How many other sellers are in this position? I have heard occasionally of PayPal accounts getting ‘frozen’ for one reason or another, and this is concerning, but I have never been contacted by one of these sellers, nor do I know the reasons PayPal might have for doing this.

Is this a specific issue at the moment? Or has it been an issue for a while? maybe email me via my contact form, I would be interested in some more info about this…

I believe it is the larger sellers who have online stores and larger turnover that will be less affected. We can absorb a drop in sales a little more easily in most cases.

For casual sellers or home based businesses this is far more difficult. It will be these sellers that may really hurt in the short term as a result of this decision.

Even if they do, it appears that it is likely that it will take 12 months to do so, in which case you are certainly correct to base your business planning around the changes.

I have not found many comments anywhere, outside of Ebay employees, that have been positive about these changes, so I appreciate your comments and outlook.

Good luck with it all. I hope that the changes do help some sellers, I don’t think it will be to my advantage but for the past five years I have worked on alternative plans being needed because you don’t know when Ebay decisions will interfere with your own business. I have those plans loosely considered, and when I give Ebay away will give away selling on-line completely.

Kind regards, Kevin

Indeed, this has brought about the ire of a lot of sellers.
But eBay has always had a very vocal crowd, as it is much more of a ‘community’ based site than say Amazon, Overstock or Yahoo Auctions. And I think the voice of the sellers is often louder here in Australia because we have fewer alternative marketplaces. For a seller in the US, who might only do 30% of their business on eBay and the rest in other channels, well they may not complain as loudly. In the US it is a little easier to vote with your feet.

I will have a go at answering your questions:
As for my business, I am not afraid of the change in the medium to long term. If a buyer and seller are both confident in using eBay, this will eventually be a good thing.

I have spoken to a number of other Powersellers (Platinum and above mostly) and the only negative feeling I have received from them is the fear of short term loss of sales and a little mistrust that some of these protection policies won’t get ammended well enough. Otherwise they tend to agree that the change will eventually be positive for the marketplace.

I like Paypal and what it offers my business. So do a lot of other Powersellers. But most probably don’t want to stand up and say it in case they get boo’d too!

I honestly think that there are just as many sellers out there who would be happy for the change.

For a volume business, Paypal offers instant payment (no chasing up bank payment details, processing cheques, finding lost payments etc) and easy management. It is a good tool to use, and I have always found access to the site to be reliable and transfer of funds back to our account reliable as well.

I, like my other Powerseller associates, as looking at ways in which we will need to change our businesses to adapt. We can only presume the change will go through and the ACCC won’t halt it. We have our own websites off eBay and may use some other channels too. Customers may buy more from our websites as we may offer more payment options.

We treat eBay as customer acquisition, but still rely on sales from it quite heavily.

We have already changed strategies for some of our accounts in the last 6 months due to other changes in the eBay marketplace.
We have to adapt to the market to stay on top of it.

So, to answer your question, do I see the directions Ebay has taken all of this year in particular as being profoundly advantageous to me as a power-seller?

Not profoundly advantageous, but yes, I think the outcome in 6 months time will be a more positive experience for me as a volume seller. But I am an optimist. I like the fact the new management in the USA are being more forward looking and taking action.

But, I hope there isn’t much of a drop in sales though in the short term. I hope PayPal management continue to work at improving policy and service and eBay can market their reasons for change effectively.

Cheers

I don’t think eBay would want that herion comment out in more of a public domain. It has already made some international press.
I would be interested in watching the session though.

There are 299 submissions on this page as of the minute prior to me starting to write this:
http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/823668/fromItemId/336311/display/submission

The ACCC has mostly beeen running more than a week behind. There was a claim earlier this week that someone was told by the ACCC that they had received just over 700 submissions, but there is a LOT of misinformation on the Ebay forums.

I don’t see how they could have not seen the massive outcry coming for this, and I do believe that that is why it is being tested on the “small” Australian market. Test is the word of Ebay’s CEO, John Donahoe, who claimed that if the test was successful, the company would introduce it in other countries “in months, not years.” Of course if the “test” is unsuccessful it has an impact on more than 50,000 Australian livelihoods, but Ebay has never considered the impact on the marketplace and people’s livings when they test anything:
Look at the faulty search engine that they opted people into without their knowledge for more than 6 months which could only find results for 2 and 4 items when there were thousands listed – example http://www.thehowcafe.com/forum/showthread.php?t=7462 – I got opted into it two weeks after encountering that thread, only 40% of my auctions showed up in view sellers other auctions, and searches for my own items would show two to four other items and never mine. I only knew to look for the opt out because of that thread, MANY people were randomly opted into that search without their knowledge and undoubtedly their bids were lost when they could not find what they were actually searching for. That search engine was NOT FIT to be tested in an active commercial marketplace and Ebay kept it active for at least six months. Imagine for a minute if the stock exchange just “tested” how playing with policy and tools affected the way that the market operated and ignored the immediate impacts. Ebay may have much lower individual transaction values, but it does impact on millions of people’s livelihoods worldwide. The marketplace is successful at this point IN SPITE of Ebay’s management, not because of it.

Sorry if this shows unnecessary ire and contempt. I AM frustrated. I know that I have to change my method of livelihood in coming months, in spite of the marketplace being very strong, but because the sharemarket believes that unrealistic levels of growth should be maintained instead of allowing a very successful business to level out and still rake in very lucrative profits. The current shift is very clearly towards stores and retail type merchandise, but ignores that Ebay is not a retail site. The last time they shifted in this direction they set up good store structures and deals and then decided to return to “core listings” (auctions) and pulled the rug out from under a huge number of sellers who had taken their lead. The current direction is discouraging small sellers and those who list the eclectic, old and unusual. So be it, but it was part of the appeal that attracted the vast numbers of people to the site in the first place. The current promotion on Ebay France, free listing of fixed price items that use PRE-FILLED information says it all, they want everyone listing standard new items, but if everyone lists the same stuff the only sellers that can win are those who have the lowest buying price (eg: buying out a liquidation or store close out), to the detriment of all other sellers. This is a dangerous road for Ebay to take (in my opinion), as once you remove the interesting old and eclectic, there really isn’t much to distinguish Ebay from any other retail site, and people are likely to shift to bigger retail names to buy retail. I use Ebay’s auction format to attract competition and higher prices for my goods (and mostly select goods that are not readily available so that there is a reason to compete for them). By encouraging buyers to compete with each other higher prices can be achieved, by encouraging seller to list the exact same items and compete with each other for the privilege can only bring the market down to the lowest viable price, thus if someone has bought items from a liquidation for ten cents on the dollar they can be profitable at wholesale rates, while every other seller struggles to maintain viability – the marketplace can not survive viably in that way. Instead of using variety to attract buyers, Ebay has taken the route of “value” and are now trying to increase seller costs while encouraging them to offer free shipping, the blue strip across the top of every page includes “at low prices on Ebay”, and every attempt is being made to lower the price structure while increasing the fee structure. How do sellers of retail items absorb this?

I am an auctioneer by trade (and will probably go back into running live auctions in the foreseeable future), so I am probably looking at this marketplace with much different eyes to you. Am I just being short sighted, or have I lost sight of the real future of Ebay? Do you, for example, see the directions Ebay has taken all of this year in particular as being profoundly advantageous to you as a power-seller?

Kind Regards, Kevin

I read yesterday that the ACCC has had over 200 submissions now. It remains to be seen whether any action can or will be taken.

I wonder if the strength of the reaction from sellers (and buyers) as caught eBay a little by surprise?