eBay – UK again cracks whip to punish top customers
By Ed | July 3rd, 2008 | Category: eBay UK | 2 commentsAnnounced yesterday, on the eBay UK PowerSeller discussion board, but not as yet on the public Announcements Board, eBay staffer and forum “Pink” Olly posted in a “stickied” thread -
As part of our focus on proper business identification on eBay, we announced back in January that business registration would become compulsory for the UK PowerSeller programme. To complete this migration, all non-Business registered UK PowerSellers will be removed from the PowerSeller programme on July 20th.
Although the vast majority of our bigger sellers are correctly representing themselves as businesses on eBay, we have a number of PowerSellers in the Bronze and Silver tiers who still describe themselves as Private sellers on our site.
Please refer to our Business Centre page for more information about the legal definition of trading as a business and your obligations under the law. http://pages.ebay.co.uk/businesscentre/identification/index.html
To upgrade your account to a business account, go to My eBay > My Account > Personal Information, and change your Account Type to Business.
The ensuing thread filled up with questions about non-PowerSeller, non-Business-registered, sellers who were obviously businesses, yet had failed to register as businesses on eBay UK, and showed obvious signs of not having done so with UK tax and regulatory authorities.
Although not directly stated, most of eBay’s paying customers (posting in response) seemed pleased that the PowerSeller ranks would be getting thinned out (= less competition), but displeased that non-PowerSeller businesses would not be getting brought to task, or into line with business registration requirements.
It does once again seem that eBay have gone for the easy targets and avoided hunting out those in true need of educating and regulating.
Ed
Update 5 July – Still nothing on the UK Public Announcements Board, and no emails sent out to UK-registered PowerSellers – even Head of UK Trust & Safety, Richard Ambrose has conceded many times (in forum discussions) that, “a very small portion of PowerSellers ever read the boards“, so why has eBay not communicated direct to those whose livlihoods and discounts are going to be affected, i.e. their own paying customers?
Doesn’t exactly help me to “Be Inspired” to “trust” eBay with the “safety” of their marketplace as a channel for my business.
Mein Gott!
I’ve just had the most awful thought about the wording of Ollie’s post ….
It can be read two ways -
1 – All registered PowerSellers who are not businesses, will be removed from the program.
2 – All PowerSellers who are not registered as businesses on eBay, will be removed from the program.
There is a subtle yet distinct difference between the two.
The January announcements stated from the outset that there would be space for non-business sellers to continue to qualify as PowerSellers, and for non-PowerSellers to qualify for the DSR-based discounts on Final Value Fees.
Gradually the UK has nibbled away at the edges of those exemptions, and bastardised (localised) them, and this announcement now reads (to me) as if the only UK sellers that will qualify for them must be both -
a – Bona Fide businesses registered as such on eBay
plus
b – PowerSellers with qualifying DSRs
In other words, there will be no exemptions on eBay UK very soon, and if you don’t fall into the above grouping, say bye bye to those discounts, because the January fee changes will become very real fee increases for successful sellers.
There’s cleaning house, and there’s cleaning house – but this is starting to look like the clearing of the Warsaw ghettoes with Reichfuhrer Richard directing UK operations, and on this occasion he cannot claim to be “only following orders” as the UK’s actions conflict with the public words of his superiors in San Jose.
Ed
I’m betting that this does not get the same rollover and extension as the newly announced amnesty related to neutral feedbacks for PS qualification and SNP suspensions.
eBay UK have a god-awful habit of bastardising and twisting global announcements, and since Richard Ambrose was elevated to Head of Trust and Safety, they also have the worst reputation of all eBay sites for treating their paying customers like criminals – that guy really is the classic example of a clinical workplace psychopath, just read the furore from sellers every time he “pinks” in an eBay UK forum.
When the sellers are smouldering over something, his words just pour petrol on the embers and turns them into an inferno. I feel sorry for the other Pinks, they get the backlash of feelings towards RA.
Gaz