Suggestion:- Time limit on new sellers

[JudesNiceThings]

I think it would be a good idea to impose at maximum time limit for 'new sellers'' auctions, in the hopw that it would cut down the 'list and forget' people who are now being discussed in many forum threads.

I would think that where a seller has had less than (say) 10 sales, they could list for a maximum of 30 days, with the option of extending manually, until the number of sales is achieved, when the usual options would be available.

(Poll set up, and open to discussion!)

[harold69]

Well, i like the sign in idea better. Don't sign after so long, your listings go away. Also a thing that helps me is that i have my preferences set, so as i recieve an email when one of my auctions sell, i recieve a PM, or a question in the AAL. I don't surf the other sites i sell on like i do eBid, but i have a cell phone that alerts me when i recieve an email, and i can read and send emails from it. This helps keep my bases covered.

[cmjewels925]

Okay, I agree the dump-and-run brigade are a problem but I would hate to see new sellers penalised in this way.

I would suggest a lifespan of 12 months on ALL 'run until sold' and 'on first bid' items, not just those listed by new sellers.

[bykimbo]

I wouldn't like to see a two-tier system. The problem of absentee sellers needs to be addressed, but not by making life more difficult for genuine, new sellers. Selling and buying need to be as easy as possible for the site to prosper. I'd rather see a system of warnings and ultimately suspension for sellers that don't log in or respond to contact if they haven't got a holiday warning set.

[klj]

Seems to me the problem is more with 'older' sellers who started on the site before it became as busy as it is now, and then just left their listings, not the new ones coming in.

[harold69]

One thing that should effect every seller, when you get reduced to just being a buyer, your auctions should be suspended for 30 days, and be deleted after that, if you don't renew or upgrade. No auction should be running that a seller can't take care of.

[cornishmaid1961]

I think it might put new sellers off if they have a different system to the rest of us. It's hard enough to figure out a new site when you join as it is.

I think it is vital that the site gets cleaned up now and as klj has said the main problem is with the old sellers whose listings were dumped long ago.

I would hope that eBid has set some kind of time limit when they changed the log in system so that sellers who don't bother to log in for a couple of months would get taken off.

It would be good if somebody from eBid would let us know if something like this has been implemented ?

[MagnetsAndHangers]

I dont think the ''under 10 sales'' figure would apply to only new sellers - that would also include many that have been here for a long time now.

Sign in once a month. If you dont sign in at the end of 30 days, you are sent an email giving you 7 days to sign in, or your listings will end automatically - that is all it takes.
Would apply to newbies and oldies - no exceptions (unless you are going on a 2 month round the world cruise, in which case you would be expected to put your listings into ''on holiday'' mode.

However I still dont think anything like this would ever be implemented, as Ebid would obviously want to keep the listing figures as high as possible - so the last thing they want to do is end a load.

[Opis]

One of the first things I do as a buyer (on many sites) is check out a sellers feedback.

Prehaps on the feedback page at the top in big bold letters:

This seller last logged on today 15.5.09.

If sellers knew their activity was shown in their feedback like this it may encourage them to log on more.

I'd rather see a system of warnings and ultimately suspension for sellers that don't log in or respond to contact if they haven't got a holiday warning set.

I agree, it takes a just a couple of minutes each day or once a week to log on to a venue and keep things looking active


I was looking for something the other week and was coming across sellers who hadn't logged on for nearly a year.


Though in fairness, this isn't just on Ebid, other venues have this 'absent seller' problem too. I'm sure the owners here will once again lead the way in making this issue a thing of the past, they seem to be very much active & on the ball

[westlondoncarparts]

Onward growth for eBay requires the input from three groups of people – the eBid management team, sellers and buyers. Sellers need to be supported so that they will be encouraged to list. If there are sellers who have listed items on a run until sold basis and who fail to respond to enquiries, etc., then the eBid management team can close their membership of this site. Nothing else needs to be done. If there are other sellers who have listed a lot of inventory which is not selling, then there is no reason for them to lose their valuable time having to keep logging on to the site. The real problem that probably needs to be addressed is the volume of sales on this site and when it becomes worthwhile for sellers to be active on the site on a regular basis. Trying to micro manage how frequently people log on to the site or to try to control new sellers might well be an irrelevance. Nobody has to try to sell on eBid and if this site decides to make it more difficult for new sellers to come here then there are plenty of other places they can try to sell instead which will not help eBid to move forward. Before a lot of energy gets spent on this topic, does anybody have any firm figures on the size of the supposed list and disappear problem? Is it 20% of listings? 10%? 5%? It might be helpful to know that.