The eBay UK Bulletin: Issue 164
The eBay UK Bulletin: Issue 164, 22nd January 2010
Topics in this issue:
1. eBay News: eBay profits up
2. News from the front
3. eBay spoof
4. Ask Molly – What holiday setting do I need?
Hello and welcome to this week's edition of The eBay UK Bulletin
It’s been a fun time at HQ this week with the highlight being a customer disputing the receipt of a parcel. Nothing strange there I hear you say, but when we e-mailed over the proof of delivery from myHermes with their signature on it the customer repsonded with “Oh yes, sorry, I completely forgot!” Bless them.
Good news for all you Tesco Clubcard fans out there; a new mobile phone offer. Buy a basic phone (I have two so far) for £15 and receive 1000 extra clubcard points worth £41.20 in holiday vouchers or cinema tickets. Then either place the phone on eBay for around £8.50 or send it straight back to Tesco recycling for 300 extra points (if you have the right envelope). That’s a £53.20 Virgin holiday vouchers for £15 – handy!
This week a great spoof that almost caught out a very experienced eBayer and in the absence of much eBay gossip, I bring you news from the front. Well, Molly HQ actually!
[For details of this newsletter, please scroll down to the end.]
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1. EBAY NEWS: EBAY PROFITS UP
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Whatever you think about the eBay system and charging policy, it seems to be working for the company with profits up, up, up!
Paypal also did very well making almost as much as eBay sales. Expect them to sell PP soon and buy a similar provider.
I do wonder however if these profits will continue now that the incentive to sell more and more has been reduced somewhat.
This leads me onto the big story of the week - the latest evaluation for Top Rated Seller status. I am pleased to say that things have improved at Molly HQ as my P&P low DSRs fell; unfortunately this was not quite enough as my level now stands at 0.52% against a requirement of 0.50%. Ironically my rating for the year is 0.43%, which would be ok.
To put this into perspective the reduction in eBay fees equates to around £80 per month as turnover is very low; an expensive 0.02%.
I have taken a couple of steps to try and improve this rating; the first is a note on each listing which reads:
“Our postage charges include up to £1.00 for packing materials & labour costs. If you consider this is too high, please do not buy the item.”
My ‘thank you for trading with us’ e-mail restates this:
“We would like to take this opportunity to let you know that our postage charges can include up to £1.00 for packing materials & labour costs. If you consider this is too high, please let us know and we will be happy to cancel the transaction.”
I would rather not have the sale than receive poor DSRs for the sake of 50p.
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2. NEWS FROM THE FRONT
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Here’s a quick round up of the weeks activity at Molly HQ, it is not that exciting, so now might be a good time to pop out and put the kettle on.
The local auction on Tuesday was a real eye opener; I can only imagine that there is a shortage of second-hand stock around as the prices were amazing. They are so high that I am going to enter a few lots of my own; all the quality junk and heavy stuff that I can’t sell on eBay.
Mollybol has now passed the 36,00^th trade; we had a quick cup of tea and moved on.
Boots did indeed have their 75% sale on Wednesday, Molly hit the Ipswich stores. This was a little scary with so many ladies in a confined space each with a glazed look in their eyes and multiple baskets. I just stood to one side clutching my boxes. The net result was a fair haul of goodies for next Christmas and one of the earliest visits to Costa for many a year.
If you did partake in the skirmish, check for any hidden ‘Advantage Card’ vouchers in your purchases as they expire at end of March. Molly acquired 32, 11 of which have already sold at 99p each!
International packets sent by Royal Mail are still very delayed, particularly to Germany for some reason. I had three ‘Item not received’ claims opened this week all from Germany as 3 weeks had lapsed since dispatch. I suspect that new packets were piled on old ones during the holidays with quite a backlog – expect problems!
In a similar vein I picked up another neutral this week for a parcel not delivered to the US. I refunded the item price and the postage writing off the deal, the delightful customer then decided not to agree to cancel the trade, thus my eBay fees remained, they rounded off the deal with a neutral. These guys are no longer on my Christmas card list and I wonder when the item finally arrives if they will let me know and pay again.
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3. EBAY SPOOF**
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“Hi Molly,
I am not sure if you have seen this spoof, but it fooled me when it arrived in my Outlook inbox this week in the midst of a batch of orders.
The images, logos and surrounding presentation were perfect. The link (deleted below) to the item in question attempted to open something that thankfully my system detected and stopped. Who knows what the other links contained.
The actual item number doesn't exist. On closer inspection afterwards the link did have a slightly unusual string of numbers at the end.
The buyer's ID (also removed here) is that of a genuine UK computer game powerseller - who would be horrified to find that he is being used in this scam. I recognised it from somewhere, so felt more assured about the email.
The email didn't arrive in my eBay message box as I checked afterwards, so it was proof of a fake.
eBay quickly confirmed this.
So there's one rule that I won't break again in the future. Only open eBay messages from My eBay and never click on a link in one of them in Outlook or anywhere else other than eBay.”
*presstotalk*
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Please let me know for what reason you stopped my bidd?
*Respond to this question***
**Item number: 280396809535**
Item URL: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
End date: 17-Jan-10 16:30:04 BST
>From User: *b*
*99.9%** Positive Feedback*
Member since 26-Jan-02 in United Kingdom
Location: United Kingdom
This message was sent when the listing was active.
*bexxxx* is a potential buyer.
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Nice one, it doesn’t look much without the graphics, but if something like this arrives in your email, just hit the delete key.
Please keep your spoofs coming – Mollybol@ebaybulletin.co.uk
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4. ASK MOLLY – WHAT HOLIDAY SETTING DO I NEED?**
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“Hi Molly,
I wonder if you could help me with my holiday shop settings? I am going away for a few days next week as business is slow!
I know how to turn my shop off but was wondering if there is a way to add a note to each individual listing to say I am away in bulk rather than editing each one as well as leaving a note on my shop home page just in case I still get the odd buyer?”
Good idea, I might as well be on holiday. Sorry, I mean I’m working really hard on the 3rd edition updates to the book, honest Hh! [Ed - the proof of the pudding is in the eating.]
In your shop holiday settings are 3 options,
1) Make my Fixed Price listings unavailable,
2) Display holiday message in all of my available listings and
3) Display holiday message near the top of every page in my Shop.
It is number 2 that you need; just enter the date when you will return.
Saying this, some customers will still buy. If you use SMP construct the Payment Received email to include a note about dispatch delays.
Have a great holiday
If you have a question about eBay or home working in general, please send it to: mollybol@ebaybulletin.co.uk
-- END NOTE --
That's all for this week. Check out www.ebaybulletin.co.uk
It suddenly struck me this week that nowhere on a listing does it show that I am a Power seller. PSs have received some bad press over the years, but I am still proud of my status and think it does reassure buyers.
To this end I have now added my own PS logo which alternates with a ‘Paypal verified’ badge on a random basis using a little ‘Javascript code’.
This also got me thinking about using the same process to promote other items on a random basis to buyers. Instead of showing these logos it is possible to promote anything.
Anyway the code has been written, so if anybody wants to give it a try, just let me know and I’ll send over the HTML.
Best wishes and happy eBaying
Mollybol
Author of the bestselling title, 'The eBay Business Handbook' - available direct from the publishers: www.harriman-house.com/ebaybusiness
At age 40 and
