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I’ve Fallen Out With eBay

May 16, 2015 by

Today has been a bad day for eBay. Last week I listed loads of clothes on the auction site hoping to earn some extra pennies towards my deposit. But then this happened….

I’m devastated. I was hoping to get at least a fiver for each item. With many items having up to 12 ‘watchers’ in the last few days of the listing, I thought that some items might even fetch a tenner. How wrong I was!

I’m feeling a bit down about all this and I’m starting to wonder whether eBay is worth the hassle. Sure, when you add all the items together that I’ve sold, I’ve not done too badly, but once I take Paypal and eBay fees into account my profits do drop. Also, when I think about the hours I’ve put into listing everything I feel like it’s been a massive waste of time.

Also, who are these people who will consider bidding on this top when it’s 99p only to change their minds and not bother when it reaches £1.04. Are you kidding me?!

Arghhhhhhh!!! Now I have to pack these clothes and treck to the post office on my lunch break on Monday with a bag full of them.

I’m probably more upset than I should be, but I just feel like I’ve wasted so much time.

I’m trying to make myself feel better by reminding myself that none of these clothes fit me any more and so if I hadn’t sold them on eBay, they’d only be sat in my wardrobe gathering dust.

Also, it’s not like there’s much of an alternative. While some of these items could have fetched more on a car boot sale, others, like the flowery Tesco shorts, would probably have sold for just a quid. If I had of tried to sell them on Buy, Sell and Swap groups, I could easily have found myself sat waiting by the door for people who wouldn’t bother to turn up to collect them.

Please tell me I’m not alone in feeling this miserable when something doesn’t sell for as much as originally planned. How do you tackle it? Do you make sure you charge more for other items that you sell, or do you adopt a ‘you win some, you lose some’ approach? Let me know in the comments below!

 

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  • Aloadofoldtat.blogspot.co.uk

    I agree Ebay doesn’t fetch as much as it used to pre recession and sometimes doesn’t seem to be worth the hassle. I expect everyone is having to watch their pennies.

  • I totally get upset if my items don’t sell for a good price, especially like you say when they have loads of watchers.

    However on the flip side I’ve watched items, forgotten that I was watching them, seen they sell for like £1.99 and I’m like damn I’d have paid more than that!

    Charlotte | http://www.discoveringcharlotte.co.uk

  • 🙁 It really sucks, but I do find if it’s high street labels like Top Shop and the like, they don’t command a good price, even if the item isn’t worn. The secret, I reckon, is to make sure your postage costs covers YOUR costs, including paypal fees, ebay listing fees and time. But I find ebay takes ages to list something and then to have it sell for a couple of quid feels so injust! Having said that, you’re right - if you hadn’t have done this, you’d have gotten nothing, so something is better than nothing, right?! x

  • gillianrance

    p.s my daughter hates eBay, she sells clothes on Depop now-attracts a younger market but she says far more straight-forward than eBay.

  • gillianrance

    I’m in the “you win some you lose some” camp…I’ve been selling clothes for years and it’s really frustrating when they don’t sell for what they’re worth but on the other hand I’ve had items go for far more than I expected. I agree sometimes it just doesn’t seem worth the hassle when you make less than a pound profit. Sunday evening is a good time to have auctions ending.

  • Maybe it was because they ended on a Saturday? Although I know when I’ve sold stuff the watcher number rarely seems to affect the ending price, I think a lot of folk save things then forget to go back! 🙂

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