eBay's "Sort By Price plus Shipping" Hurting FedEx, DHL Shippers

[mandy]

A visit to eBay's discussion board devoted to the topic of Search shows buyers and sellers continuing to cope with changes eBay is rolling out to the site. eBay's new approach to search (which it began calling "finding" this year) is reminiscent of its rollout of Item Specifics a few years ago. The reasoning behind the change is logical, and outsiders are likely baffled by sellers' resistance to changes that may appear to be improvements. But because eBay does not control the "inventory" for sale on its marketplace - and because eBay's platform itself is less than perfect - the moves are awkward and jolting and can put some sellers at a disadvantage.

eBay's replacement of sort by price with a sort by "price plus shipping" is one example. eBay only supports UPS and USPS in its shipping calculator (and not every service from these providers). For sellers who use FedEx, DHL and other carriers and don't specify flat-rate shipping, their items will show up at the bottom of search results when sorted by price. It's a good bet many sellers are not even aware that their listings may be appearing on the bottom of search results when sorted by price...

full article: http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y07/m10/i24/s01

more:

eBay has replaced the feature that allows shoppers to sort by price with one that sorts by "price plus shipping." But eBay only supports UPS and USPS in its shipping calculator (and not every service from these providers). For sellers who use FedEx, DHL and other carriers and don't specify flat-rate shipping, their items will show up at the bottom of search results when sorted by price. ..

full article: http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blo...46772.html

[amy]

For sellers who use FedEx, DHL and other carriers and don't specify flat-rate shipping, their items will show up at the bottom of search results when sorted by price.

Another reason for me to avoid eBay: almost half of our orders ship FedEx ground.

[mandy]

A related article from Auctionbytes:

eBay informed developers that its shipping calculator "is not available under certain situations." Because eBay now relies on the shipping calculator to serve up search results that are sorted by total price, the problem is even more serious. It appears from the description of the problem that the calculator can't handle certain dimensional weight pricing (dim weight). What eBay does not say is what happens to those listings where the shipping calculator fails - do they go to the bottom of the "price plus shipping" sort results?...

full article: http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y07/m10/i29/s01