eBay is shifting fees to buyers for purchases made from lower-volume sellers in Australia as it did in the UK and Germany, and those sellers will be required to buy shipping labels on eBay when sending items. eBay Australia is also banning cash-on-pickup payments and is making changes to its User Agreement.
Sellers with $25,000 or less in total sales over the preceding 12-month period will be eligible for “free selling.” All other sellers will be enrolled in a Pro plan by default, and their buyers will not have to pay for what eBay AU is calling Buyer Protection fees.
eBay AU linked to a page with a comparison chart of Pro plans and explained:
“The Pro Starter plan is part of our suite of Pro subscriptions but will also operate as the default selling experience for sellers whose registered address is in Australia and whose annual total sales exceeds AU $25,000. The Pro Starter plan has no monthly cost and the same transaction fees as selling without an eBay Store.
“As part of the changes to our selling experiences, existing eBay Store subscriptions (Basic, Featured or Anchor Store) will be automatically moved to the respective eBay Pro plan (Pro Basic, Pro Featured or Pro Anchor).”
Buyers who purchase from sellers who don’t have a Pro plan will pay Buyer Protection fees calculated as follows:
A flat fee of $0.30 per item, and
8% of the item price up to $20, and
6% of any portion of the item price from $20 to $500, and
4% of any portion of the item price from $500 to $5,000
There’s a cap on the total fee amount you’ll pay. Any portion of the item price over $5,000 won’t incur any additional fee.
eBay sellers based in Australia who are enrolled in free selling will be required to buy a label on eBay when sending items, with the following exceptions:
- Items sold for less than $20, or over $5,000
- Items that may be sent in an envelope. These include: trading cards, comics, magazines, coins and banknotes, jewellery, CDs/DVDs/video games, patches, postcards, greeting cards, seeds, stamps, stickers and decals
- Heavy or bulky items where a label isn’t available
- Orders where the buyer selected local pickup
Sellers will be able to see if their items will require an eBay shipping label when listing.
eBay Australia is updating its User Agreement to include these changes and others – in its Announcement Board post on March 28 (local time), it advised users, “If you prefer not to accept the updated terms, please take steps to close your account.”
Sellers discussed the changes in this thread on the eBay Australia discussion boards.
