The ABC's of the eBay "List 5 Free" Promotion

[iggyman]

This rant is a bit late but what the heck....

I love eBay! There business model closely parallels that of a shell game on Fulton street in New York City. When will they reach the tipping point?

EBay has a great deal for you! 5 FREE Insertion Fees every 30 days (in bold letters...)! Sounds great....where to I sign-up? It's easy, the first 5 items that you list using the eBay listing tool will be considered free. Gosh, eBay is not so bad after all.... Wait a second, did you see the fine print?

http://pages.ebay.com/sell/June2009/...ree/index.html

The Final Value Fees for those first 5 items will be 8.75% until you reach $20 in FVF. In other words, they give the impression that you are going to save some real $$$. But, if you are not careful, it can be a cleverly devise bait and switch. Let me explain, if an item sells for $200 the FVF without the free promotion is $8.87, but with the free promotion the FVF is $17.90. Ouch, real classy of them. However this promotion shell game does have a nice benefit.

If an item sells for under $25 (your FVF is the same, but you benefit with a free listing....whoopee!). Now this is the real good part, if an item sells for more then $522 and up to *17.99 million (see footnote), your FVF will only be $20. Okay, so that part of it is great for a seller. But, anything in between and your testicles are being squeezed for a few more pennies dollars. By the way, this promotion does not apply to buy-it-now; as it is only valid in a straight auction listing. The only way to get around it (as far as I know) is to use 3rd party software to list your items (vendio, auctiva, etc...)

For the novice or casual seller, they will probably get burned. For those that "read fine print" it creates some opportunity. From the buyers perspective, well......alot more clutter searching for pre war cards.

Lovely Day...

*Excludes items with a Start/Buy It Now/Reserve price of $18 million and above.
(I thought this footnote in the promotion was funny......I guess it excludes those shieks trying to sell oil wells...)