@blurryface said:
again, in no way shape or form do i think pwcc is clean here. its the pot vs the kettle.
Good point. Let's always remember, To make something clean, something else has to get dirty. But, sometimes you can make EVERYTHING dirty without EVER making anything clean.
@rexvos said:
eBay is going to lose big on this. PWCC is a name that despite scandals will continue to get big $$$ in sales and now eBay is in the cold. eBay lost me as a seller due to ridiculous policies over a year ago and I am not going back no matter how many emails they send me, but I do not matter in the slightest to their bottom line. This will hurt bad. Really bad. They are quickly becoming my last option to buy cards and now they just lost their biggest seller of sports cards. eBay wanted to be Amazon and now they are going to be on the outside looking in on what was one their strongest categories.
How do you figure it's going to hurt "bad. Really bad." for Ebay?
Ebay has revenues of $10.2B a year. PWCC apparently does about $150m in sales on Ebay annually. Even if Ebay got the full 10% feel off of that, that's only $15m in revenue for Ebay. Or roughly 0.1% of their total revenue. You think they're going to miss that at all, let alone "really bad"?
This is correct. PWCC needed ebay a lot more than ebay needed PWCC. And they get far less than 10% in fees, too.
I'd have to agree with the "less than 10%" on a whole, probably somewhere between 8 to 10% dependent on how many cards sell for more than $2500.
While it's true that ebay fees AVERAGE about 12% and change due to their now managing seller's payments versus the 9 to 10% when paypal handled the payments, at a seller cost of about 3%, ebay has a final value fee cap, a limit to the amount that can be charged. For instance, the fees might cost the same amount whether the item sells for $2500 or $250,000, with the fee cap in place, and there are some times that ebay incentivizes high ticket sales by lowering the fees and/or reduction of the fee cap even further..
Way less than 8-10%. If you look at what they pay their consignors on higher end items, there's no way they'd be making any money if they paid anywhere near that percentage.
The only thing there is that I've got to believe that they deduct the ebay fees from their consignor's payments and then base their consignment fee on that adjusted amount, for instance:
Sale price = $1000 to PWCC
Adjusted price (- ebay seller fees) = $900
PWCC's cut: $900 X 10% = $90
$900 - $90 = $810 for the consignor
Yes? No? I've never sold through PWCC so have I got this wrong?
No, their percentage is based on the winning bid price, not the winning bid price less ebay seller fees.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
@rexvos said:
eBay is going to lose big on this. PWCC is a name that despite scandals will continue to get big $$$ in sales and now eBay is in the cold. eBay lost me as a seller due to ridiculous policies over a year ago and I am not going back no matter how many emails they send me, but I do not matter in the slightest to their bottom line. This will hurt bad. Really bad. They are quickly becoming my last option to buy cards and now they just lost their biggest seller of sports cards. eBay wanted to be Amazon and now they are going to be on the outside looking in on what was one their strongest categories.
How do you figure it's going to hurt "bad. Really bad." for Ebay?
Ebay has revenues of $10.2B a year. PWCC apparently does about $150m in sales on Ebay annually. Even if Ebay got the full 10% feel off of that, that's only $15m in revenue for Ebay. Or roughly 0.1% of their total revenue. You think they're going to miss that at all, let alone "really bad"?
This is correct. PWCC needed ebay a lot more than ebay needed PWCC. And they get far less than 10% in fees, too.
I'd have to agree with the "less than 10%" on a whole, probably somewhere between 8 to 10% dependent on how many cards sell for more than $2500.
While it's true that ebay fees AVERAGE about 12% and change due to their now managing seller's payments versus the 9 to 10% when paypal handled the payments, at a seller cost of about 3%, ebay has a final value fee cap, a limit to the amount that can be charged. For instance, the fees might cost the same amount whether the item sells for $2500 or $250,000, with the fee cap in place, and there are some times that ebay incentivizes high ticket sales by lowering the fees and/or reduction of the fee cap even further..
Way less than 8-10%. If you look at what they pay their consignors on higher end items, there's no way they'd be making any money if they paid anywhere near that percentage.
The only thing there is that I've got to believe that they deduct the ebay fees from their consignor's payments and then base their consignment fee on that adjusted amount, for instance:
Sale price = $1000 to PWCC
Adjusted price (- ebay seller fees) = $900
PWCC's cut: $900 X 10% = $90
$900 - $90 = $810 for the consignor
Yes? No? I've never sold through PWCC so have I got this wrong?
I have never consigned but i don;t think that is how it works based on all the emails I received from 4sharp's consignment business.
and to top it off what incentive is there to not sell it yourself if you pay all the fees and then pay them another 10%. they would never get the volume that they do
all i know is that the “shilling” excuse seems to have a ton of holes in theory.
It does seem that way. Typically, ebay will warn a seller if it detects likely shilling activity. There won't be a suspension, deletion of listings, or revocation. The seller will be directed to electronically page through an ebay site generated tutorial on the evils of shill bidding and why ebay and criminal authorities take a dim view of it. Upon completion of the tutorial, full rights of ebay membership are restored.
If at some future time, the seller repeats the shilling, then other actions will be taken by ebay, typically a 2 week suspension which may or may not include removal of listings for that 2 weeks, those transferred to completed listings so they can be relisted once the suspension time is completed. They also warn that it is against state (except Texas) and Federal law to shill bid on a national platform.
Then, if it occurs a third time, that's typically the end of the line for a seller. NARU, bon voyage, don't forget to write. Of course, most almost immediately start up another account under a family member's name and address, typically buying a new PC or device to eliminate the trail, as circumventing eBay's revocation is cause for immediate revocation.
I've actually read all the rules and guidelines. I even read the policy updates! Always good to check all the nuts and bolts of the platform you're standing on.
@rexvos said:
eBay is going to lose big on this. PWCC is a name that despite scandals will continue to get big $$$ in sales and now eBay is in the cold. eBay lost me as a seller due to ridiculous policies over a year ago and I am not going back no matter how many emails they send me, but I do not matter in the slightest to their bottom line. This will hurt bad. Really bad. They are quickly becoming my last option to buy cards and now they just lost their biggest seller of sports cards. eBay wanted to be Amazon and now they are going to be on the outside looking in on what was one their strongest categories.
How do you figure it's going to hurt "bad. Really bad." for Ebay?
Ebay has revenues of $10.2B a year. PWCC apparently does about $150m in sales on Ebay annually. Even if Ebay got the full 10% feel off of that, that's only $15m in revenue for Ebay. Or roughly 0.1% of their total revenue. You think they're going to miss that at all, let alone "really bad"?
Excellent points supported by facts and not emotions. PWCC needs eBay - EBay does not need PWCC. This is not a big mystery and every collector knows what happened back in 2015-16. Massive shill bids and retractions by their friends in Alabama and Texas where bidder ID’s were well known, and when caught they said “we will coach those people doing this.” Really bad only refers to the number of collectors who paid more for cards than they should have due to their shenanigans.
This can't be good for the confidence of PWCC in the eyes of those that have cards there. I'm sure PWCC will find a way through this, but looks like they were caught completely unaware today.
That shiny new vault in Oregon may be a lot emptier in a few months.
PWCC is far, far from the only selling outfit where shilling is a problem. It is a deep rooted problem in the hobby, to be sure— one that hurts all collectors’ wallets. Yet whatever the true nature of the beef between eBay and PWCC, there are a lot of honest bidders and consigners who got screwed today by eBay. Auctions of cards that collectors were bidding on, gone. Cards that owners needed sold, money they may have needed in a timely manner, now held up in a tangled mess. eBay did not execute this in a manner that was considerate of all parties; they could have wound things down with better logistical planning. To zap everything in one day smacks to me of a punitive mentality— eBay was out to get PWCC, or distance itself from PWCC, and as long as that objective was accomplished in the swiftest and strongest manner, the effect on the thousands of auctions that were active was deemed acceptable collateral damage. eBay happily shafted lots of honest collector/buyers and owner/sellers in order to land a blindside punch on an enemy.
@rexvos said:
eBay is going to lose big on this. PWCC is a name that despite scandals will continue to get big $$$ in sales and now eBay is in the cold. eBay lost me as a seller due to ridiculous policies over a year ago and I am not going back no matter how many emails they send me, but I do not matter in the slightest to their bottom line. This will hurt bad. Really bad. They are quickly becoming my last option to buy cards and now they just lost their biggest seller of sports cards. eBay wanted to be Amazon and now they are going to be on the outside looking in on what was one their strongest categories.
