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Dec 27, 2023

eBay Fields Questions on New International Shipping Program

The first comment out of the gate at this month’s eBay Chat on Wednesday was why eBay wouldn’t allow sellers to specify which items they allowed to be sent internationally on a listing-by-listing

The first comment out of the gate at this month’s eBay Chat on Wednesday was why eBay wouldn’t allow sellers to specify which items they allowed to be sent internationally on a listing-by-listing basis. Currently it’s an all or nothing proposition when opting into eBay’s new shipping program, which was the topic of the chat.

eBay is transitioning sellers from the Global Shipping Program to the new eBay International Shipping program (EIS).

The seller said the new EIS program can only be turned off at the account level, no longer at the listing level. “Sellers should be able to turn off select listings from international shipping for whatever the seller has for their reason,” the seller posted. “This equals eBay forcing sellers to ship internationally and it simply should not be that way. We have the right to decide.”

An eBay moderator wrote the following response to the seller’s comment:

“Our Shipping Team has provided the following response to your question:

“”To ensure eBay follows international export regulations regarding restricted, prohibited, oversized, or branded items, filters have been implemented to restrict these from the eIS program. This ensures a better buying experience for both the Buyer and the Seller as it reduces the number of items that cannot be shipped through the program and would require returning to the Seller or liquidating the item.

“eBay is currently working to update the removal of eIS at a listing level. Once this is available to Sellers, eBay will update our Help Pages to reflect these changes. Meanwhile, you can apply country level exclusions to certain listings you don’t want to sell internationally – just exclude all countries (worldwide) except the USA.””

Another seller said items sent via the new eBay International Shipping program seemed to take longer to arrive and asked if that would change. “Based on the estimated delivery times, it appears that eBay International shipping service uses surface transport,” the seller asked. “Instead of arriving in a week to 10 calendar days, we are seeing delivery times in weeks. Are there any plans to offer a more expedient service?”

eBay replied: “Surface transport is utilized on certain lanes from the US Hub (i.e. Canada) and via air for overseas deliveries. The transit days are currently in line with standard times via other eBay programs (eISD, GSP, etc.). Depending on the shipping type (DDU vs DDP) these times can be slightly longer depending on customs requirements and processing. eBay is currently working to add additional international carriers into the program to assist with regional deliveries into rural outlining regions and improve transit times.”

Note that DDP referes to Delivered Duty Paid and DDU refers to Delivered Duty Unpaid.

During Wednesday’s chat, the eBay shipping team revealed that “eBay International Shipping is an eBay owned and managed product that is run by eBay itself.”

When a seller said packages sent through the EIS program are sent to a location in the middle of the country and and asked if eBay would open other locations, eBay responded, “We are opening our second hub location in Los Angeles in April. We are also evaluating other locations as we expand our operations.”

There’s been a decline in seller engagement since the eBay-hosted chat sessions changed to a monthly schedule devoted to a single topic, but sellers lobbed numerous questions at eBay’s Shipping Team on Wednesday.

Some of the responses eBay provided to address seller questions include the following:

“Once you sell an item with eBay International Shipping you can consider it sold. If a package arrives at the International Shipping hub and is determined to be ineligible for export eBay will refund the buyer. We do not send the package back to the seller, however you get to keep the sale and the money stays in your account.”

“The responsibility of the Seller is to ensure the package arrives at the eBay US Domestic Hub, once it arrives any issues that occur do to damage, lost in transit or delivery issues are the responsibility of eBay. The Seller will keep the original sale and eBay will refund the Buyer directly.”

“VAT and custom fees collection depends on an item price and a buyer country. In some cases (DDP – Delivered Duty Paid) – they are collected at checkout, the buyer is informed about those amounts collected. In other cases (DDU – Delivered Duty Unpaid) the buyer will pay taxes and duties, if any, upon delivery.

“The seller is not responsible for informing the buyer about any taxes and duties, eBay takes care of that. Those duties and taxes should not be included into the seller’s 1099 either.”

In terms of the shipping rates available through the program, a moderator for the Shipping Team wrote:

“We regularly review eBay International Shipping rates to provide the best value to our buyers. Usually you can find them on the Seller Center pages, right now we are currently updating the rates and will publish the new table by the end of this month here:

“We work closely with multiple carriers to provide the best value for buyers and sellers – both in costs and delivery time. Each shipment is evaluated on an individual basis and the carrier and route is determined to provide the best time/price ratio. eBay International Shipping is an eBay owned and managed product that is run by eBay itself.”

eBay also said it charged Final Value Fee (which is a commission plus payment processing fees) on the item price – plus sales tax – plus the cost of shipping to the domestic shipping bug. “FVF is NOT charged on the calculated international shipping,” the Shipping Team said.

eBay acknowledged a drawback of the new EIS program. A seller wrote, “A buyer purchased 4 items and their order is going international. I attempted to purchase one shipping label to send the package to the hub; however, I was unable to do so. Does the new eBay international shipping program prohibit sellers from combining orders to ship to the hub?”

eBay replied, “We currently do not support combining orders with eBay International Shipping, but plan to address this in the future.”

Another limitation is the maximum value of items shipped. Initially, sellers were limited to using EIS for items $500 or less. eBay said the limit was increased to $2,500 on March 7, 2023 and explained, “If you want to sell more expensive items internationally, you can list them with other shipping options not managed by eBay.”

Note that eBay had run the GSP program using Pitney Bowes as a partner. On Monday, eBay’s Chief Financial Officer Steve Priest told Wall Street analysts eBay had moved from being an agent to principal with the new EIS program.

Sellers should be sure to scroll through the entire thread. We published some callouts on the EcommerceBytes Blog where you can leave comments and questions.