Re: New features?
I've not seen any new fees as a "private individual" user, though one friend recently commented that when they issued a refund to someone, they were shocked by the fact that Paypal kept their fees.
And I'm pretty sure that in the past when I've issued a partial/complete refund on a commercial transaction, Paypal refunded the appropriate percentage of their fees, too.
TBH, it's Ebay who are currently earning my ire - though it's related to Paypal, in a way.
They've decided that they're no longer going to let people receive payments directly from Paypal. Instead, the money goes to Ebay, and they then pass it onto you by delivering it straight into your bank account.
However, this process takes several days.
Which means that you have to cover any postage costs out of your own pocket, rather than from the money that the buyer gave you to pay for said postage.
Better yet, they're also deducting listing fees at the point of listing, rather than the point of sale. And this comes out of any money they're currently holding onto.
So, to use a worked example (aka: what actually happened!):
a) Sunday: I listed 9 items. Total listing fees: £4.50
b) Monday: I sold one item for £35, plus a £2.99 postage fee. Total paid by buyer: £37.99
c) Tuesday: I posted the item, having paid £2.70 for postage
d) Thursday: Ebay sent me £27.42
I.e. of the £38 the buyer sent me, I received £27.42. And since I'd spent £2.70 on the postage costs, this means that I actually only received £24.72.
Or to put it another way, Ebay's sliced around a third of the sale value off before passing any money over to me.
Admittedly, £4 of the £9.36 has come from the listing fees for the other, unsold items. But by the same token, that means I'm financially down until/unless those items sell.
And as with Paypal's refund fees, I'm fairly sure that Ebay used to be no sale = no fees. Either way, it certainly wasn't deducted up front!
For an added bonus. it turns out that the buyer was international, and I'm using Ebay's international shipping system. I.e. I post the parcel to some depot in the UK, and Ebay then delivers it to the customer.
As part of this, they charge the customer extra (£12 in this case, I think; I stumbled across the charge at some point during the despatch process, but I'm struggling to see any details from within Ebay)
And it turns out, they've also charged me for the privilege of using this service. £0.91, to be precise.
You could even argue that's fair, and I'd be inclined to agree. But there's no mention of any fees for the use of their international programme when you create the item.
For me, it seems pretty clear that Ebay has decided to focus on commercial, high-turnover traders, who have a continual revenue trickle and can keep things listed until they sell.
Hell, it might even be an attempt to clear down some of the crap on Ebay by forcing people to pay upfront.
And, y'know, that's fine.
But as an individual who's just trying to clear out some relatively low-value items, they've pretty much turned me off ever selling on Ebay again.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