How do you figure it's going to hurt "bad. Really bad." for Ebay?
Ebay has revenues of $10.2B a year. PWCC apparently does about $150m in sales on Ebay annually. Even if Ebay got the full 10% feel off of that, that's only $15m in revenue for Ebay. Or roughly 0.1% of their total revenue. You think they're going to miss that at all, let alone "really bad"?
This is correct. PWCC needed ebay a lot more than ebay needed PWCC. And they get far less than 10% in fees, too.
I'd have to agree with the "less than 10%" on a whole, probably somewhere between 8 to 10% dependent on how many cards sell for more than $2500.
While it's true that ebay fees AVERAGE about 12% and change due to their now managing seller's payments versus the 9 to 10% when paypal handled the payments, at a seller cost of about 3%, ebay has a final value fee cap, a limit to the amount that can be charged. For instance, the fees might cost the same amount whether the item sells for $2500 or $250,000, with the fee cap in place, and there are some times that ebay incentivizes high ticket sales by lowering the fees and/or reduction of the fee cap even further..
Way less than 8-10%. If you look at what they pay their consignors on higher end items, there's no way they'd be making any money if they paid anywhere near that percentage.
The only thing there is that I've got to believe that they deduct the ebay fees from their consignor's payments and then base their consignment fee on that adjusted amount, for instance:
Sale price = $1000 to PWCC
Adjusted price (- ebay seller fees) = $900
PWCC's cut: $900 X 10% = $90
$900 - $90 = $810 for the consignor
Yes? No? I've never sold through PWCC so have I got this wrong?
I have never consigned but i don;t think that is how it works based on all the emails I received from 4sharp's consignment business.
and to top it off what incentive is there to not sell it yourself if you pay all the fees and then pay them another 10%. they would never get the volume that they do
The incentive? You get paid, no matter what. Say you sell on ebay and your buyer is dishonest. Among the many scams a buyer can attempt is/are:
1) "I never received the parcel". "That's not my signature on the USPS ledger"
This is now probably the #1 ebay buyer scam since Covid has enabled carriers from all companies to sign off and leave a parcel on a doorstep, EVEN IF USING SIGNATURE SERVICE.
So you have delivery registers marked, "JP C-19" and guess who signed for it? The carrier. No personal signature = buyer never got it thus a successful "item not received" case by the buyer!
Seller out the item and the buyer's money, a Schneider for the seller, a big goose egg.
2) The "rock in the box" return. Buyer doesn't like an item, starts a "not as described, materially different". The return is AUTOMATICALLY ACCEPTED by ebay and the amount of the funds associated for the sale put on hold in the seller's account, no two ways about it, no questions asked. The buyer is then directed to return the item to the seller and he supposedly does, getting a tracking number for the parcel. Now the moment the package is marked "received/delivered", the return is complete.
Now get this, many post offices don't even wait for a parcel with tracking to be delivered to a recipient before marking it as delivered. Some mark the tracking "received/delivered" AS SOON AS IT GETS TO THE POST OFFICE. Ebay will pick that up as delivered and consider it a complete, successful return BUT, in some cases it has not been delivered and the seller has not been given the chance to CONFIRM THAT THE ORIGINAL ITEM SENT TO THE BUYER IS THE SAME THING IN THE RETURN PARCEL!!
3-10) I'm not going to keep listing more scams that buyers use to routinely steal from sellers because the purpose here is not a tutorial on how to commit mail fraud.
My point is that when you sell through a reputable auction house or seller, THEY are responsible for leakage and fraud and you are paid for your item. For people who have experienced these seller nightmare scenarios, paying a little extra to assure you are paid for your item because your consignee assumes these risks as part of his vig may be an acceptable and fair added expense.
@rexvos said:
eBay is going to lose big on this. PWCC is a name that despite scandals will continue to get big $$$ in sales and now eBay is in the cold. eBay lost me as a seller due to ridiculous policies over a year ago and I am not going back no matter how many emails they send me, but I do not matter in the slightest to their bottom line. This will hurt bad. Really bad. They are quickly becoming my last option to buy cards and now they just lost their biggest seller of sports cards. eBay wanted to be Amazon and now they are going to be on the outside looking in on what was one their strongest categories.
How do you figure it's going to hurt "bad. Really bad." for Ebay?
Ebay has revenues of $10.2B a year. PWCC apparently does about $150m in sales on Ebay annually. Even if Ebay got the full 10% feel off of that, that's only $15m in revenue for Ebay. Or roughly 0.1% of their total revenue. You think they're going to miss that at all, let alone "really bad"?
This is correct. PWCC needed ebay a lot more than ebay needed PWCC. And they get far less than 10% in fees, too.
I'd have to agree with the "less than 10%" on a whole, probably somewhere between 8 to 10% dependent on how many cards sell for more than $2500.
While it's true that ebay fees AVERAGE about 12% and change due to their now managing seller's payments versus the 9 to 10% when paypal handled the payments, at a seller cost of about 3%, ebay has a final value fee cap, a limit to the amount that can be charged. For instance, the fees might cost the same amount whether the item sells for $2500 or $250,000, with the fee cap in place, and there are some times that ebay incentivizes high ticket sales by lowering the fees and/or reduction of the fee cap even further..
Way less than 8-10%. If you look at what they pay their consignors on higher end items, there's no way they'd be making any money if they paid anywhere near that percentage.
The only thing there is that I've got to believe that they deduct the ebay fees from their consignor's payments and then base their consignment fee on that adjusted amount, for instance:
Sale price = $1000 to PWCC
Adjusted price (- ebay seller fees) = $900
PWCC's cut: $900 X 10% = $90
$900 - $90 = $810 for the consignor
Yes? No? I've never sold through PWCC so have I got this wrong?
I have never consigned but i don;t think that is how it works based on all the emails I received from 4sharp's consignment business.
and to top it off what incentive is there to not sell it yourself if you pay all the fees and then pay them another 10%. they would never get the volume that they do
The incentive? You get paid, no matter what. Say you sell on ebay and your buyer is dishonest. Among the many scams a buyer can attempt is/are:
1) "I never received the parcel". "That's not my signature on the USPS ledger"
This is now probably the #1 ebay buyer scam since Covid has enabled carriers from all companies to sign off and leave a parcel on a doorstep, EVEN IF USING SIGNATURE SERVICE.
So you have delivery registers marked, "JP C-19" and guess who signed for it? The carrier. No personal signature = buyer never got it thus a successful "item not received" case by the buyer!
Seller out the item and the buyer's money, a Schneider for the seller, a big goose egg.
2) The "rock in the box" return. Buyer doesn't like an item, starts a "not as described, materially different". The return is AUTOMATICALLY ACCEPTED by ebay and the amount of the funds associated for the sale put on hold in the seller's account, no two ways about it, no questions asked. The buyer is then directed to return the item to the seller and he supposedly does, getting a tracking number for the parcel. Now the moment the package is marked "received/delivered", the return is complete.
Now get this, many post offices don't even wait for a parcel with tracking to be delivered to a recipient before marking it as delivered. Some mark the tracking "received/delivered" AS SOON AS IT GETS TO THE POST OFFICE. Ebay will pick that up as delivered and consider it a complete, successful return BUT, in some cases it has not been delivered and the seller has not been given the chance to CONFIRM THAT THE ORIGINAL ITEM SENT TO THE BUYER IS THE SAME THING IN THE RETURN PARCEL!!
3-10) I'm not going to keep listing more scams that buyers use to routinely steal from sellers because the purpose here is not a tutorial on how to commit mail fraud.
My point is that when you sell through a reputable auction house or seller, THEY are responsible for leakage and fraud and you are paid for your item. For people who have experienced these seller nightmare scenarios, paying a little extra to assure you are paid for your item because your consignee assumes these risks as part of his vig may be an acceptable and fair added expense.
Once again, though, there are no "ebay seller fees" subtracted from the winning bid price for consignors before the percentage is paid. Robert67 posted the consignment rates above. And yes, the number of consignments would drop drastically if it did.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
@fergie23 said:
craig44,
Why would you be worried about the PWCC vault? With Goldin offering a vault service as well, I see this space growing.
I think this is eBay punishing PWCC for starting their own auction service. If Probstein's auctions stay up, then we know this has nothing to actually do with shill bidding.
Robb
I also wonder if this may be the first domino of the FBI investigation to drop. if that is so, all "assets" could be impounded for a very long time.
FBI Priorities:
Protect against terrorist attacks
Investigate shill bidding on Ebay / PWCC
Impose consequences on cyber adversaries
@daltex said:
I doubt PWCC employees ever shilled. However, PWCC consigners are also affiliated with the company.
