Ebay - Are you sure you want to sell?

I know often selling things on Ebay can be a bit of a faff - taking photo's, uploading them, filling in all the details for whatever you are selling, then trying to write a decent description and work out how to make it collection only or what the P&P costs will be etc, etc.

Not everyone is going to get it right, and of course interested buyers may well ask questions to find more out.

What really winds me up, and this has happened several times to me recently, is just how lacking some people are in communication skills! Surely it's in a sellers interest to answer questions quickly and fully.

I've asked questions several times now i.e how old, what colour, what size... not particularly difficult questions, yet either have to ask several times before getting a response - or I ask 2-3 questions in one email and get a reply answering only one of the questions.

Does this get your goat too? I just don't bother buying things from sellers with a lack of communication skills...

Stopped using ebay now, it's just annoying, mainly thanks to a nice loophole the sellers have found, for instance look at a charger for a HTC phone, should be ablout £5, yet they add one of those crappy stylus from poundland and put that at 99p as part of the listing, so when you click for lowest price they are all 99p, yet change the thing you want to buy and it shoots up to whatever the seller Wants meaning you ha e to search every single post for the cheapest.

It's just pointless now.

Ebay is fine for buying but no way would i ever sell again. It cost me the thick end of 400 quid last time thanks to some scamming scummer.

I no longer sell on ebay.

3yrs ago work dried up (self employed joiner) so I decided to sell some camera gear I had. It fetched around £1000 yet I came away with £750ish!!

Ebay listing fees

Paypal commission

Ebay commission

And then weeks after I got hit by Luxembourg fees!!

Never, ever again...ever!!

I now sell if I need to via Gumtree but that brings a certain crowd with it!

Whatever you price it at, they always, always offer less. Not because you were asking too much, it's just the type of people that gumtree attracts "Owt for Nowt" gang.

In future I'll offer it to friends family otherwise I'll give it to Bluebell wood.

But ebay..... When you read up on them, away from their glossy image they are ruthless. Buy by all means but NEVER sell!!

What the hell are Luxembourg fees??

I will NEVER sell on ebay again! I think it's fine for buyers, but my selling days are over.

I got ripped off by ebay too after a scammer gave them a sob story about the 'dodgy' item. There was nothing dodgy about it at all - they were just trying it on and wanted to return it after six weeks. It cost me £500.00 - and I was only selling the item to try and help a friend! The item was returned and surprise, surprise, there was nothing wrong with it.

Ebay support were worse than useless and are a law to themselves. Sellers beware!

...Whatever you price it at, they always, always offer less. ...

That makes me chuckle on here. You see some shiny bit of electronics kit for sale at some usually entirely reasonable three-figure price, no offers, buyer to collect. Then a post or two later someone asks if they'd accept twenty quid and if they'd deliver .

What the hell are Luxembourg fees??

Some kind of tax i think.

What the hell are Luxembourg fees??

God knows, but ebay deducted it from my paypal account!!

Ebay takes the moral high ground on certain items yet turns a blind eye and offers a platform to all manor of obviously knocked of gear that certain unscrupulous sellers like to move on.

What the hell are Luxembourg fees??

Selling on ebay privately, you pay a listing fee (used to be, not so much these days) then, when the item sells you, pay a final value fee (FVF) which is 10% (most categories). If you take payment by Paypal, they take their cut direct from that 3.4% + 20p per transaction. eBay fees explained here.

The 15% VAT in included in the eBay FVF, so not really sure what mrcharlie is on about.

I've sold tons on there for the last 15 years, including since eBay.co.uk went eBay SàRL, and paid plenty of eBay invoices, not ever seen Lux VAT charged separately weeks later or heard about it, so some more detailed info from mrcharlie would be welcome.

Ebay is fine for buying but no way would i ever sell again. It cost me the thick end of 400 quid last time thanks to some scamming scummer.

Ditto. Plus there are plenty of free services around now - Preloved, Gumtree and regional "for sale" groups of Facebook or national specialist ones, like "Sinclair for Sale" for any old Sinclair computers and accessories.

Ditto. Plus there are plenty of free services around now - Preloved, Gumtree and regional "for sale" groups of Facebook or national specialist ones, like "Sinclair for Sale" for any old Sinclair computers and accessories.

Thats actually a really good point. Simply typing what you want and your location into google can bring up lots of results. This is something i do more and more these days. I dont do Facebook so i havent seen the groups on there but that sounds like a good idea too.