Ok lets get this straight, on under items that sell for under £10 ebay and paypal make way to high a percentage benefit, on an item that sells for say
£5.98 inc £1.99 postage such as a dvd i sold recently :
The packaging and postage cost not being loaded is £1.99
that leaves £3.99
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final value fee will be 8.75%, and arent calculated inc postage cost
so that leaves £3.64p
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the listing fee for a dvd is 10p
so that leaves £3.54
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the paypal charge to receive the total £5.98 payment is 40p
so that leaves £3.14
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so for selling a dvd on ebay for £5.98 inc postage
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I make £3.14 or 53% of the price
post office make £1.99 or 33% of the price
ebay make £0.85p or 14% of the price
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if you discount the postage part of the equation and view ebays share as costs subtracted from the actual sale price not including postage it works out as ebay receiving 21% commission on this sale of £3.99.
so really ebay for items around the fiver value is receiving 21% commission, now they may claim that paypal is a seperate entity blah blah etc and cant be lumped together with ebay, but really its all part of the process. I cant understand the post offices costs to some extent although they have risen over the years pushing small sales on ebay further away again from selling small items on ebay. The post office at least have to physically deliver something to someones door. All of ebays costs are mainly electronic ? and therefore the high percentage they take along the chain seems unnecessary, surely there is an opportunity here for someone to do the job cheaper than this the final value itself seems an exorbitant percentage on small items. and from my purchasers view postage is just another part of the total price, so I cant really not include that in my costs.
overall the costs involved in selling small items means, that you cant really justify selling items under a tenner not including your own costs listing and under £20.00-£30.00 including your own time costs of listing packaging and posting the item.
Which basically means the second hand selling on ebay which one of the best ways of green recycling for many items is not viable unless >
1. you dont count your own time costs in the equation.
2. the items your selling are at least over £20.00 in value
if postage and ebay/paypal costs were lower it would make this kind of selling more viable for the average person. As it is the average person is financially better off working an extra hour and throwing the item away or giving it to a charity shop.
true theyre is now … a whole micro payments system :
https://micropayments.paypal-labs.com/
so ebay can use this small paypal payment scheme, which reduces the charges for receiving money on small items, Problem the smaller charges scheme is really difficult to sign up to, like very hard to find and get activated on your account. And takes a long time to be approved on an account from what ive heard like you might have to wait 3 months and still need to remind paypal to apply to your account.
most of the other micro payment and tipping pay monthly web sharing schemes are dependant on being paid through paypal, the problem with anything money on the web is it almost need to hit the ground running with critical mass and widespread support, which most of these competing systems do not get which is why paypal is so dominant, and certainly for ebay the only choice ?
I’m nearly sure that there’s some form of paypal account that is specifically for items under a tenner. The charge that paypal takes off you is a lot less when this kind of account it used. I’m currently trying to get further information, although it’s proving to be difficult.