I doubt eBay takes this action and sends out that communication if they are just referring to consignees
I think it's a heck of a lot easier to detect shilling to whatever level you're confident enough to send a letter like this than to determine the occupations or exact identities of the alleged shillers.
@rexvos said:
eBay is going to lose big on this. PWCC is a name that despite scandals will continue to get big $$$ in sales and now eBay is in the cold. eBay lost me as a seller due to ridiculous policies over a year ago and I am not going back no matter how many emails they send me, but I do not matter in the slightest to their bottom line. This will hurt bad. Really bad. They are quickly becoming my last option to buy cards and now they just lost their biggest seller of sports cards. eBay wanted to be Amazon and now they are going to be on the outside looking in on what was one their strongest categories.
How do you figure it's going to hurt "bad. Really bad." for Ebay?
Ebay has revenues of $10.2B a year. PWCC apparently does about $150m in sales on Ebay annually. Even if Ebay got the full 10% feel off of that, that's only $15m in revenue for Ebay. Or roughly 0.1% of their total revenue. You think they're going to miss that at all, let alone "really bad"?
This is correct. PWCC needed ebay a lot more than ebay needed PWCC. And they get far less than 10% in fees, too.
I'd have to agree with the "less than 10%" on a whole, probably somewhere between 8 to 10% dependent on how many cards sell for more than $2500.
While it's true that ebay fees AVERAGE about 12% and change due to their now managing seller's payments versus the 9 to 10% when paypal handled the payments, at a seller cost of about 3%, ebay has a final value fee cap, a limit to the amount that can be charged. For instance, the fees might cost the same amount whether the item sells for $2500 or $250,000, with the fee cap in place, and there are some times that ebay incentivizes high ticket sales by lowering the fees and/or reduction of the fee cap even further..
Way less than 8-10%. If you look at what they pay their consignors on higher end items, there's no way they'd be making any money if they paid anywhere near that percentage.
The only thing there is that I've got to believe that they deduct the ebay fees from their consignor's payments and then base their consignment fee on that adjusted amount, for instance:
Sale price = $1000 to PWCC
Adjusted price (- ebay seller fees) = $900
PWCC's cut: $900 X 10% = $90
$900 - $90 = $810 for the consignor
Yes? No? I've never sold through PWCC so have I got this wrong?
I have never consigned but i don;t think that is how it works based on all the emails I received from 4sharp's consignment business.
and to top it off what incentive is there to not sell it yourself if you pay all the fees and then pay them another 10%. they would never get the volume that they do
The incentive? You get paid, no matter what. Say you sell on ebay and your buyer is dishonest. Among the many scams a buyer can attempt is/are:
1) "I never received the parcel". "That's not my signature on the USPS ledger"
This is now probably the #1 ebay buyer scam since Covid has enabled carriers from all companies to sign off and leave a parcel on a doorstep, EVEN IF USING SIGNATURE SERVICE.
So you have delivery registers marked, "JP C-19" and guess who signed for it? The carrier. No personal signature = buyer never got it thus a successful "item not received" case by the buyer!
Seller out the item and the buyer's money, a Schneider for the seller, a big goose egg.
2) The "rock in the box" return. Buyer doesn't like an item, starts a "not as described, materially different". The return is AUTOMATICALLY ACCEPTED by ebay and the amount of the funds associated for the sale put on hold in the seller's account, no two ways about it, no questions asked. The buyer is then directed to return the item to the seller and he supposedly does, getting a tracking number for the parcel. Now the moment the package is marked "received/delivered", the return is complete.
Now get this, many post offices don't even wait for a parcel with tracking to be delivered to a recipient before marking it as delivered. Some mark the tracking "received/delivered" AS SOON AS IT GETS TO THE POST OFFICE. Ebay will pick that up as delivered and consider it a complete, successful return BUT, in some cases it has not been delivered and the seller has not been given the chance to CONFIRM THAT THE ORIGINAL ITEM SENT TO THE BUYER IS THE SAME THING IN THE RETURN PARCEL!!
3-10) I'm not going to keep listing more scams that buyers use to routinely steal from sellers because the purpose here is not a tutorial on how to commit mail fraud.
My point is that when you sell through a reputable auction house or seller, THEY are responsible for leakage and fraud and you are paid for your item. For people who have experienced these seller nightmare scenarios, paying a little extra to assure you are paid for your item because your consignee assumes these risks as part of his vig may be an acceptable and fair added expense.
Once again, though, there are no "ebay seller fees" subtracted from the winning bid price for consignors before the percentage is paid. Robert67 posted the consignment rates above. And yes, the number of consignments would drop drastically if it did.
If that is the case, so what is PWCC's take after they pay the seller fees and remit payment to the consignor for the sale price minus their consignment fee? What's in it for PWCC? Crumbs? Can a consignor actually MAKE money on ebay if they have to pay their consignor's selling fees and not collect that off the top?
If that is the case, so what is PWCC's take after they pay the seller fees and remit payment to the consignor for the sale price minus their consignment fee? What's in it for PWCC? Crumbs? Can a consignor actually MAKE money on ebay if they have to pay their consignor's selling fees and not collect that off the top?
That was one great reason to go with PWCC, because your total fees would be less than selling by yourself. Plus, they list the item and they take all the risk. And, they got great auction prices, most of the time. The downside is that you were at their mercy. Sometimes they took to long to list, sometimes, their auction listing title did not do your item justice, etc...
I had placed a bid on an auction item a few days ago, I now have nothing in my bid list in eBay.
I also had about 5 items of theirs in my watch list, they are gone too.
I did receive the PWCC email but not the eBay email.
PWCC, offer free returns of any current vault items "all the suckers you got with FREEVAULT, before the ban hammer. Like this guy over here. Offer free commission on the new completely LEGIT market place for current vault members. Ebay lower the fees on collectibles. Police your site, even a little. And someone make me some rainbow stew.
In case you haven't seen the update, here is the latest post on the PWCC site regarding the current state of affairs from their operations perspective:
@miwlvrn said:
In case you haven't seen the update, here is the latest post on the PWCC site regarding the current state of affairs from their operations perspective:
“Since March, our team of developers has been focused on building and improving the Premier Auction experience which is currently live and has always been independent of eBay.”
i thought i remember seeing that the premier auction was in conjunction of ebay and had their seal plastered on it? was i seeing things? anyone else remember seeing it?
@DM23HOF said:
PWCC is far, far from the only selling outfit where shilling is a problem. It is a deep rooted problem in the hobby, to be sure— one that hurts all collectors’ wallets. Yet whatever the true nature of the beef between eBay and PWCC, there are a lot of honest bidders and consigners who got screwed today by eBay. Auctions of cards that collectors were bidding on, gone. Cards that owners needed sold, money they may have needed in a timely manner, now held up in a tangled mess. eBay did not execute this in a manner that was considerate of all parties; they could have wound things down with better logistical planning. To zap everything in one day smacks to me of a punitive mentality— eBay was out to get PWCC, or distance itself from PWCC, and as long as that objective was accomplished in the swiftest and strongest manner, the effect on the thousands of auctions that were active was deemed acceptable collateral damage. eBay happily shafted lots of honest collector/buyers and owner/sellers in order to land a blindside punch on an enemy.
I can definitely see that side of the coin for sure and innocent people are impacted without a doubt. You're right on about shilling being a problem throughout the hobby.
That said, I think eBay might say they protected those same honest bidders and consignors from being manipulated in this current auction by ending it. If eBay has information of shill bidding, and they've been performing the forensic analysis to arrive at that conclusion, they should act on that as soon as they are convinced there were issues. As a matter of fact, they may have evidence that shill bidding was already occurring for items in this current auction. I fully expect another class action lawsuit to be filed on this issue (there is already one out there from a few years ago). Had eBay known this was going on, and decided to let these auctions finish, while later it was proven that they knew shill bidding was going on in some of these auctions, they opened up a liability for themselves.
I don't think they had a choice but to act as soon as they were sure - and that absolutely impacted a lot of innocent folks. In the end, it's the cheaters that are to blame for this, not eBay, IMHO.
Interesting to see how many listings are left that spam the name PWCC in their item listing title. Curious to see if that practice continues being an advantageous rule violation (presumably increases quantity of item views), or if it instead moves towards something that harms the seller's efforts.
“What happens when somebody is caught placing a bid they don't intend to honor, known as shill bidding?
