[Closed] Ebay - compulsory managed payments

Do we still have to do this??

I've just ignored all the emails, but then I don't use Ebay much for selling (or just have occiasional bursts of activity), so will worry about it when I next want to use it to sell something.

Do we stil have to do this??

Only if you want to continue selling on ebay.

But yes, I've made the "switch" it really makes zero* odds to me as a seller if payment comes via eBay, Google pay or PayPal. As a buyer it gives me more options.

*By zero I mean it's cheaper not to be paid by PayPal but it really isn't any additional nuisance.

Generally works out better. Not as good for cash on collection but better for online payment. If you list on a £1 or £3 deal then it's loads better. Takes a few days for the money to be in your account but it is in your eBay account so you can post straight away. The only negative for me is that now I don't have 'paypal money', ie money that I can spend on toys because it isn't real.

Generally works out better. Not as good for cash on collection but better for PayPal. If you list on a £1 or £3 deal then it’s loads better. Takes a few days for the money to be in your account but it is in your eBay account so you can post straight away.

This 👆

I only list on the offer days though.

Yeah, seems to work pretty well, as above only list when you get a £1, £3 or 80% off listing fees deal.

I signed up to this and sold an item.

My money has been "processing" for 2 days now.... I had to despatch the item right away or risk my selling status.

This is annoying.

Previously I could get the money right away in paypal and instantly transfer to bank. Now we have to wait a few days to actually get the money?! WTF!

You're no worse off. Standard ebay fees used to be around 10% plus around 4% for paypal. All that has changed is that buyers aren't forced to pay by paypal. The money goes to your bank 2 days later rather than sitting in paypal for you to collect. If the fees quoted are 12.8% then the seller is possibly slightly better off.

"Processing" by the way means ebay have your cash and its on its way to you, not that the buyer hasnt paid. I've had this confirmed.

I changed to the Ebay managed payments last Friday, sold something on Saturday & the buyer paid straight away, money appeared on my Ebay page & in my bank account on Tuesday from payee 'Adyen N.v.'

Just check you have the right account set up, my first payout tried to go to an old account, one that I haven’t used for about 8 years, and bounced.

Took a few minutes to sort on live chat but it’s fine now and works.

Works fine here. Overall revenue from sales is pretty much the same, as you save the paypal fees. I do miss having a steady trickle into the paypal account which allowed for buying stuff with pretend money - now everything appears on the bank statement.

now everything appears on the bank statement.

That's what a Monzo / Revolut / Starling account is for 🙂

Yes but critically ebay have my money for 2 days for no good reason.

Previously a couple of clicks and I'd have the paypal in my bank account.

I rang ebay about and they said it takes 2 days to do "checks" on the money for fraud. So if they found fraud they won't pay me the money! Meanwhile the item is on its merry way.

Previously if fraud was found by the buyer paypal would have to suck it up as I would already have the money.

It actually works pretty well, I have weekly payout setup

The problem is that before I could leave it in PayPal and spend from there remaining semi-anonymous but now it goes straight to the bank attached to my details so I’ll have to cap my selling at or just above the £1000 HMRC ‘arts and crafts’ thing.

How much can you actually get away with realistically? I’m hardly going to be hunted down by the tax man for selling £1200 of my 3D printed fork mounts but how about £2000, £5000? Realistically I could do £15k a year of sales but that would likely raise some alarm bells

Note that the £1k limit is profit, not turnover! I'm not sure at what point they would start to ask questions but at 20% margin that would be £6k going through the account and totally legit not to declare it

Andrewh you sure about that? I read very specifically in a few places that it is gross, but can’t actually find it on HMRC sites

Theoretically I could just keep buying new printers and turn over 15k while keeping my profit below 1k quite easily. Add in some ‘prototype testing’ trips to Wales and that money could disappear pretty quick 😬

Do what I did when I signed up for it and remove PayPal as an option for payment for buyers. The new managed systems mean that buyers can pay direct by card/Apple Pay etc so you don’t get any payment fees at all. And if you list on a cheap weekend all you pay is £1 for pretty much any value of sale.
It’s a pain waiting for payments but I’m sort of resigned to it now.

How much can you actually get away with realistically? I’m hardly going to be hunted down by the tax man for selling £1200 of my 3D printed fork mounts but how about £2000, £5000? Realistically I could do £15k a year of sales but that would likely raise some alarm bells

£15k sales sounds like a business to me, not a hobby.

