Recent announcements from the US and the UK are hyping up the changes to eBay for Charity (the UK program) and eBay Giving Works (the US program) with particular emphasis on sellers being able to organise their listings and donations from within eBay, without having to register at MissionFish, or leave a credit card on file there.

The US announcement also included a link and date for an online workshop to introduce and explain the new changes - something the UK rarely seems to do in messaging changes to its sellers.  (Actually, the only workshops I can remember ever being held on the UK site were organised by PowerSellers that were also eBay Education Specialists - not an eBay staffer in sight).

Neither of the announcements specifically state the charity arms are up for the chop, in fact they extoll newly redesigned websites for them, but there’s that little “je ne sais quoi” (or however it’s spelled) in the announcements, that says there’s no longer the happy relationship or synergy that there used to be. 

Certainly the charity arms would not seem to fit comfortably with JD’s vision of an all business, no flea market, super efficient eBay marketplace for big etailers.

Ed