Our Marketplace Trust team is extremely proactive in monitoring bidding. We have placed permanent blocks on any bidder who does not pay. Refer to the Marketplace Tenets for more details on our monitoring procedures.”
so is honoring a bid not considered shilling? genuinely asking.
some call it a “hidden reserve”, some call it “id buy every card at that price whether its my consignment or not” or some call it “pushing the bid to document a record sales price”.
obviously different perspectives but with the bolded text above, i guess im asking is it still ever considered a shill bid if you do honor a bid you placed no matter what? curious as to what the overall consensus is there…
Both PWCC and Probstein commission rates include ebay fees.
For high dollar cards PWCC charges 8%. I have heard from reliable sources they actually pay ebay about 4%
IMHO PWCC doesn't need ebay and will survive. The vault has been a haven for buyers to escape sales tax on big dollar cards. They have been doing this for a while now and just took in $100 Mill in card value over the national. Now you can send cards for free there if over $250.
They are gaining control of the high value cards everyone is afraid to sell on their own with ebay policies.
Collecting PSA... FB,BK,HK,and BB HOF RC sets 1948-76 Topps FB Sets FB & BB HOF Player sets 1948-1993 NY Yankee Team Sets
One would assume that Ebay must have had its ducks in a row in order to send out any type of general email accusing PWCC of shill bidding.
"Hey Bob, you may want to run that by legal before sending that out."
What happens to Auctions that were completed and paid for (prior to the shut down -- even earlier from let's say the beginning of the year)? So if eBay can prove shill bidding in Auctions completed in March, will they offer compensation to the buyers? (and then make PWCC pay eBay a penalty or shilling fee)? I am assuming eBay has a bunch of money from completed auctions before the shutdown -- maybe they can draw on those funds?
@DotStore said:
What happens to Auctions that were completed and paid for (prior to the shut down -- even earlier from let's say the beginning of the year)? So if eBay can prove shill bidding in Auctions completed in March, will they offer compensation to the buyers? (and then make PWCC pay eBay a penalty or shilling fee)? I am assuming eBay has a bunch of money from completed auctions before the shutdown -- maybe they can draw on those funds?
its ebay, i dont know for sure…but my initial inkling is “of course not. its ebay”
@rexvos said:
eBay is going to lose big on this. PWCC is a name that despite scandals will continue to get big $$$ in sales and now eBay is in the cold. eBay lost me as a seller due to ridiculous policies over a year ago and I am not going back no matter how many emails they send me, but I do not matter in the slightest to their bottom line. This will hurt bad. Really bad. They are quickly becoming my last option to buy cards and now they just lost their biggest seller of sports cards. eBay wanted to be Amazon and now they are going to be on the outside looking in on what was one their strongest categories.
How do you figure it's going to hurt "bad. Really bad." for Ebay?
Ebay has revenues of $10.2B a year. PWCC apparently does about $150m in sales on Ebay annually. Even if Ebay got the full 10% feel off of that, that's only $15m in revenue for Ebay. Or roughly 0.1% of their total revenue. You think they're going to miss that at all, let alone "really bad"?
This is correct. PWCC needed ebay a lot more than ebay needed PWCC. And they get far less than 10% in fees, too.
I'd have to agree with the "less than 10%" on a whole, probably somewhere between 8 to 10% dependent on how many cards sell for more than $2500.
While it's true that ebay fees AVERAGE about 12% and change due to their now managing seller's payments versus the 9 to 10% when paypal handled the payments, at a seller cost of about 3%, ebay has a final value fee cap, a limit to the amount that can be charged. For instance, the fees might cost the same amount whether the item sells for $2500 or $250,000, with the fee cap in place, and there are some times that ebay incentivizes high ticket sales by lowering the fees and/or reduction of the fee cap even further..
Way less than 8-10%. If you look at what they pay their consignors on higher end items, there's no way they'd be making any money if they paid anywhere near that percentage.
The only thing there is that I've got to believe that they deduct the ebay fees from their consignor's payments and then base their consignment fee on that adjusted amount, for instance:
Sale price = $1000 to PWCC
Adjusted price (- ebay seller fees) = $900
PWCC's cut: $900 X 10% = $90
$900 - $90 = $810 for the consignor
Yes? No? I've never sold through PWCC so have I got this wrong?
I have never consigned but i don;t think that is how it works based on all the emails I received from 4sharp's consignment business.
and to top it off what incentive is there to not sell it yourself if you pay all the fees and then pay them another 10%. they would never get the volume that they do
The incentive? You get paid, no matter what. Say you sell on ebay and your buyer is dishonest. Among the many scams a buyer can attempt is/are:
1) "I never received the parcel". "That's not my signature on the USPS ledger"
This is now probably the #1 ebay buyer scam since Covid has enabled carriers from all companies to sign off and leave a parcel on a doorstep, EVEN IF USING SIGNATURE SERVICE.
So you have delivery registers marked, "JP C-19" and guess who signed for it? The carrier. No personal signature = buyer never got it thus a successful "item not received" case by the buyer!
Seller out the item and the buyer's money, a Schneider for the seller, a big goose egg.
2) The "rock in the box" return. Buyer doesn't like an item, starts a "not as described, materially different". The return is AUTOMATICALLY ACCEPTED by ebay and the amount of the funds associated for the sale put on hold in the seller's account, no two ways about it, no questions asked. The buyer is then directed to return the item to the seller and he supposedly does, getting a tracking number for the parcel. Now the moment the package is marked "received/delivered", the return is complete.
Now get this, many post offices don't even wait for a parcel with tracking to be delivered to a recipient before marking it as delivered. Some mark the tracking "received/delivered" AS SOON AS IT GETS TO THE POST OFFICE. Ebay will pick that up as delivered and consider it a complete, successful return BUT, in some cases it has not been delivered and the seller has not been given the chance to CONFIRM THAT THE ORIGINAL ITEM SENT TO THE BUYER IS THE SAME THING IN THE RETURN PARCEL!!
3-10) I'm not going to keep listing more scams that buyers use to routinely steal from sellers because the purpose here is not a tutorial on how to commit mail fraud.
My point is that when you sell through a reputable auction house or seller, THEY are responsible for leakage and fraud and you are paid for your item. For people who have experienced these seller nightmare scenarios, paying a little extra to assure you are paid for your item because your consignee assumes these risks as part of his vig may be an acceptable and fair added expense.
Once again, though, there are no "ebay seller fees" subtracted from the winning bid price for consignors before the percentage is paid. Robert67 posted the consignment rates above. And yes, the number of consignments would drop drastically if it did.
If that is the case, so what is PWCC's take after they pay the seller fees and remit payment to the consignor for the sale price minus their consignment fee? What's in it for PWCC? Crumbs? Can a consignor actually MAKE money on ebay if they have to pay their consignor's selling fees and not collect that off the top?
If I had to guess, I'd say PWCC seller fees are as low as 3%, maybe lower, so there is certainly profit to be made.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
@rexvos said:
eBay is going to lose big on this. PWCC is a name that despite scandals will continue to get big $$$ in sales and now eBay is in the cold. eBay lost me as a seller due to ridiculous policies over a year ago and I am not going back no matter how many emails they send me, but I do not matter in the slightest to their bottom line. This will hurt bad. Really bad. They are quickly becoming my last option to buy cards and now they just lost their biggest seller of sports cards. eBay wanted to be Amazon and now they are going to be on the outside looking in on what was one their strongest categories.
How do you figure it's going to hurt "bad. Really bad." for Ebay?
Ebay has revenues of $10.2B a year. PWCC apparently does about $150m in sales on Ebay annually. Even if Ebay got the full 10% feel off of that, that's only $15m in revenue for Ebay. Or roughly 0.1% of their total revenue. You think they're going to miss that at all, let alone "really bad"?
This is correct. PWCC needed ebay a lot more than ebay needed PWCC. And they get far less than 10% in fees, too.
I'd have to agree with the "less than 10%" on a whole, probably somewhere between 8 to 10% dependent on how many cards sell for more than $2500.
While it's true that ebay fees AVERAGE about 12% and change due to their now managing seller's payments versus the 9 to 10% when paypal handled the payments, at a seller cost of about 3%, ebay has a final value fee cap, a limit to the amount that can be charged. For instance, the fees might cost the same amount whether the item sells for $2500 or $250,000, with the fee cap in place, and there are some times that ebay incentivizes high ticket sales by lowering the fees and/or reduction of the fee cap even further..
Way less than 8-10%. If you look at what they pay their consignors on higher end items, there's no way they'd be making any money if they paid anywhere near that percentage.
