Everyone gets five free auctions a month on eBay starting in June
Filed under: Bargains, Shopping, Technology, Fantastic Freebies
The recession is killing off impulse shopping, eBay's sales dwindled by 16% since last year, and something must be done about it. So the popular auction website is giving away free access to the store to stimulate activity. Starting June 16, if you use the Sell Your Item or the Simple listing form (if you're like most people cleaning out their attics, you will), you'll have the right to list five items for free every 30 days.
Normally, eBay charges an "insertion fee" for the right to put an item up for auction in a given category, and that fee rises from 10¢ to $4 as the value of the item increases. For the five free listings, though, there'll be no charge, no matter how much you list your item for. So you have the potential to save $20 a month if you arrange for five insertions of big-ticket items. Or, if you set your auctions' starting point low, you could save all of 50¢.
eBay normally charges 8.75% of the final price at the end of the auction, and for the free listings, the rate will be the same, or $20, whichever is lower. That "Final Value Fee" is how eBay can afford to give away the listings for free -- it hopes to get its money in the back end.
For the casual eBay user who has been waiting on the sidelines, the suspension of those five insertion fees takes the financial risk out of the equation. Until now, you could pay to advertise your junk and end up with no sale. But with the five free insertions, if your item fails to sell, you won't be out a cent.
Of course, eBay hopes that doesn't happen. It just wants people buying stuff on the site again, and how.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
5-17-2009 @ 9:04PM
christy said...
Actually, this promotion is NOT a good thing for most sellers.
The final value fee on these “free” listings is 8.75% regardless of what the item sells for. Normally, eBay collects 8.75% of the first $25, 3.5% of the amount between $25.01-$1,000, and 1.5% of the amount above $1,000. Let’s say you started a listing today at 99 cents and it sold for $100. The insertion fee is 15 cents. The final value fee breakdown would be $2.19 for the first $25 ($25 x .0875) + $2.63 for the remaining $75 ($75 x .035) + .15 insertion fee for a total of $4.97 or 4.97% of the selling price in total fees. With this “promotion,” the final value fee of your “free” listing on June 16 would be $8.75 ($100 x .0875) or 8.75% of the selling price in total fees. To save the 15 cent insertion fee, you pay eBay almost $4 more in final value fees. Even if you started the listing at $100 and the insertion fee jumped to $2, you would still be paying eBay an additional $2 in total fees. It’s like McDonald’s running a promotion for free hamburgers and then sending a bill for $10 a week later. Like always, eBay is trying to trick sellers into thinking they’re doing them a favor, when in reality they’re trying to gouge unsuspecting people into paying more in fees.
Reply
5-17-2009 @ 10:30PM
Jason Cochran said...
Casual, low-value sellers could benefit from this. Fees vary, but if the selling price is under $50, you could end up saving money. If it's $50 to $450, according to some sources, you could end up paying more. For all items, no matter the final selling price, the trade-off is the removal of risk: If your item doesn't sell, you don't pay anything at all.
Sellers can plug numbers into this online fee calculator to find out how the new rules might affect their item, although it's tough to use when you can't predict your final selling price: http://www.rolbe.com/ebay.htm
Reply