc. I'm sure GSP has its place (even in the stamp categories,) but it clearly shouldn't be the choice for every seller.

I don't get it. Every ebay buyer must include the shipping in his decision to bid or buy. It's right there in black and white. Just don't bid or buy if it's not worth it. If the sales drop, the shipping will have to be adjusted. Isn't that the basic principle behind capitalism?

sak: The problem is that it's not all there in black & white. There's also customs fees that can be added and that's not listed upfront. The fees can be added on items not normally charged with a fee.

There ain't nothing like an ebay thread to spike our traffic, eh?




Take a breath. One example: anyone & everyone who has stopped using ebay could not care less.

GSP is not a change to the core business model, to wit: be marketplace, capture revenue.




What about facts which are available online?

SEC filings trump 'research': http://investor.ebayinc.com/secfili...&CIK=1065088

Hint: always read the 10-K, never the annual report.

Traffic ain't profits. While the growth in revenue & profit may have slowed, we should all suffer such a 'downward spiral'.




That ship has, like, so sailed. Like, maybe, you know, ten years ago.




Or is it the ever-swelling flood of sellers & listings that is thinning the bidding for any individual item? ebay's revenues keep growing <=== focusable factoid




That ship has, like, also sailed.

Boycotting Amazon, I bought a book from Abebooks. Paid no attention to the seller until I got the book, whereupon I learned that the seller is a bookstore in Manhattan that I walk past ~once per month.

My son (currently transgendering from USAF to USAFR) doesn't know from anybody but Amazon. About the only time I've ever heard of him visiting a brick'n'mortar store was for second-hand furniture. He may not know that Amazon has 'competitors', or that these strange beings may offer lower prices or better terms ... or care.

Many people in big cities can do the math on travel time/cost, parking fees, etc, and decide that they would rather a) click while watching TV, than b) drag their butts from store to store.

If need be, search 'bookstore closing' at http://www.nytimes.com/ for a better understanding of the future of eCommerce in big cities.




Maybe. Maybe ebay see all of those low-price 'micro' listings as cluttering their search results. Maybe their focus groups complain that the low-price 'micro' listings are cluttering their (individual) search results. Maybe ebay wants to get away from the garage sale market, as part of getting into serious (higher-markup) retailing & fulfillment.

You've suggested that low-price 'micro' listings being the gateway drug to buying serious up-ticket items.

Q/ Who wants to buy new upscale electronics & home appliances in a goofy internet thrift shop?

Q/ Why not try to explain why ebay's decisions make sense for ebay?

"... cutesy is for etsy, let's make some real money ..." <== imaginary non-quote

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Anyone who wants to be a serious seller on ebay will use it as a loss leader and then draw the dtatbase across to a self-run website, or a format that is much more seller friendly such as Delcampe.

ebay don't want low level sellers and they will get their wish in the long run.

I only list on ebay Australia now, I haven't noticed any drop off in sales levels and sell with free shipping on all lots.

Quote: or a format that is much more seller friendly such as Delcampe

Delcampe is a waste of time for sellers. You can list on ebay USA and manage your own postage. ebay still has many good customers.

On one hand it seems that ebay wants to encourage bigger and bigger sales through Stores, etc on their site, but at the same time they have no listing fees which basically encourages sellers to list cheap krap which clogs up every stamp catagory. Go into the US Postal Stationary and shop by price, from lowest to highest. It is amazing how much junk is in every stamp catagory. So there seems to be a real contradiction here. No?

With 620,000 items sold in January 2015, I hardly think is accurate.

Bill:

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that the 'no listing fees' only applies to 1) the first one hundred 2) auction items, plus the occasional 'bonus' free listing days.

That feature looms large if you are thinking of beginning to sell on ebay, but I have no idea how much of their business it represents, and I'm certain buyers could not care less.

And that is where ebay's attention has always been: on attracting quality buyers, firm in the belief that all that money will, if need be, suck sellers out of the Phantom Zone.