The only thing there is that I've got to believe that they deduct the ebay fees from their consignor's payments and then base their consignment fee on that adjusted amount, for instance:
Sale price = $1000 to PWCC
Adjusted price (- ebay seller fees) = $900
PWCC's cut: $900 X 10% = $90
$900 - $90 = $810 for the consignor
Yes? No? I've never sold through PWCC so have I got this wrong?
I have never consigned but i don;t think that is how it works based on all the emails I received from 4sharp's consignment business.
and to top it off what incentive is there to not sell it yourself if you pay all the fees and then pay them another 10%. they would never get the volume that they do
The incentive? You get paid, no matter what. Say you sell on ebay and your buyer is dishonest. Among the many scams a buyer can attempt is/are:
1) "I never received the parcel". "That's not my signature on the USPS ledger"
This is now probably the #1 ebay buyer scam since Covid has enabled carriers from all companies to sign off and leave a parcel on a doorstep, EVEN IF USING SIGNATURE SERVICE.
So you have delivery registers marked, "JP C-19" and guess who signed for it? The carrier. No personal signature = buyer never got it thus a successful "item not received" case by the buyer!
Seller out the item and the buyer's money, a Schneider for the seller, a big goose egg.
2) The "rock in the box" return. Buyer doesn't like an item, starts a "not as described, materially different". The return is AUTOMATICALLY ACCEPTED by ebay and the amount of the funds associated for the sale put on hold in the seller's account, no two ways about it, no questions asked. The buyer is then directed to return the item to the seller and he supposedly does, getting a tracking number for the parcel. Now the moment the package is marked "received/delivered", the return is complete.
Now get this, many post offices don't even wait for a parcel with tracking to be delivered to a recipient before marking it as delivered. Some mark the tracking "received/delivered" AS SOON AS IT GETS TO THE POST OFFICE. Ebay will pick that up as delivered and consider it a complete, successful return BUT, in some cases it has not been delivered and the seller has not been given the chance to CONFIRM THAT THE ORIGINAL ITEM SENT TO THE BUYER IS THE SAME THING IN THE RETURN PARCEL!!
3-10) I'm not going to keep listing more scams that buyers use to routinely steal from sellers because the purpose here is not a tutorial on how to commit mail fraud.
My point is that when you sell through a reputable auction house or seller, THEY are responsible for leakage and fraud and you are paid for your item. For people who have experienced these seller nightmare scenarios, paying a little extra to assure you are paid for your item because your consignee assumes these risks as part of his vig may be an acceptable and fair added expense.
Once again, though, there are no "ebay seller fees" subtracted from the winning bid price for consignors before the percentage is paid. Robert67 posted the consignment rates above. And yes, the number of consignments would drop drastically if it did.
If that is the case, so what is PWCC's take after they pay the seller fees and remit payment to the consignor for the sale price minus their consignment fee? What's in it for PWCC? Crumbs? Can a consignor actually MAKE money on ebay if they have to pay their consignor's selling fees and not collect that off the top?
If I had to guess, I'd say PWCC seller fees are as low as 3%, maybe lower, so there is certainly profit to be made.
pwcc sells your card for $50k. 8% commission = $4000
fees incurred to psa by selling that $50k card:
ftv topped at $500 (maybe was even lower)
3% paypal fee = $1500 (maybe even lower)
total cost for them - $2k.
charge $4k in commish, only pay out $2k = $2k profit. x’s how many cards per month, per year? not bad for taking a couple of pics, creating a fancy description, storing for a month & not even having one red cent invested in the card. easier than being a real estate agent w half the hassle.
How does this impact the new eBay Price Guide and Collection tools? I'm sure historical sales from PWCC played some part in their statistical gathering...
If that is the case, so what is PWCC's take after they pay the seller fees and remit payment to the consignor for the sale price minus their consignment fee? What's in it for PWCC? Crumbs? Can a consignor actually MAKE money on ebay if they have to pay their consignor's selling fees and not collect that off the top?
5% on $150,000,0000 seems like a pretty good gig.
Add in another $1.00 in profit when shipping 50,000 items per month
And 1% on vault fees for everyone who is saving on taxes.
Ok. Need to know. How does the vault tax haven work. In two sentences or less?
m
Walker Proof Digital Album Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
Shipping address determines sales tax.
in NYS it is 8%
Ship to PWCC (Oregon) there is no sales tax shipped direct from a seller (add PWCC as addy in paypal).
No fee if your card is purchased from PWCC
1% curation fee if purchased elsewhere.
Note PWCC has monthly storage fees
Collecting PSA... FB,BK,HK,and BB HOF RC sets 1948-76 Topps FB Sets FB & BB HOF Player sets 1948-1993 NY Yankee Team Sets
If that is the case, so what is PWCC's take after they pay the seller fees and remit payment to the consignor for the sale price minus their consignment fee? What's in it for PWCC? Crumbs? Can a consignor actually MAKE money on ebay if they have to pay their consignor's selling fees and not collect that off the top?
Add in another $1.00 in profit when shipping 50,000 items per month
And 1% on vault fees for everyone who is saving on taxes.
Those crumbs turn into a mountain.
per the shipping, they are making much more than that. considering their shipping volume, i can assure you the get a very epic base rate discount. they still charge the base rate though. then lets talk shipping insurance. absolutely zero way they are paying anywhere near the rate joe blow pays when shipping. i would assume they have a comprehensive policy that covers all things pwcc. long story short, on a $50 shipping charge listed on ebay, they are prolly really only paying $18-20. tops. if not, hittem over the head w a tack hammer. so multiply anywhere from $5 - $50 profit per shipment x’s the number of shipments they make a year and we arent talking crumbs. we are talking harry crumb. and he was definitely a mountain of a man.
I took a day to take in all of the news and not overreact to this stunning event. IMHO PWCC has been a plus for my collecting. I look back at all of my purchases with them and I do not feel that I was shilled. When prices got too high I just got off the bid train and never chased the high. I will qualify that endorsement since I have not purchased as many cards from them since 2016 especially in the $1000+ market.
On the sell side, the returns I received from PWCC were superior to any other ebay consignor. While shilling may have been a factor, any consignor has the same issue. I believe the majority of the premium was because PWCC did the best job organizing, promoting, and presenting their listings. I know there are specific egregious cases out there, but I'm talking about my experience and the mid-high range stuff I consigned to them.
That being said, I had a large stack of cards that were destined for the Vault but a delayed PSA return shipment stopped me from sending it in. I think the grading Gods are looking out for me because I would NOT be comfortable sending my stuff into PWCC right now. I wonder if PWCC had wind of this with the rather long Free Vault promo and the online ad blitz.
My take is that Ebay did this because PWCC is leaving the platform. Based on how they treated the eommerceBytes couple, Ebay is a vindictive petty company. That culture goes beyond the few people that got busted.
To clarify my earlier statement as many think that eBay can just brush off a major seller like PWCC and have no pain at all in the matter.
eBay does not win here, PWCC does not win here. If eBay did this to Probstein it would crush them, not PWCC. They have already moved their biggest items to their Premier Auctions site.
The biggest loser is the guy who does not want to sell directly on eBay and loses them as a consigner for his $150-2000 card. He can switch gears and go with 4SCs but PWCC always yielded the most eyeballs and highest returns for most not all items.
I am not some big PWCC supporter, but I see this as just another in a recent history of bad moves by eBay in a category that they have dominated for 2 decades
Forcing sellers to use managed payments
Forcing returns on sellers
Taking away incentives to buy (eBay bucks) and incentives to sell (taking away power seller/preferred seller deals unless you agree to terms that I did not deem wise to accept)
Yes I agree as many attest to that PWCC has been involved with many shady things (Moser, shilling, etc) in the past 24 months and maybe eBay did not like the thin margins on their sales, but the timing is odd to say the least. They are losing ground in all aspects of their card sales to other sites (Myslabs, sportlots, 45Cs site, Amazon, Facebook, et others) and now they flushed their biggest player. 4SCs will probably win out pretty big here as well as Probstein. I have used their service on multiple occasions and find it pretty smooth. I will never use Probstein for all the horror stories I have heard about his organizational skills, but have no problem buying from them. I have never sold one thing via PWCC. I bought more from them 3-4 years ago, and have probably bought less than 5 cards from them since all the scandals were unearthed. All were lower value cards that only an idiot would try to alter to get a higher grade.
