AuctionCities Announces Fee Hike--Listing Fees More Than Doubled, FVF Fees Rise

[bargainbloodhound]

AuctionCities.com will be charging new fees for auction services starting September 4th, 2005. To view these fees please log into http://www.AuctionCities.com and click on "Fee Policy" on the right. All items listed before September 4th, 2005 can be re-listed (auto re-list or manual) for no charge until December 31, 2005 or until they sell, whichever comes first.

In addition all discounts will expire once the new fee schedule is activated, on September 4, 2005. Credits will remain intact.

Auction Cities Fee Schedule
Beginning September 4th, 2005 at 12:00PM PST

City Bucks Category: No listing Fees and no final value fees! However, if you decide to enhance your auction, as discussed below, other fees may apply.

Relists: You are allowed one free relist if you item does not sell.

Listing Fees: All Auctions, all categories, autos, real estate, boats, and fine art:

Grandfathering: Any items listed before September 4th 2005 can be relisted free of charge until December 31 2005.

Discounts: All discounts will expire October 4th 2005, all credits will remain unchanged.

Minimum Bid, Opening Value, or Reserve Price Listing Fee
$0.01 - $0.99            10¢ with 1 free relist  (old 5¢ with 12 free relists)
$1.00 - $9.99            15¢  with 1 free relist  (old 5¢ with 12 free relists)
$10 - $24.99              25¢  with 1 free relist  (old 5¢ with 12 free relists)
$25 - $49.99              40¢  with 1 free relist  (old 5¢ with 12 free relists)
$50 - $99.00              80¢  with 1 free relist  (old 5¢ with 12 free relists)
$200 - $499.99          $1.00  with 1 free relist  (old 5¢ with 12 free relists)
$500 and up         $1.30  with 1 free relist  (old 5¢ with 12 free relists)

Enhancement Fees: You may add any or all of the following enhancements:

Auction Enhancements
Additional Category              x1.5  (old $0.10)
Bold Title                            $0.50  (old $0.25)
Highlight                            $2.50  (old $0.25)
Banner                                $0.15  (old $0.10)
Featured in Category            $3.00  (old $0.50)
Featured on Front Page        $5.00  (old $1.00)
Special Icon                        $0.50    (old $0.25)
Studio Thumbnail                  $0.15  (old FREE)
Featured in Studio                  $3.00  (old $0.25)
Local Zip code listing              FREE      (old FREE)
10 Day Auction x1.5              $0.25    (old $0.25)

Final Value Fees:

Closing Price Final Value Fee
Item not sold    FREE    (old FREE)
$0.01 - $25.00      2.5% of closing price  (2.0% of closing price)
$25 - $1000.00      3.5% of the closing price  (2.0% of closing price)
$1000 and up     4.0% of closing price  (2.0% of closing price)

My comment: This is a belated April Fool's Day joke, right?  Perhaps its to pay the cost of redesigning the logo for the 4 name changes the site has gone through in the past 5 years (BidBay, Auction Diner, BidWay, and now Auction Cities)? Maybe they've decided it would be cheaper to run the site if they didn't have any sellers or listings left and so they decided to impose this fee hike?  ...and to think this site once had 5 million listings--wonder why those days are long gone  :blinkie:

[edit]Moderator edit: Calendar edited to reflect changed date of September 6 -regi[/edit]

[bargainbloodhound]

some of the comments on the BidBay Auction Diner BidWay AuctionCities message  boards following this morning's fee hike announcement:

I'll be joining you. Back to the big Y I go.

After Aug 31 I will be moving all my auctions.

I will miss AC, but who can afford the fees?

Holy Cow! Auctioncities you must be insane? Your most dedicated members got together to try and bring this place back to life so we came up with the contest idea, Allison did the footwork, we all did our part and listed like crazy, you guys won't even send out the newsletter or advertise with the banner???? We aren't gonna stay here an pay more fees after all of this, good lord! I get 5-10 emails a week from scammers that can easily register to this site.
I'm with the rest of the warriors, after this contest and sale month is over I'm outta here too!

I think they must want us to leave, maybe it was the only way they could run us off?

I'll have to take my auctions elsewhere. Too bad for AC. Maybe they wany the site to die??? Maybe the zip code thing is working out better. Remember when there were no fees and there were LOTS of sellers & LOTS of buyers. I miss that.

...well you get the idea of the mood there... : :

[bargainbloodhound]

AuctionCities.com fee changes moved back to September 6th

The fee changes effective September 4th, 2005 will be moved back to September 6th, 2005. This is to offer better support for our users by being fully staffed when the changes hit, rather than making the change over the labor day weekend.

[bargainbloodhound]

Sellers 1 AuctionCities Management 0 

To all AuctionCities.com members and to our most appreciated former members, we wish you the happiness of this Thanksgiving Season.

During the time just prior to beginning trading on the Public Stock-market (OTC: AUCC) and through those initial months of focused effort to launch this fledgling company, we, in retrospect, feel that we lost communication with our charter membership.  We feel that we lost sight of the true objectives of “client service.”

Policies that we felt needed to be implemented in order to establish proper precedents in the pricing structure of the new public company, seem only to have distanced us from our original, loyal members.  Herein lays the value of corporate management and the corporate review process.

I have made a few executive decisions to attempt to correct those matters.  We have increased our executive staff and fresh thinking now guides our plans for the New Year.  Therefore, I am making the following announcements:

·          Since our inception, Registration has always been free of charge

·          Now, there is NO CHARGE for a basic listing fee

·          Other enhancement fees such as BOLD TYPE, PHOTOS, STREAMING VIDEO walk-around auto inspections and virtual real estate tours and much less expensive than our competitors

·          Final Value fees are more than 30% cheaper than eBay and other competitors

·          Introducing a new “cost-per-click” advertising system

We have launched a proactive promotion campaign to build membership registration and motivate our fans to watch our website very closely.  We are giving away a Hummer in a sweepstakes open to all, we are giving away iPods, and other “cool goodies.”  Watch for  CA$H contests and game-like programs to keep things interesting so as, to offer each website visitor something extra…values added to enhance your participation at AuctionCities.com.

Return to the website and receive 100 FREE CLICKS from our new Keyword-based advertising system.  Look for other improvements, coming soon, including a greatly improved listing and inventory management tool.

We want to hear from you, and we are open to civil, constructive dialog, however, we are currently taking steps to improve the technology of the AuctionCities.com Chat Room to screen inappropriate comments in violation of the AuctioinCities.com Chat Policies.

Please rejoin us.  Keep track of the activity at AuctionCities.com. Visit the Press Room on our homepage, our brilliant marketing activities are chronicled, there.  You will notice a pro-active schedule of announcements of at least one a week since we went “public.” 

Today, I am thankful that we are all so gifted as to be able to send and receive this message of Thanksgiving.  So, here is a Holiday Present…From noon PST November 22nd, 2005 to January 15, 2006 The person who posts auctions with the highest total final value will win$100… Second Place $50… Third Place $25.  May you have a very happy Holiday Season and may all of your unwanted gifts be sold on (www.auctioncities.com).

Sincerely,

MICHAEL BERMAN, CEO

related topic: http://community.tuliptools.com/index.ph...218.0.html

[Nat]

·          Since our inception, Registration has always been free of charge

That's an odd thing to be promoting one's site over - free registration? What sites charge for registering to make this sound to exceptionally great?