eBay warned sellers on Friday that USPS was raising Ground Advantage rates the next day. “Effective Saturday, July 25, 2026, USPS is increasing Ground Advantage rates. As a result, eBay Labels rates for Ground Advantage shipments weighing 3–5 lbs. will increase by $0.10 across shipping zones 1 – 8. This is the only USPS rate update at this time. Updated rates will automatically be reflected in the eBay shipping calculator when they take effect.”
USPS announced rate changes that took effect on July 12, 2026, but it doesn’t publicly announce rate changes for USPS Connect eCommerce, a program that lets marketplaces and postage service providers offer discounted rates to sellers.
For eBay sellers who don’t use calculated shipping features – including those who offer free shipping, the lack of advance notice can be costly if they need to raise their shipping charges or product prices. A seller posting on the eBay discussion boards said, “the concerning part isn’t the ten cents, it is the fact the USPS can now implement random changes with less than 24 hours notice.”
In Friday’s announcement, eBay said it recognized that USPS had made more frequent rate changes this year and said it understood how important it was for sellers to stay ahead of the updates. “We’re working closely with USPS to help sellers navigate these changes and provide timely updates as they happen.”
It also stated, “We’re continuing to work with our carrier partners to provide sellers with the most competitive shipping rates available. We’ll keep our seller community informed as quickly as possible whenever new information becomes available.”
not huge but 4th rate increase this year AND without warning, so USPS gets raise rates as they please. On my light weight items, that makes it $3-4 rate increase just the 1st half of the year.
““the concerning part isn’t the ten cents, it is the fact the USPS can now implement random changes with less than 24 hours notice.””
Yet seller says nothing about eBay’s FVF on shipping, a scam that has been running since 2010.
eBay could drop shipping prices across their whole site by only charging FVF on any shipping overage. They can compare the cost of the label to what was charged the buyer, which includes their own labels and third party label providers integrated with eBay such as PirateShip. That would allow everyone using online labels to offer commercial rates to buyers.
eBay could also work with USPS to modify its internal API for its retail meter machines to access the cost of its labels so these sellers would also get credit for the cost of labels versus having to pay FVF on the entire shipping amount. Alternatively they get not credit as way to make them move to online labels.
I’ve been saying that since before the FVF on shipping was put in place yet eBay armed with billions of dollars and thousands of employees can figure it out. That is because its a scam, especially considering their abuse of the 1969 UPU program for developed countries was done to raise shipping rates by causing USPS to loose money on international packages by flooding the U.S. with millions of Chinese packages on which USPS was losing money on each one.
The impact of the “rural rate” on USPS Ground Advantage rates for lightweight packages will ultimately fall on buyers. How long will it take someone to build an application allowing sellers to flag “rural” buyers? Who can estimate the impact of “rural” rate price increases? Today, Pirate Ship added two dollars to the price of a three-ounce USPS Ground Advantage package from Massachusetts to a “rural” address in South Carolina, a 35 percent increase.