Why eBay is going downhill....

Quoted from Matt Stevenson's Blog on MySpace (and I wholly agree with every word).

I was reading my mates blogs on MySpace today and he has posted this EXCELLENT blog entry regarding why eBay has turned NASTY. All the comments here are made by Matt Stevenson, however I wholly agree with them. eBay has certainly turned into the nasty more expensive place to shop. Needless to say you can still find bargains, but only on items which are not commercially available. Those sorts of items can be bought on the overall cheaper from most other sites other than eBay. My advice is if you are looking for a bargain search eBay first, then do a comparison search on other sites such as play, amazon etc. You'll more than likely find the items cheaper on these other sites and mostly with fixed postage costs where you can't get stitched up... Now read att's wholly interesting blog entry below... Enjoy.

Ebay is crap for Buyers because...

Basically, in the early days of Ebay, it was a great place to not only pick up bargains, but also to find elusive hard to find items for reasonable prices. The range of sellers on ebay was quite varied, ranging from occasional sellers, to traders to collectors. However, the days of getting a bargain are pretty much gone on ebay now... Most sellers on ebay these days are companies / traders, rather than private sellers and collectors who have been pretty much priced out of using Ebay, or inconvenienced so much that it just aint' worth the effort anymore (see Ebay is crap for Sellers because.... below). As a result, most items listed these days are buy it now items and the prices of these are usually the same as, or more expensive than RRP on the item brand new.

Add on the postage for Ebay and it is simply not cost effective to buy most items from Ebay anymore. Ebay pitch and scream that they don't have so many buyers on Ebay due to the economic downturn (less expendable income to play with) but the hard reality is that there are less buyers on Ebay these days because it is crap! Period.

Case in point, I decided I wanted to get a copy of an old DVD. As it was an old DVD, and not a rarity, my first bet was to look on Ebay, and there were quite a few examples. For UK sellers, there were in all 9 copies of this item...but wait! All 9 were buy it now and were being sold by traders on Ebay, not private sellers/collectors. Plus the price of the item ranged from £5.99 up to around the £10 mark - plus postage costs. Hmmm.... I logged onto play.com and found the DVD...you can buy a brand new copy of this, for £4.99 delivered...yep, delivered...NO extra postage charges. I rest my case....needless to say, play.com got my order...

Ebay is also pretty crap for buyers due to the amount of lazy companies selling items on Ebay. Most of them sell hundreds of items a month on Ebay (just look at their feedback) and as a result, their "customer service" is lousy. More often than not, they send out the wrong items, send out items incredibly slowly....or both!

Plenty of other reasons...but let's move onto why Ebay is crap for Sellers...

Ebay is crap for Sellers because...

Ebay is crap for sellers (and by sellers here, I'm talking about private sellers / collectors such as myself, rather than companies selling on ebay).

Ebay is crap for sellers as there are so many unscurpulous buyers on Ebay....you think some of the sellers are devious....you should try selling! So many buyers trying to get something for nothing and holding you to ransom with their feedback ratings and comments - which often they mark you down for very unfairly (thus affecting your display and ordering in future search results)....and what do you have in return to protect you? Absolutely NOTHING....even Ebay doesn't give a shite... in fact all they seem to care about is the buyer (not really surprising seeing as they are losing them hand over fist).

This is even worse now with the new Ebay policy on buyer feedback. Ebay have now changed the site so that you can ONLY leave positive feedback for a buyer when they purchase one of your items. The choices are... leave positive feedback, or don't leave any feedback... that's it!

So, as usually is the case, as a seller, you list your item, get screwed around by the buyer who takes about 3 weeks to pay for the item... then leaves you negative feedback as you refused to send the item out until they had paid. BUT... you HAVE to leave THEM positive feedback! Yep... you heard it right!! All you can do in this instance is leave them no feedback and place a comment on their negative feedback about you... but the damage to your rating has already been done.

Ebay state that they have made this change to stop sellers apparently blackmailing buyers into forcing them to give them positive feedback, no matter how the transaction progresses, but holding the threat of negative feedback for the buyer over them. Seems that Ebay have just turned this around completely and placed the seller in a completely impossible position with regards to their ratings...now the SELLER is open to any blackmail and extra demands by the buyer as there is no way that the seller can comeback from this.