I've been googling g and you're right Chris, it is turnover.
Most places say 'earnings'which to me means profit but apparently to HMRC that does mean turnover in this context, that's a bugger

I'm also now getting a slew of offers - all linked to me updating my account to the new system.

I'm running down my listings to the end of the month and then stopping selling - TBH there's other places to list anything, and if I REALLY need to sell on eBay then I'll move over to the new system then.

It's the increased risk as a seller that bothers me and off the back of recent experiences just makes it too much of a risk / PITA - it's beholden on you to send the item whilst eBay merrily runs its 'checks' (collects interest) and you get your money at some point thereafter. You're fully on the hook if the buyer decides to play the system - from experience you've the sum total of f*ck-all protection via eBay. With PP, for all its flaws, at least it added a modicum of fallback - and you had more control over the money itself (to a degree).

But you are paying for that protection. With the new payments and £1 selling I've probably saved enough for 3 or 4 sales to go wrong and still be ahead. As they haven't gone wrong so far I'm well ahead.

it’s beholden on you to send the item whilst eBay merrily runs its ‘checks’ (collects interest) and you get your money at some point thereafter.

If you are that paranoid just change your dispatch time to 7 days. Then you can dispatch after 2 or 3 days when you have the money in your bank account and still be well within your stated dispatch time.

But you are paying for that protection. With the new payments and £1 selling I’ve probably saved enough for 3 or 4 sales to go wrong and still be ahead. As they haven’t gone wrong so far I’m well ahead.

I'm not a business - though selling more than usual recently as we've been clearing out a bunch of clothes, bike bits, some expensive pens etc over the last six months or - only takes one pricey sale to go sideways - and it happens more and more frequently - then no number of listing offers would offset the downside. Most people are honest but someone wants to claim a £300 fountain pen is fake I've got zero redress.

So then it becomes a case of only selling stuff where the potential loss is not material. Which renders the whole thing a PITA with limited upside.

If you are that paranoid just change your dispatch time to 7 days. Then you can dispatch after 2 or 3 days when you have the money in your bank account and still be well within your stated dispatch time.

I 'think' there's a link between dispatch and receipt of funds. Regardless, I think (?) there are no set rules as to when the money will get deposited so you're at the mercy of their discretion anyway.

An eBay/PayPal transaction fee was 13%

eBay 'in house' now 12.8% (so you save a whopping 0.2%) on the change and eBay can say most people save money!!!

eBay also keep your money for 2 days and earn interest on it.

eBay are The MAN.

Does anyone know how old you have to be to get paid from ebay? I will be 17 on monday but I'm worried if I put that in it will be a no go and I will stop being able to sell things. Thanks.

Is there a potential seller benefit here on scam refunds? With paypal eBay used to be able to automatically extract funds from your account if the purchaser put in a claim and you had very little chance to object as a seller. If the money has gone into your bank account, I assume eBay can't get at it without a direct debit mandate (which has good protections)

eBay are The MAN.

eBay's business model has been the same for the past 10 years - no innovation.
Once the PayPal eBay divorce was complete, they were always going to come up with their own payment options to try to boos their profits.

I keep meaning to do this. Only thing putting me off is that I currently use PayPal as a bit of a slush fund for stuff I don't really need, but want.

I'll need to decide where to set-up an account to do the same thing.
I might get one of those Plum accounts set-up that automatically skims a bit out of your current account every month to help you save.

eBay’s business model has been the same for the past 10 years – no innovation.

Worse, they actually make it harder to find what you want. Not Amazon levels of bad but sometimes not far off.

I’ve now had several threatening messages from ebay

Hardly, but feel free to ignore them and stop selling on there. That's what I did when Amazon demanded I upload my passport details for anti-money laundering purposes.

It’s a pain now so I don’t really use it anymore

Liked the fact you got your money instantly before and it went into a “secret” PayPal accountant then you posted the item.
Now you’re having to post an item before you physically have your money in your bank, doesn’t seem right that.
Ebay earning interest on every payment, possibly...

Is there a potential seller benefit here on scam refunds? With paypal eBay used to be able to automatically extract funds from your account if the purchaser put in a claim and you had very little chance to object as a seller. If the money has gone into your bank account, I assume eBay can’t get at it without a direct debit mandate (which has good protections)

No, it's now much worse. I didn't bother reading much of the fine print as I "opted in" to the new compulsory managed payments, and it turns out it does include a direct debit mandate. Although, you could probably just cancel that just as easily as you could with paypal, in the case of any issues.

