eBay Releases 2019 Spring Seller Update

After releasing an “early update” in February, eBay finally released a full spring 2019 seller update. Here are the highlights from this update:

Marketplace Updates

• Calendar-month renewals for Good ‘Til Canceled listings
• Easy re-listing of canceled items and remorse returns
• State sales tax exemption is now available
• Easier order management with user-friendly order numbers
• Fee updates

The key points from this group are an increase in the final value fee for underperforming sellers and eBay has finally added a method to allow buyers to provide sales tax exemption certificates for eligible purchases.

Seller Protections

• New measures to identify and take action against abusive buyers and protect sellers
• Reduced search visibility for sellers who use a retailer to ship directly to buyers

eBay continues the fight against drop shipping arbitrage. This is good for those sellers that constantly battle sellers who have no inventory and only use Amazon, Walmart, and other retailers to drop ship products and make pennies on order and often lack the ability to provide good customer service.

And again eBay is claiming they will do something about abuse buyer behavior. eBay has promised this so many times before with minimal noticeable enforcement it is difficult to believe that anything will change.

Managed Payments

• New managed payments options and features

eBay continues to improve its payments system with new features and options that will make it easier for sellers to justify adding eBay Payments to their listings.

Now that PayPal is an option again for sellers that opted into the beta and with more flexibility on refunds and easier order management, it is likely that more sellers will embrace eBay Payments sooner.

Growth Tools

• Promoted Listings is now available to non-Store subscribers
• Best Offer and “Offer to buyers” enhancements
• Multi-quantity listings promotions with Volume Pricing

Inventory Optimization

• Category changes and item specifics updates

Sellers need to look at the list of categories that will be impacted as eBay will automatically move listings if sellers do not make the changes themselves.

Overall, there is not a lot of big news in this update, which is good. Some sellers will need to pay attention to category changes to avoid missing out on sales.

As eBay is expanding eBay Managed Payments, including an expansion to Germany, seller will need to pay closer attention to this program.

While eBay admits that there is some friction from legacy buyers and sellers to move away from PayPal to eBay Payments, many new buyers on the marketplace are embracing the non-PayPal driven payments system.

Like it or now, eBay Payments is here to stay and now that PayPal is again an option for sellers that accept eBay Payments, it is time to give it a serious look.

To view the full details on the US 2019 eBay Seller update, click here.

International sellers should visit their eBay’s marketplace seller update page to get the latest information on changes.

Some changes on the US platform do not apply to other marketplaces and other country marketplaces may have other changes not applicable to US sellers.

Links to other English language eBay site are available below:

• 2019 UK Spring Seller Update is available here.
• 2019 Canada Spring Seller Update is available here.

READ MORE: eBay Releases 2019 “Early” Seller Update

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