eBay UK Loosens Simple Delivery Mandate Again, Expanding Opt Out to Certain Items Priced At £20 Or Less
As UK private sellers continue to pushback on Simple Delivery mandate, eBay is once again loosening restrictions, allowing more items priced at £20 or less to opt out.
Sellers received the following notice via email today:
We’ve listened to your feedback and made Simple Delivery optional for more items priced £20 or less. This includes items in categories like Trading cards, Coins and Stamps, which are typically letter or large letter-sized and 100g or under.
It’s an update that gives you more choice. You can choose a low-cost, untracked delivery option when protections aren’t essential, or stick with Simple Delivery to benefit from prepaid labels and automatic tracking, all at competitive prices.
And while eBay doesn't give a fully exhaustive list of the categories whether this new policy will apply, the Simple Delivery help page indicates that mobile phone cases, CDs, and DVDs are included.
Simple Delivery is now optional for more items priced £20 or under in categories like Trading cards, Coins and Stamps, Mobile Phone Cases, CDs, and DVDs, which are typically letter or large letter-sized and 100g or under.
Now you can choose to select a low-cost, untracked delivery option when protections aren’t essential, or stick with Simple Delivery to benefit from prepaid labels, automatic tracking, and full protection if the item is lost or damaged in transit, all at competitive prices.
The policy does still say it only applies to items 100g and under though - so not all items under £20 within the specific sub-categories allowed will have the option to opt out.
Simple Delivery continues to be a contentious topic amongst private sellers in the UK with many complaints about problems at the post office, concerns about insurance coverage, difficulties getting refunds for unused labels, and rising postage costs pricing them out of the market.
Liz Morton
Private sellers in the UK community say this is a good change, but it doesn't go far enough and they're still hoping eBay will eventually backtrack on forcing them to use Simple Delivery at all
Unfortunately, that's not very likely as eBay has explicitly stated on recent earnings calls they see Simple Delivery as an important revenue driver - saying they expect it to "meaningfully contribute" to increasing take rate.
Simple Delivery is currently only mandatory for UK private sellers and while eBay's help pages officially still say it's only available for private sellers, at least one business seller on Reddit says they have also recently started seeing it being applied to their listings - though it's not entirely clear from that post if this was a glitch, confusion, or if eBay really is now expanding Simple Delivery to business sellers in the UK.
And sellers in the US have been wondering if/when it will be expanded to them as well, with eBay running recent surveys testing US seller sentiment on the subject and a glitch just yesterday that briefly showed Simple Delivery as a shipping option on the US .com site listing form.
Liz Morton
What do you think of the latest changes to Simple Delivery in the UK? Do they go far enough or should eBay scrape the mandate all together and let private sellers voluntarily decide whether or not to use the managed shipping service? Let us know in the comments below!
