eBay UK Buyer Protection Fee: Does The Math Add Up?
UPDATE 2-10-25
eBay UK community staff have confirmed this Buyer Protection Fee discrepancy is due to VAT not being calculated correctly.
jimthing
Just two days into the launch of eBay UK's new Buyer Protection Fee, sellers say the math doesn't add up with eBay apparently taking 3p less than they should on every transaction.
The apparent fee calculation error was revealed in an eBay UK community forum discussion started by a seller who was trying to figure out a way to create a simple spreadsheet with the calculation baked in to help them determine how to set item pricing in order to still show buyers more attractive round number or .99 pricing rather than random amounts many listings with the buyer fee added in currently show.
But while trying to work out those calculations, some sellers noticed eBay appears to be incorrectly taking 4% off of the £0.75 - leaving them actually collecting £0.72 for that part of the fee instead.
jimthing
Ebay have set this up wrongly, as they're working out the fee wrongly!
While Ebay's help says in their example:
£20 - Item price set by the seller
£1.55 - Buyer Protection fee (4% of £20 [i.e. £0.80], + £0.75)
£21.55 + postage - Price that buyer sees for the listing
£20 - seller earnings
The list-an-item page works it out incorrectly as:
£20 - Item price set by the seller
-£0.75 - minus fixed fee
= £19.25
£0.77 - Buyer Protection fee (4% of £19.25)
= £1.52 - TOTAL FEE (£0.75+£0.77)
£21.52 + postage - Price that buyer sees for the listing
£20 - seller earnings
This is ENTIRELY THE WRONG WAY according to Ebay's own help page!
As proof, the seller showed a screenshot of what the listing form shows when entering a price of £20 - saying UK buyers will pay a £1.52 fee for Buyer Protection.
But that clearly doesn't match the example eBay gave in their own help and policy page which shows on a £20 item it should be £0.80 variable fee plus £0.75 fixed fee for a Buyer Protection Fee total £1.55.
On another community thread dedicated to the issue, one seller surmised eBay may be taking the 4% variable fee off of the fixed fee - which would make sense given the amount of the difference.
jimthing
I've got no idea how exactly the calculation is going wrong but my guess is somehow the 4% of the buyer fee is getting mixed in with the 75p fixed fee - the 3p discrepancy is 4% of 75p
We can also see this isn't just a display issue on the listing form - the incorrect calculation is also what shows and is being charged to buyers on live listings.
Narrowing search results down to between £20-£22 shows no results at £21.55 and a lot of results at £21.52, proving the calculation on the listing form is what is being used for the live listing, not the calculation shown on the help and policy page.
Side note - it appears this has completely broken the sort by price functionality for buyers too.
Using the "lowest price plus P&P" sort option, it's obvious that eBay is sorting based on the item price the seller set, not on the fee inclusive price shown to the buyer, which makes lower total price options from business sellers appear randomly mixed in with higher total price fee inclusive results from private sellers.
That's a terrible buyer experience now matter which way you slice it.
While I do believe in this instance the calculation is incorrect and eBay will be fixing it soon, it's interesting to note the actual language in their help and policy page says the fixed fee will be "up to" £0.75 - seemingly leaving wiggle room for eBay to charge less than that should they choose to do so at any time, for any reason, on any transaction.
Either way, even small mathematical errors don't exactly inspire confidence in the process, especially not after eBay already had to make a last minute change to a phased roll out, then suffered a failure to launch and two day delay and buyers are already trying to find creative workarounds to avoid paying the new fee.
Liz Morton
Are you seeing discrepancies in eBay's Buyer Protection Fee math? Let us know in the comments below!
