EBay’s Bulk Listing Tool Inspires Balking About Bilking Sellers
The ease of inserting and editing multiple items in bulk on eBay is invaluable.
However there may be well-hidden costs to that service.
Even if the tool tells you there are none.
eBay’s Bulk Listing tool is easy enough to access. For editing purposes, when you select two or more items on your Active Selling list, the Bulk Listing tool is automatically activated. The tool is also activated from your Sold and Unsold lists when you are performing two or more relists at a time.
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The Bulk Listing tool allows you to adjust nearly every facet of your listings with the exception of photos. You can modify the title, price, category, duration, and much more.
I never pay for inserting an item onto eBay. Each month, eBay has been offering Listing Promotions. These promotions allow sellers to list an insane amount of items–often 5,000-50,000–entirely free. More listing promotions are received by frequent sellers. I’m currently on 5 overlapping listing promotions, not including the automatic 50 free listings everyone gets per month.
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Needless to say, I shouldn’t have to pay for Insertion Fees. And I never should be charged.
There are intricacies with each promotion. Often Listing Upgrades are costs above the free insertion fees. Fees for Picture Upgrades, Extended Durations, and Multiple Categories are seldom part of the promotion.
And this is where you may find the old adage “Nothing in Life is Free” painfully true.
When using the Bulk Listing tool, even if you’re on a listing promotion, the tool assesses all the charges and asks you to confirm your listings with a denoted charge.
After you press the Confirm and Submit Button however, it should strike out that charge, provided you have no peripheral charges.
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At this juncture, I always have a heart palpitation, hoping that I won’t be charged fees for upgrades I neither wanted nor knew about.
For quite a while, I’ve been using the tool and intermittently and overwhelmingly been incorrectly charged fees.
Recently I’ve encountered a problem with the Select All box. While it does indeed Select All, changes are not always implemented for all of your listings.
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So, for instance, if you want to remove all Listing Upgrades, the tool may not remove them on every listing-even though you used the Select All box, and each and every listing is selected.
I’ve reported the problem many times to eBay to no avail.
For the past two weeks, I’ve spoken to five representatives including a supervisor in an attempt to remove my incorrect charges.
And now it seems the tool is charging insertion fees on existing listings. After editing current listings, I received two insertion fees.
So even if you attempt to guarantee the excising of bogus fees, the Bulk Listing tool may still charge you.
Here are some things you can do to:
· Ensure all Listing Upgrades are removed by performing the removal process multiple times.
· Check the Fees column and edit any unusual listing individually.
· Remove any problematic listing from the Bulk Listing tool prior to submission and edit/list it individually.
While these cannot insure you’ll be devoid of charge, it may help decrease the amount.
· Cancel the listing immediately. Your account will reflect which item numbers were assessed fees.
· Make note of the item number.
· Utilize the Call Us button and speak to a representative and have those charges reversed.
· Be sure to get a Service Request # and have the representative document your call.
If that doesn’t work and eBay proceeds to charge your credit card for the bogus fees, you’ll have to instigate a dispute on the charge with your bank.
Prior to the good folk in charge of eBay’s social media page removed my call seeking others who encountered similar problems, I received a message from “John” who said he has been disputing fees for over two months without resolution. John believes that eBay has intentionally embedded kinks into the program to offset the revenue lost to its various promotions.
The claim is not entirely dismissable especially since eBay recently touted their new look and look but has yet failed to correct existing problems.
With these problems, eBay proves another adage: “Things are not always what they seem.” Especially when they’re hidden charges.