All this being said, I do not think PWCC needs eBay as badly as people think. I also think eBay will lose revenue over this, but that is a trend that has been occurring for a while now. That was my point the 2 decade reign of eBay being the go to location for Sports card buying is nearing if not at its end. That is my point. That is all. If you want to read into it that I am PWCC apologist or eBay hater go ahead. I deal with sales trends and markets for a living. Maybe eBay can reinvent themselves but I am highly skeptical.
@ndleo said:
On the sell side, the returns I received from PWCC were superior to any other ebay consignor. While shilling may have been a factor, any consignor has the same issue. I believe the majority of the premium was because PWCC did the best job organizing, promoting, and presenting their listings. I know there are specific egregious cases out there, but I'm talking about my experience and the mid-high range stuff I consigned to them.
That was my experience too. Sad that shilling was a part of the buying experience, but as a non-shiller who liked consigning, I will miss the avenue PWCC provided. The all-in ROI vs. doing it myself was very appealing.
Clearly eBay taking a preemptive strike against the big money auctions leaving their site now and all PWCC auctions leaving eventually.
Obviously, shill bidding is a part of any consignor on eBay doing business. I cannot believe that people don’t realize that. This is why one should always snipe.
The optics are horrible for PWCC, but I think aBay is not taking any sort of moral high road here.
Personally, I am in favor of PWCC long-term. If they fail, that is bad for the business overall.
i know a lot are scrambling looking for other possible avenues for consignment, my only advice as of now on what not to do is use pcsportscards. just for the time being. without going into too much detail, things are very unorganized right now. from covid, to office moves, to personnel probs, to a few other things too personal to them to bring up, the amount of delays, listing errors and unpaid listings (last few ran close to 20%). then after the long wait to get listed, the archaic accounting system (excel spreadsheet) is just as frustrating. a new user-portal has been promised for 6+ months to alleviate all these concerns and is starting to make goldins new auction format promises look good.
anyways, my goal isnt to beat them down. its to save anyone here from unnecessary headaches while scrambling as to what to do consignment-wise. they are good people over there, esp josh on the group sub side. the consignment side though is a wreck, understaffed, outdated and overstressed. and i only predict that it gets monumentally worse as they just reopened grading to consignment which means they are gonna get flooded with all the group subs cards going straight to being listed on ebay. its a nice service in theory. executing it has been their downfall. on my last graded consignment, 24 outta the 32 cards had wrong player names & card specifics. there was another card listed recently (not mine) that went for half of what it was worth because of simple spelling errors.
sometimes knowing what NOT to do is just as important as what to do.
@blurryface said:
i know a lot are scrambling looking for other possible avenues for consignment, my only advice as of now on what not to do is use pcsportscards. just for the time being. without going into too much detail, things are very unorganized right now. from covid, to office moves, to personnel probs, to a few other things too personal to them to bring up, the amount of delays, listing errors and unpaid listings (last few ran close to 20%). then after the long wait to get listed, the archaic accounting system (excel spreadsheet) is just as frustrating. a new user-portal has been promised for 6+ months to alleviate all these concerns and is starting to make goldins new auction format look good.
anyways, my goal isnt to beat them down. its to save anyone here from unnecessary headaches while scrambling as to what to do consignment-wise. they are good people over there, esp josh on the group sub side. the consignment side though is a wreck, understaffed, outdated and overstressed.
Thanks for the advice. I was leaning towards myslabs based on the other thread. I tried 4SC but the return was below average.
@blurryface said:
i know a lot are scrambling looking for other possible avenues for consignment, my only advice as of now on what not to do is use pcsportscards. just for the time being. without going into too much detail, things are very unorganized right now. from covid, to office moves, to personnel probs, to a few other things too personal to them to bring up, the amount of delays, listing errors and unpaid listings (last few ran close to 20%). then after the long wait to get listed, the archaic accounting system (excel spreadsheet) is just as frustrating. a new user-portal has been promised for 6+ months to alleviate all these concerns and is starting to make goldins new auction format look good.
anyways, my goal isnt to beat them down. its to save anyone here from unnecessary headaches while scrambling as to what to do consignment-wise. they are good people over there, esp josh on the group sub side. the consignment side though is a wreck, understaffed, outdated and overstressed.
Thanks for the advice. I was leaning towards myslabs based on the other thread. I tried 4SC but the return was below average.
i agree. i tried 4sc as a result of being disppointed w pcsportscards. i can not say enough about any and all things going smooth as can be with 4sc…except the realized prices.
Someone will fill the void and within a year we will see most of those cards back on E-Bay being consigned.
Opportunity for 4SC, Greg Morris or somebody else. Probstein will likely get overwhelmed.
Somebody with an infrastructure in a different hobby could move into cards (no idea if they even exist)
One of the large auction houses could start a new group that lists less prominent cards on EBay. (Memory Lane used to do this).
PWCC will have a following. Will see what percent of their business follows. I imagine those who list big $ items are more likely to follow because they can just list everything they want to all at once.
I am happy to never do a search again and see a card I am looking for only to see it is offered by that shady outfit. There are few in the hobby who care - so I am sure many will check out PWCCs auctions each month.
This will yield competition and there is an opportunity for someone to fill the void. Monthly EBay auctions with desirable graded cards organized in a logical way with great pictures was the combination that started PWCCs success. That is not impossible to replicate. However, it is harder than it seems because so far nobody else has.
There is a segment of hobbyists who will not pay a buyers premium. They will stick with EBay and many will never click on PWCCs website.
@brad31 said:
Someone will fill the void and within a year we will see most of those cards back on E-Bay being consigned.
Opportunity for 4SC, Greg Morris or somebody else. Probstein will likely get overwhelmed.
Somebody with an infrastructure in a different hobby could move into cards (no idea if they even exist)
One of the large auction houses could start a new group that lists less prominent cards on EBay. (Memory Lane used to do this).
PWCC will have a following. Will see what percent of their business follows. I imagine those who lost big $ items are more likely to follow because they can just list everything they want to all at once.
I am happy to never do a search again and see a card I am looking for only to see it is offered by that shady outfit. There are few in the hobby who care - so I am sure many will check out PWCCs auctions each month.
This will yield competition and there is an opportunity for someone to fill the void. Monthly EBay auctions with desirable graded cards organized in a logical way with great pictures was the combination that started PWCCs success. That is not impossible to replicate. However, it is harder than it seems because so far nobody else has.
There is a segment of hobbyists who will not pay a buyers premium. They will stick with EBay and many will never click on PWCCs website.
I agree with a lot of this. Only problem now is that eBay has the added tax premium that others do not, which makes it easier for some to justify the buyers premium when not being hit with the 10% sales tax.
Someone should fill the void. 4SCs is really poised to do it, I did not experience lesser returns when I listed but it may had to do of the timing at which I sold on each item I consigned.
Don’t have a horse in this race, but if any of these vault companies got in serious financial trouble, consignors cards would be at risk. Not saying it’s imminent, and definitely isn’t likely, but good luck getting your cards back as one or these companies was being liquidated. Examples of this in the wine business / offsite storage.
@fergie23 said:
craig44,
Why would you be worried about the PWCC vault? With Goldin offering a vault service as well, I see this space growing.
I think this is eBay punishing PWCC for starting their own auction service. If Probstein's auctions stay up, then we know this has nothing to actually do with shill bidding.
Comments
Good point. Let's always remember, To make something clean, something else has to get dirty. But, sometimes you can make EVERYTHING dirty without EVER making anything clean.
Here is the consignment table that is, for now, still on their site:
No, their percentage is based on the winning bid price, not the winning bid price less ebay seller fees.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
I have never consigned but i don;t think that is how it works based on all the emails I received from 4sharp's consignment business.
and to top it off what incentive is there to not sell it yourself if you pay all the fees and then pay them another 10%. they would never get the volume that they do
all i know is that the “shilling” excuse seems to have a ton of holes in theory.
It does seem that way. Typically, ebay will warn a seller if it detects likely shilling activity. There won't be a suspension, deletion of listings, or revocation. The seller will be directed to electronically page through an ebay site generated tutorial on the evils of shill bidding and why ebay and criminal authorities take a dim view of it. Upon completion of the tutorial, full rights of ebay membership are restored.
If at some future time, the seller repeats the shilling, then other actions will be taken by ebay, typically a 2 week suspension which may or may not include removal of listings for that 2 weeks, those transferred to completed listings so they can be relisted once the suspension time is completed. They also warn that it is against state (except Texas) and Federal law to shill bid on a national platform.
