I know this will get me fired, but I am walking out today, so it does not matter anymore.
I work in the Seller Development department .
This department handles the future of how eBay members list, how they sell, what they sell, detailed seller ratings, feedback, etc.
Just about anything you do with selling is regulated with this department.
I've been with eBay for over 9 years, and I am one of the longest working employees in this department.Many others have left, or have been terminated, due to being "lenient towards sellers".
Anyway, I want to bring up some key points that were discussed at the last "work shop".
This workshop meets for about one hour on every Wednesday. This work shop consists of several "upper level" eBay employees, and from time to time, John Donahoe, president of eBay, will stop in to make sure everything is "up to snuff" (as he puts it).
Anyway, after all the wrong doing eBay has done to sellers, what was discussed today was the final "straw that broke the camel's back", after posting this, I'm walking out after 9 years of putting up with eBay's unfairness to sellers, non sense, often immoral (bordering illegal) policies that I personally have had to develop and implement into the eBay website.
The upcoming event, will be the final "nail in the coffin" for many eBay sellers, however I want to get this out here ahead of time, so you can prepare for it. This was actually going to be announced one week before being put into place.
On October 1st, 2011, eBay, Inc, on ALL eBay country locations (.co.uk, .jp, .com, etc) will be ending the auction listing format.
After October 1st, 2011, all auctions will cease to exist on eBay, in favor of Donahoe's plan (more on this later).
As you many know, we at eBay implemented a 9% final value fee on shipping costs.
Our official statement was released to the public stating it was done to prevent excessive shipping charges.
In reality, eBay was suffering profit losses, and this fee was a must in order to keep a positive income.
We understood that this would make a few sellers upset, this is why we also announced a new fee structure, and gave sellers 50 free auction listings.
This was done in order to keep our company looking untarnished for investors of eBay shares. We wanted to make more money from sellers, but keep them on here at the same time.
Many of you may wonder why eBay allowed numerous sellers from China to list on the eBay.com website.
We did this because:
-. Not only can buyers from china purchase things from eBay China, buyers can now purchase things from china all over the world. China is a largest seller, and allowing them more search exposure would increase our fee income, and increase our GMV.
- It undersells sellers from other countries, and allows China to be the leader in sells for eBay.
Now you may be wondering why John Donahoe wants to get rid of auction format.
Here are some of the reasons that were mentioned at today's workshop:
- When buyers bid, they are not purchasing unless they win.
- The more buyers purchasing, the higher our fee profit is from sales.
- Time wasted bidding, is time that could be used for buying.
So there you have it, from the words of John Donahoe himself.
There will be another update released in February 22nd, 2012, that will get rid of small and medium volume sales.
eBay is tired of small sellers, because:
-They can't self sustain themselves, and tie up our customer support system.
- They often list junk, we don't want to look like a flea market.
- They make us fees, but not enough for it to be worth them on our trading platform, due to all the issues they have.
On February 22nd, any one selling on the eBay website, will have to have at least 7,500 items in stock and ready for shipment.
-This number may increase.
- Sellers will have to submit proof of inventory, any documents proving they own the inventory, and (maybe) pictures of inventory.
- This will not apply to sellers who currently sell at least 5,000 items a month, since their selling volume is generally enough to satisfy our per-seller fee goal.
Well, that's all I have to say, its been a unpleasant 9 years at eBay, and I hope all sellers reading this will take proper measures to ensure their success on eBay.