Well done Ebay... that was REAL clever...
Ebay is also crap for sellers as sellers are FORCED to give complete refunds to buyers if the item is lost. Case in point... I also used to send out my items to buyers via 1st class normal post (in an attempt to keep postage costs down for the buyer... I DON'T mark my postage up to cover costs like some other sellers!). However... what happens if the package is lost by Royal Mail I hear you ask? Yep... you guessed it... Ebay FORCES the seller to give the buyer a full and complete refund... and guess what, if they don't like it... Ebay just accesses your Paypal account behind your back and takes the money out of your account and / or charges your credit card and gives the buyer a refund now anyway (surely that is theft isn't it?) Ok, you might say that this is fair as the buyer never received their item... but how is this fair on the seller? It isn't his / her fault that the postal service lost the package is it? So... it leaves me with little choice other than make sure that ALL items I now sell are sent out by 1st class recorded / signed for delivery - in this instance, the seller has proof of postage if the package is lost and then doesn't not have to give money back to buyers if the package is lost through no fault of their own. It also stops the dirty tricks that some buyers pull whereby they actually receive their item, but still claim it never turned up to get their refund too... you would be surprised how often this happens Ebay!! Ok, so all items are now sent out by 1st class signed for... except as a result, you have to put your postage rates up to cover the extra postage charges now... which makes your item more expensive altogether and less competitive against other sellers. Also, buyers now complain because your postage rates are now "too high"... well, they don't have to bid on the item in this case do they? (you would be amazed at how many people bid and win items, and then complain about your postage rates - they WERE clearly stated in the auction before they placed a bid....if you think postage rates are too high, then DON'T BID you idiots!!!).

Anyway, I can honestly say that I will not be selling much of anything on Ebay from now on... recent underhand tactics by Ebay and quality of buyers has left me no option but to cease this activity as due to the points above, there is now no point because:

1. Profit made for my items, balanced against listing fees, paypal robbery (err, sorry paypal charges - remember, Ebay now forces you to list an item to be paid via paypal now.....hmmm...who did Ebay recently buy....oh yes...it was paypal wasn't it!!!), extra postal charges just don't make it worthwhile to list anything any more unless it is of any real value. I used to list a number of CDs and DVDs which were from my own private collection. All items were usually almost mint and all originals and all at low starting prices (usually only £0.99) and no reserve....due to Ebay changes, it is now no longer worth my time to bother doing this. Still, Ebay's loss are a gain for animals as now any such items get put in a bag and taken down to the animal shelter where they can sell them to make extra money to look after abandoned animals. I also get a better feeling of satisfaction, knowing my items are being used for a good cause.

2. Way too many devious buyers on Ebay, now holding sellers to ransom due to the changes in the feedback rule (nice one Ebay, way to encourage sellers to sell their items on your site!).

3. No cover for sellers on Ebay. All the rules are in favour of the buyer guys....simple as that. Good if it is an honest buyer who needs protection on a transaction...but, useless when it is a dishonest buyer who is trying to get something for nothing.

4. The Ebay seller helpline... you know the one...the phone number for "power" sellers which lets them speak to someone at Ebay to discuss a transaction and what a seller can do when they are being shafted by a buyer? Well, don't even bother...it is shite and a complete waste of your time....you will just get shafted by Ebay....after you've been shafted by the dishonest buyer.....form a orderly queue please....

Latest I've heard is that Ebay have also now purchase Skype (why?). Ebay's new initiative is that sellers add their Skype details onto their listing so that buyers can ring them up and ask them questions about the listing (Ebay obviously liked it so much... they bought the company)... only problem is that most sellers are not on the end of Skype to ask the question live anyway! So buyers have to do this novel thing called send an email....how quaint!
Could it be that lower buyers... disappearing (and incredibly p*ssed off) sellers on their site, coupled with their extra expenses incurred by purchasing things such as Skype is making it a little difficult for them financially? There are reports out there which suggest the very same... and some that predict that give it a couple of years and Ebay could even implode completely... here's hoping... maybe they would treat their sellers (i.e. bread and butter) with a little more respect if they had to start up again...

Matt Stevenson