Then, if it occurs a third time, that's typically the end of the line for a seller. NARU, bon voyage, don't forget to write. Of course, most almost immediately start up another account under a family member's name and address, typically buying a new PC or device to eliminate the trail, as circumventing eBay's revocation is cause for immediate revocation.
I've actually read all the rules and guidelines. I even read the policy updates! Always good to check all the nuts and bolts of the platform you're standing on.
Excellent points supported by facts and not emotions. PWCC needs eBay - EBay does not need PWCC. This is not a big mystery and every collector knows what happened back in 2015-16. Massive shill bids and retractions by their friends in Alabama and Texas where bidder ID’s were well known, and when caught they said “we will coach those people doing this.” Really bad only refers to the number of collectors who paid more for cards than they should have due to their shenanigans.
pwcc only pays 4 percent in final value fees, same as apmex
This can't be good for the confidence of PWCC in the eyes of those that have cards there. I'm sure PWCC will find a way through this, but looks like they were caught completely unaware today.
That shiny new vault in Oregon may be a lot emptier in a few months.
PWCC is far, far from the only selling outfit where shilling is a problem. It is a deep rooted problem in the hobby, to be sure— one that hurts all collectors’ wallets. Yet whatever the true nature of the beef between eBay and PWCC, there are a lot of honest bidders and consigners who got screwed today by eBay. Auctions of cards that collectors were bidding on, gone. Cards that owners needed sold, money they may have needed in a timely manner, now held up in a tangled mess. eBay did not execute this in a manner that was considerate of all parties; they could have wound things down with better logistical planning. To zap everything in one day smacks to me of a punitive mentality— eBay was out to get PWCC, or distance itself from PWCC, and as long as that objective was accomplished in the swiftest and strongest manner, the effect on the thousands of auctions that were active was deemed acceptable collateral damage. eBay happily shafted lots of honest collector/buyers and owner/sellers in order to land a blindside punch on an enemy.
@DM23HOF ....It's punitive as PWCC looks to be moving to their own independent auction house Premier Auctions....
^ agreed, like and lol…for being brutally honest. punitive mentality = nail on the head.
The incentive? You get paid, no matter what. Say you sell on ebay and your buyer is dishonest. Among the many scams a buyer can attempt is/are:
1) "I never received the parcel". "That's not my signature on the USPS ledger"
This is now probably the #1 ebay buyer scam since Covid has enabled carriers from all companies to sign off and leave a parcel on a doorstep, EVEN IF USING SIGNATURE SERVICE.
So you have delivery registers marked, "JP C-19" and guess who signed for it? The carrier. No personal signature = buyer never got it thus a successful "item not received" case by the buyer!
Seller out the item and the buyer's money, a Schneider for the seller, a big goose egg.
2) The "rock in the box" return. Buyer doesn't like an item, starts a "not as described, materially different". The return is AUTOMATICALLY ACCEPTED by ebay and the amount of the funds associated for the sale put on hold in the seller's account, no two ways about it, no questions asked. The buyer is then directed to return the item to the seller and he supposedly does, getting a tracking number for the parcel. Now the moment the package is marked "received/delivered", the return is complete.
Now get this, many post offices don't even wait for a parcel with tracking to be delivered to a recipient before marking it as delivered. Some mark the tracking "received/delivered" AS SOON AS IT GETS TO THE POST OFFICE. Ebay will pick that up as delivered and consider it a complete, successful return BUT, in some cases it has not been delivered and the seller has not been given the chance to CONFIRM THAT THE ORIGINAL ITEM SENT TO THE BUYER IS THE SAME THING IN THE RETURN PARCEL!!
3-10) I'm not going to keep listing more scams that buyers use to routinely steal from sellers because the purpose here is not a tutorial on how to commit mail fraud.
My point is that when you sell through a reputable auction house or seller, THEY are responsible for leakage and fraud and you are paid for your item. For people who have experienced these seller nightmare scenarios, paying a little extra to assure you are paid for your item because your consignee assumes these risks as part of his vig may be an acceptable and fair added expense.
Once again, though, there are no "ebay seller fees" subtracted from the winning bid price for consignors before the percentage is paid. Robert67 posted the consignment rates above. And yes, the number of consignments would drop drastically if it did.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
FBI Priorities:
Protect against terrorist attacks
Investigate shill bidding on Ebay / PWCC
Impose consequences on cyber adversaries
I think it's a heck of a lot easier to detect shilling to whatever level you're confident enough to send a letter like this than to determine the occupations or exact identities of the alleged shillers.
If that is the case, so what is PWCC's take after they pay the seller fees and remit payment to the consignor for the sale price minus their consignment fee? What's in it for PWCC? Crumbs? Can a consignor actually MAKE money on ebay if they have to pay their consignor's selling fees and not collect that off the top?
I think it was PWCC's insane shipping charges that finally did them in.
That was one great reason to go with PWCC, because your total fees would be less than selling by yourself. Plus, they list the item and they take all the risk. And, they got great auction prices, most of the time. The downside is that you were at their mercy. Sometimes they took to long to list, sometimes, their auction listing title did not do your item justice, etc...
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Successful transactions on the BST boards with rtimmer, coincoins, gerard, tincup, tjm965, MMR, mission16, dirtygoldman, AUandAG, deadmunny, thedutymon, leadoff4, Kid4HOF03, BRI2327, colebear, mcholke, rpcolettrane, rockdjrw, publius, quik, kalinefan, Allen, JackWESQ, CON40, Griffeyfan2430, blue227, Tiggs2012, ndleo, CDsNuts, ve3rules, doh, MurphDawg, tennessebanker, and gene1978.
I had placed a bid on an auction item a few days ago, I now have nothing in my bid list in eBay.
I also had about 5 items of theirs in my watch list, they are gone too.
I did receive the PWCC email but not the eBay email.
PWCC, offer free returns of any current vault items "all the suckers you got with FREEVAULT, before the ban hammer. Like this guy over here. Offer free commission on the new completely LEGIT market place for current vault members. Ebay lower the fees on collectibles. Police your site, even a little. And someone make me some rainbow stew.
Last months JULY PWCC auction on ebay is yielding payments today 8/18/21~ has anyone gotten paid thus far??
Their recent negative feedbacks are fun to read.
In case you haven't seen the update, here is the latest post on the PWCC site regarding the current state of affairs from their operations perspective:
https://pwccmarketplace.com/faq
“Since March, our team of developers has been focused on building and improving the Premier Auction experience which is currently live and has always been independent of eBay.”
i thought i remember seeing that the premier auction was in conjunction of ebay and had their seal plastered on it? was i seeing things? anyone else remember seeing it?
I can definitely see that side of the coin for sure and innocent people are impacted without a doubt. You're right on about shilling being a problem throughout the hobby.
That said, I think eBay might say they protected those same honest bidders and consignors from being manipulated in this current auction by ending it. If eBay has information of shill bidding, and they've been performing the forensic analysis to arrive at that conclusion, they should act on that as soon as they are convinced there were issues. As a matter of fact, they may have evidence that shill bidding was already occurring for items in this current auction. I fully expect another class action lawsuit to be filed on this issue (there is already one out there from a few years ago). Had eBay known this was going on, and decided to let these auctions finish, while later it was proven that they knew shill bidding was going on in some of these auctions, they opened up a liability for themselves.
I don't think they had a choice but to act as soon as they were sure - and that absolutely impacted a lot of innocent folks. In the end, it's the cheaters that are to blame for this, not eBay, IMHO.
Steve
The Doomsday Collection
Dallas Cowboys Ring of Honor | All-Time Dallas Cowboys | Bob Lilly Master | Pro Football HOF Dallas Cowboys
Interesting to see how many listings are left that spam the name PWCC in their item listing title. Curious to see if that practice continues being an advantageous rule violation (presumably increases quantity of item views), or if it instead moves towards something that harms the seller's efforts.
“What happens when somebody is caught placing a bid they don't intend to honor, known as shill bidding?
Our Marketplace Trust team is extremely proactive in monitoring bidding. We have placed permanent blocks on any bidder who does not pay. Refer to the Marketplace Tenets for more details on our monitoring procedures.”
so is honoring a bid not considered shilling? genuinely asking.
some call it a “hidden reserve”, some call it “id buy every card at that price whether its my consignment or not” or some call it “pushing the bid to document a record sales price”.
obviously different perspectives but with the bolded text above, i guess im asking is it still ever considered a shill bid if you do honor a bid you placed no matter what? curious as to what the overall consensus is there…
Both PWCC and Probstein commission rates include ebay fees.