There was also some verbiage about "we'll hold the money to ensure the buyer is happy with the item". I find it hard to believe ebay will become even more unfriendly to sellers, but looks like they found a way.

I just wish that more people would look on sites like Pinkbike. I have items up on there for months, that then sell within days on ebay once I get the FVF offer.

6 months in, how are people finding this? Anyone been royally stitched up as a seller?

Not at all. If anything it's better than it was. I often have the money in my account on the same day, if not it'll be next day. No issues I've seen after lots of sales

6 months in, how are people finding this? Anyone been royally stitched up as a seller?

Yes and no...
Sold an item, buyer claiming not as described and a part missing, wrongly.
I reported a fraudulent claim to eBay who did bugger all about it and just refunded him.
However, this system does mean that they have refunded him and not been able to take any money from me so I've left it and opened a new account, if they want to pay him up to them but I won't. Gave up trying to sort it out.
(780 positives and a history of refunding the few genuine cockups seems to count for nothing)
Been looking for alternatives but they are just so dominant. Anyone found anything? FB, Gumtree etc only really work for bigger value collection items IME, just sold a washing machine through FB for £100 but not sure I want to do 100 CDs at £3-5 each...

Not at all. If anything it’s better than it was

Agree. The initial 2 days before payment sent always sounded a bit dodgy, even though eBay claimed they were not profiting from the money in that time but now the payment is sent across within 24 hours.

No issues with it - seems to be working well.
PayPal clearly have issues though. I tried to buy a guitar using PayPal (fees paid) yesterday. The payment went from my end but was put on hold for the seller by PayPal. So understandably the seller refused to send the guitar. He refunded the PayPal payment and I sent the money by bank transfer - not ideal and PayPal lost £28 in fees. It would appear that some of the leadership are asleep at the wheel.

Ebay had to make it work well & fast or it would have been the end of them.

See, it's stories like @andrewh that put me off. There's seems to be little to no protection of someone tries to scam a seller.

After signing up to managed payments, and jumping through their various hoops, they are now demanding that I upload photo id or they won't release £50 of my own money, (plus the threat of more account restrictions) from my last sale on there. (More, if anything else sells)

The whole thing is a massive PITA and I just can't be bothered with them anymore. Quite frankly, they can stick it...

PayPal clearly have issues though. I tried to buy a guitar using PayPal (fees paid) yesterday. The payment went from my end but was put on hold for the seller by PayPal.

What did PayPal tell him when he phoned them as there would have been a reason that it was on hold?

In the last couple of months I've sold around £3500 of stuff. Mainly some high ticket hifi, ham radio and drone stuff that I've been offloading to fund other hobbies.

No issues at all, all payments have been in my bank within 48 hours and before necessarily posting the items- even a fairly posh watch - no buyer issues, nothing. Some items have gone abroad via ebay's GSP as well. Again, zero issues.

Its been 100% pain free and easy and everything has been sold on £1 or £2 listing offers. Way less hassle than Facebook Marketplace.

What I would say is I describe my items conservatively and perhaps even take a bit of a hit on the selling price for noting things that don't really matter, I take loads of photos of me packing the item up and I only post RM 1st class signed for or special next day delivery. I am fairly confident I have covered my own back each time.

Yep, my experience matches dannybgoode - I list super accurately, loads of photos, make a point of mentioning my 100% seller rating and RRP in every listing, then take photos of item as packing it, as well as proof of postage and send to buyer on day of despatch (always next working day after sale). I only ever use royal mail recorded and charge accordingly.

Had one fraudulent buyer a couple of years back trying to argue condition of a pair of shorts, so reported them and proactively uploaded more info, link to listing, extra photos (not quite as good/sharp as the one used in the listing) to prove my case, and ebay backed me.

Moral of the story is be accurate on listing, proactive on all aspects of despatch, only send recorded and if you get a query/fraud attempt, absolutely carpet bomb it with evidence from the get go.

What I would say is I describe my items conservatively and perhaps even take a bit of a hit on the selling price for noting things that don’t really matter

Yep. My standard is something like "this has been used, if you are looking for a brand new one this isn't it". I've bought quite a bit of stuff described as new or mint and it's been a bit scratched or missing bits that would've been supplied with it new. Not a big deal and part of buying used to me but there are plenty that will kick up a fuss and eBay will usually side with the buyer

Agree dannybgoode and andyrm. I have been selling on eBay for 15 years and sold over £50K worth of items with 2000+ positive feedback, no issues, no dodgy buyers etc,.
I also only ever sell as Buy It Now and never use auctions as tended to get a lot of non payers.