The GSP program needs to be evaluated in terms of its impact on buyers.

Yes, the GSP cost may move some small items out-of-reach and, therefor, lose ebay those buyers that only buy small items. But these are, naturally enough, the least important buyers to ebay, however many there are.

Similarly, the GSP program might lead the least successful sellers of the smallest items to walk away, but will ebay miss them? If nothing else, this would reduce the number of unproductive free listings.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

I don't even notice any difference in my monthly ebay bill with the free listing fees I get every month. And even with any free listing offers bonus days my bills always roughly the same range. I wonder if any sellers actually go in and check the way ebay calculates their monthly bills? Funnily enough even with discounted / free postage to buyers seems to make no difference on the monthly ebay bill either.

duncanvr, Greetings:

In years past, my sole proprietorship had a Google AdWords spend of, to keep it easy, U$D ~1,000 per month.

Since that was more than I wanted to spend, every coupla months I would reduce some of my PPC (Pay Per Click) bids.

My bill would drop by several hundred dollars the next month but, within a few months, be right back up to U$D ~1,000 per month.

So I'd reduce more of my PPC (Pay Per Click) bids, the monthly spend would go down, the monthly spend would go back up ...

After a couple of cycles, I arrived at an understanding that Google's famed algorithm was compensating for my reducing my bids by showing my ads that much more often so as to generate enough clicks to get me back to my/their 'comfort' level. They knew I was good for so many bucks per month, and that was that.

Mind you, I said "I arrived at an understanding" because I do not know the behavior of the other bidders in the marketplace; maybe they, too, were reducing their bids, so I just kept on magically spending the same total cash each month.

Do you think it possible that ebay gives you extra free listings each month in light of your productivity?

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

ikeyPikey, your experience is very interesting and somewhat scary to an internet dependent non-techy like me.

Trying to get back on track: The ebay Global Shipping Program is not suitable for small, light weight items and it is certainly not effective for inexpensive items. I have shipped more than 4,000 stamps with less than 10 losses over the last decade. Of 400+ international mailings one destined for Canada was lost and another to Poland was claimed to be lost, but was probably not lost.

I don't see any incentive to use the GSP for $100 or even $200 stamps. The cost to mail internationally is less than tracked shipping in the United States. To maintain Top Rated Seller Status, tracked domestic shipping is required. The retail rate is $2.32 using stamps. It is possible to mail a stamp internationally for $1.15. I also sell color slides which cost $1.36 to mail to Canada at the 2 ounce rate in a stiff mailer and $2.34 to the rest of the world. It is also possible to send a tracked First Class Parcel to Canada for about seven dollars. I use the desktop version of USPS Click-N-Ship for business to print labels without postage. I then add stamps from inventory. Currently it is possible to buy postage at 50% of face at stamp shows from walk in sellers. I can also use Click-N-Ship to print address labels with the customs form if necessary. Also, the policy from Collectibles insurance will cover mailing losses if their requirements are followed.

For more expensive stamps, I quote a high shipping charge to cover the cost of Global Priority Mail Express or FedEx, but since I already have insurance, any additional protection offered by the GSP would be unnecessary.

One real annoyance and gotcha with the GSP program is that if the buyer cannot be found, the seller will be reimbursed and the items will be resold. It is bad enough for stamps but is unacceptable when selling copyrighted items when I own the copyright. I suppose if it happened, I would have to file a VERO complaint against ebay, but I don't intend to ever let it happen. If the GSP program is forced on all sellers, I would lose all of my Canadian business or I would have to train them to use bidStart, DelCampe (or Etsy for the color slides). The problem with bidStart is that while they have a color slide category, I found that my slides were 100% of the listings in the category. Since the category is normally empty, no one would think to look there and, sales of stamps aren't that much better. I suppose I would use DelCampe, but the automation available in the SixBit Software ecommerce application is available only on ebay and bidStart. I would have to write my own software to interface with DelCampe.

Given the choice between writing the software and using GSP, I would write the software.

Clark