Otis Inc LA's Lug Nut* Blog (*and many other things)

OK. This is here I use this blog to rant a little. This rant is aimed at the new eBay return policies that are going to be required to maintain "Top-Seller" status but more importantly the 20% discount received off of the monthly eBay fees charged to the sellers.

Currently eBay allows sellers to determine their own return policies including not accepting returns which for some sellers is important because these returned items cannot be resold and must simply be discarded. 

eBay's new policy going into effect February 2016 will require all sellers that wish to maintain their "Top-Seller" status AND their 20% discount to offer 30 day money back return policies. This is in addition to their older policy changes requiring free shipping and other things in order to maintain this "Top-Seller" status.

This new policy (at least for this eBay seller) will result in a further decline in sales as we WILL NOT offer 30 day money back guarantees on products that we currently do not offer returns. We will also be RAISING our prices by 20% to make up for the discount we are losing. Over the past couple of years our eBay sales have been steadily declining and our Amazon sales have been steadily INCREASING due to the understanding by Amazon that their revenue is derived from the sellers NOT from the buyers. It is up to the individual sellers as to how we choose to handle our customers not eBay. 

eBay seems to have lost sight of the fact that the sellers keep the lights on in their building NOT the buyers. eBay's reply to our concerns is this, "We need to create a safe place for your buyers to shop. If there were no buyers there would be no sellers". Our reply to this which seemed to go unheard was that "without sellers there would be no eBay and that we will take care of our own customers but in the meantime we are eBay's customers and what are they doing to take care of their customers?" We also tried to impress upon them that "the policies being initiated were going to do nothing except result in higher prices for the precious buyers that they were bending so far over backwards to protect and that this energy and should be more focused on helping the people (sellers) that keep them employed". This reply got us nothing except un-invited to participate in further eBay seller forums. 

It was good while it lasted but this seller is now focusing all of our energy on building our Amazon presence. At Amazon they understand things a little more clearly than at eBay. We will keep our eBay store open with higher prices and a "No Return" policy on some of our items. We wish them luck. They are going to need it.