Ebay & Etsy Selling

Updated 21st November 2024

TL:DR
I will be increasing prices on my ebay and etsy shops to reflect the fees, difficulties, delays and greed of both these platforms. They both have proven - and worsening - track records of withholding funds from sellers while keeping us in the dark and expecting us to pay out of pocket to continue to do business as usual. This is unacceptable, unprofessional and unethical behaviour.


In January 2024 ebay targeted my account without explanation or apology - they removed all my active listings and withheld my funds causing damage to both my cashflow and my reputation whilst giving the excuse that there was a "suspicious increase in sales on my account" which they needed to investigate.

At Christmas.

They then had to allegedly conduct a full investigation into the cause of this anomaly.

An investigation which I might add took them almost two months to complete despite me trying to contact them on an almost daily basis to find out what was wrong, what information they needed and how I could help to expedite the process.

Let me state that again clearly:

It took ebay two months to figure out why a seller might sell more items at Christmas time.

Today (21st November 2024) ebay have once again targeted my account claiming this time it is a "periodic performance review". The second such hostage situation in less than a year. A review which wasn't triggered a few months ago when my sales were at their highest all year, nor was it triggered on a specific date/time/value threshold. No this was triggered when I conveniently dared to try to withdraw funds from my account - money which has been cleared into my seller account for days already.

ebay are deliberately opaque in their business practices and make it impossible to contact the people committing these heinous acts in their name.

Although so far they haven't removed any listings this time they have blocked me from accessing my funds until their "typically 5 day" investigation is concluded.

So from around the start of December 2024 the price of my items on ebay will be increasing. This is due to the continued problems we as sellers face when trying to do business through a site like ebay:

  • Ever increasing fees for ever diminishing returns / platform value
  • Poor listing performance unless you pay extra to advertise
  • Unreasonable delays in payment processing times / payout restrictions / blocks
  • Harassment / targeting of sellers without explanation or justification
  • Policies which blindly penalise sellers at every turn
  • Increased difficulty contacting support

    While I do intend to keep my listings active on ebay for the time being there is such a sginifcant risk that I either won't get paid at all, will get paid extremely late or will have my entire site presence suspended without recourse - all while paying extortionate fees for the privilege - that these risk factors have to be reflected in my prices over there.

    Current calculations place these fees at a 20-30% increase, which I'm informally dubbing "ebay tax".

    For the best prices (without ebay tax), highest priority service and my complete range please use this website or contact me directly here.