2008 eBay Changes – PowerSeller Program

Today, we continue our discussion about the 2008 eBay changes and how they affect those that sell on eBay. We are going to talk about the upcoming changes to the eBay PowerSeller program.

On the heels of eBay’s recent changes to the PowerSeller program minimum requirements, they have gone ahead and announced further qualification changes. In eBay’s words, the new requirements, effective July 2008, are as follows:

“We’re taking steps to give new meaning to PowerSeller status on eBay. Starting July, a score of 4.5 or more on all DSRs (based on the last 12 months) will be required for membership in the PowerSeller program.”

eBay has added this additional PowerSeller requirement to ensure that only the highest quality sellers can call themselves PowerSellers. This will only benefit the community and cause sellers to create better listings and provide better customer service.

Another change for those making money on eBay, and who qualify for the PowerSeller program, is that there will be additional discounts that you might be eligible for on sales on or after 20 February 2008 (discounts will hit your account starting in April 2008). The new PowerSeller Final Value Fee discounts are as follows:

• If you are a PowerSeller and all four of your Detailed Seller Ratings (DSRs) for the past 30-day period are 4.6 or higher, you qualify for a 5% discount on Final Value Fees.
• If you are a PowerSeller and all four of your Detailed Seller Ratings (DSRs) for the past 30-day period are 4.8 or higher, you qualify for a 15% discount on Final Value Fees.

We see the only real problem for most good eBay sellers is keeping the DSR for Shipping and Handling Charges high enough to be eligible for these new PowerSeller discounts. eBay buyers don’t seem to understand the concept of what it costs to ship items, and you will even find people with free shipping getting less than a perfect score in this category. We previously ranted about eBay’s Detailed Seller Ratings, which you might be interested in reading.

These eBay Final Value Fee discounts are most likely in direct response to the call by many people who sell on eBay to offer some sort of volume discount for the larger sellers. We think that eBay has implemented these discounts in a very fair way, in that the discounts will not only be for the high volume sellers. In fact, anyone that meets eBay’s fairly minimal PowerSeller requirements will have an equal shot at being eligible for these discounts.

As a side note, there has been a lot of discussion on the eBay Boards about how eBay is now catering to the larger seller because of these discounts afforded to PowerSellers that meet these certain requirements. The reality of it is that the eBay PowerSeller requirements are not that tough to meet, so anybody who does any amount of selling on eBay can become a PowerSeller, and thus be eligible for the Final Value Fee discounts.

So the only major change to the eBay PowerSeller requirements are ones that are meant to ensure only the highest quality sellers are able to call themselves eBay PowerSellers. This should only benefit the eBay community and shouldn’t be a problem for anyone who is serious about making money on eBay.

Image: The Consumerist

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