For high dollar cards PWCC charges 8%. I have heard from reliable sources they actually pay ebay about 4%
IMHO PWCC doesn't need ebay and will survive. The vault has been a haven for buyers to escape sales tax on big dollar cards. They have been doing this for a while now and just took in $100 Mill in card value over the national. Now you can send cards for free there if over $250.
They are gaining control of the high value cards everyone is afraid to sell on their own with ebay policies.
1948-76 Topps FB Sets
FB & BB HOF Player sets
1948-1993 NY Yankee Team Sets
One would assume that Ebay must have had its ducks in a row in order to send out any type of general email accusing PWCC of shill bidding.
"Hey Bob, you may want to run that by legal before sending that out."
What happens to Auctions that were completed and paid for (prior to the shut down -- even earlier from let's say the beginning of the year)? So if eBay can prove shill bidding in Auctions completed in March, will they offer compensation to the buyers? (and then make PWCC pay eBay a penalty or shilling fee)? I am assuming eBay has a bunch of money from completed auctions before the shutdown -- maybe they can draw on those funds?
its ebay, i dont know for sure…but my initial inkling is “of course not. its ebay”
Not sure if any of you heard but
PROBSTEIN123 is actively accepting CONSIGNMENTS !!
If I had to guess, I'd say PWCC seller fees are as low as 3%, maybe lower, so there is certainly profit to be made.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
Think of the mess that would be created if this happend to problemstein good luck ever seeing your stuff
pwcc sells your card for $50k. 8% commission = $4000
fees incurred to psa by selling that $50k card:
ftv topped at $500 (maybe was even lower)
3% paypal fee = $1500 (maybe even lower)
total cost for them - $2k.
charge $4k in commish, only pay out $2k = $2k profit. x’s how many cards per month, per year? not bad for taking a couple of pics, creating a fancy description, storing for a month & not even having one red cent invested in the card. easier than being a real estate agent w half the hassle.
How does this impact the new eBay Price Guide and Collection tools? I'm sure historical sales from PWCC played some part in their statistical gathering...
5% on $150,000,0000 seems like a pretty good gig.
Add in another $1.00 in profit when shipping 50,000 items per month
And 1% on vault fees for everyone who is saving on taxes.
Those crumbs turn into a mountain.
Ok. Need to know. How does the vault tax haven work. In two sentences or less?
m
Fellas, leave the tight pants to the ladies. If I can count the coins in your pockets you better use them to call a tailor. Stay thirsty my friends......
Shipping address determines sales tax.
in NYS it is 8%
Ship to PWCC (Oregon) there is no sales tax shipped direct from a seller (add PWCC as addy in paypal).
No fee if your card is purchased from PWCC
1% curation fee if purchased elsewhere.
Note PWCC has monthly storage fees
1948-76 Topps FB Sets
FB & BB HOF Player sets
1948-1993 NY Yankee Team Sets
per the shipping, they are making much more than that. considering their shipping volume, i can assure you the get a very epic base rate discount. they still charge the base rate though. then lets talk shipping insurance. absolutely zero way they are paying anywhere near the rate joe blow pays when shipping. i would assume they have a comprehensive policy that covers all things pwcc. long story short, on a $50 shipping charge listed on ebay, they are prolly really only paying $18-20. tops. if not, hittem over the head w a tack hammer. so multiply anywhere from $5 - $50 profit per shipment x’s the number of shipments they make a year and we arent talking crumbs. we are talking harry crumb. and he was definitely a mountain of a man.
I took a day to take in all of the news and not overreact to this stunning event. IMHO PWCC has been a plus for my collecting. I look back at all of my purchases with them and I do not feel that I was shilled. When prices got too high I just got off the bid train and never chased the high. I will qualify that endorsement since I have not purchased as many cards from them since 2016 especially in the $1000+ market.
On the sell side, the returns I received from PWCC were superior to any other ebay consignor. While shilling may have been a factor, any consignor has the same issue. I believe the majority of the premium was because PWCC did the best job organizing, promoting, and presenting their listings. I know there are specific egregious cases out there, but I'm talking about my experience and the mid-high range stuff I consigned to them.
That being said, I had a large stack of cards that were destined for the Vault but a delayed PSA return shipment stopped me from sending it in. I think the grading Gods are looking out for me because I would NOT be comfortable sending my stuff into PWCC right now. I wonder if PWCC had wind of this with the rather long Free Vault promo and the online ad blitz.
My take is that Ebay did this because PWCC is leaving the platform. Based on how they treated the eommerceBytes couple, Ebay is a vindictive petty company. That culture goes beyond the few people that got busted.
To clarify my earlier statement as many think that eBay can just brush off a major seller like PWCC and have no pain at all in the matter.
eBay does not win here, PWCC does not win here. If eBay did this to Probstein it would crush them, not PWCC. They have already moved their biggest items to their Premier Auctions site.
The biggest loser is the guy who does not want to sell directly on eBay and loses them as a consigner for his $150-2000 card. He can switch gears and go with 4SCs but PWCC always yielded the most eyeballs and highest returns for most not all items.
I am not some big PWCC supporter, but I see this as just another in a recent history of bad moves by eBay in a category that they have dominated for 2 decades
Yes I agree as many attest to that PWCC has been involved with many shady things (Moser, shilling, etc) in the past 24 months and maybe eBay did not like the thin margins on their sales, but the timing is odd to say the least. They are losing ground in all aspects of their card sales to other sites (Myslabs, sportlots, 45Cs site, Amazon, Facebook, et others) and now they flushed their biggest player. 4SCs will probably win out pretty big here as well as Probstein. I have used their service on multiple occasions and find it pretty smooth. I will never use Probstein for all the horror stories I have heard about his organizational skills, but have no problem buying from them. I have never sold one thing via PWCC. I bought more from them 3-4 years ago, and have probably bought less than 5 cards from them since all the scandals were unearthed. All were lower value cards that only an idiot would try to alter to get a higher grade.
All this being said, I do not think PWCC needs eBay as badly as people think. I also think eBay will lose revenue over this, but that is a trend that has been occurring for a while now. That was my point the 2 decade reign of eBay being the go to location for Sports card buying is nearing if not at its end. That is my point. That is all. If you want to read into it that I am PWCC apologist or eBay hater go ahead. I deal with sales trends and markets for a living. Maybe eBay can reinvent themselves but I am highly skeptical.
That was my experience too. Sad that shilling was a part of the buying experience, but as a non-shiller who liked consigning, I will miss the avenue PWCC provided. The all-in ROI vs. doing it myself was very appealing.
Bosox1976
Clearly eBay taking a preemptive strike against the big money auctions leaving their site now and all PWCC auctions leaving eventually.
Obviously, shill bidding is a part of any consignor on eBay doing business. I cannot believe that people don’t realize that. This is why one should always snipe.
The optics are horrible for PWCC, but I think aBay is not taking any sort of moral high road here.
Personally, I am in favor of PWCC long-term. If they fail, that is bad for the business overall.
i know a lot are scrambling looking for other possible avenues for consignment, my only advice as of now on what not to do is use pcsportscards. just for the time being. without going into too much detail, things are very unorganized right now. from covid, to office moves, to personnel probs, to a few other things too personal to them to bring up, the amount of delays, listing errors and unpaid listings (last few ran close to 20%). then after the long wait to get listed, the archaic accounting system (excel spreadsheet) is just as frustrating. a new user-portal has been promised for 6+ months to alleviate all these concerns and is starting to make goldins new auction format promises look good.
anyways, my goal isnt to beat them down. its to save anyone here from unnecessary headaches while scrambling as to what to do consignment-wise. they are good people over there, esp josh on the group sub side. the consignment side though is a wreck, understaffed, outdated and overstressed. and i only predict that it gets monumentally worse as they just reopened grading to consignment which means they are gonna get flooded with all the group subs cards going straight to being listed on ebay. its a nice service in theory. executing it has been their downfall. on my last graded consignment, 24 outta the 32 cards had wrong player names & card specifics. there was another card listed recently (not mine) that went for half of what it was worth because of simple spelling errors.
sometimes knowing what NOT to do is just as important as what to do.
Thanks for the advice. I was leaning towards myslabs based on the other thread. I tried 4SC but the return was below average.
i agree. i tried 4sc as a result of being disppointed w pcsportscards. i can not say enough about any and all things going smooth as can be with 4sc…except the realized prices.
Someone will fill the void and within a year we will see most of those cards back on E-Bay being consigned.
Opportunity for 4SC, Greg Morris or somebody else. Probstein will likely get overwhelmed.
Somebody with an infrastructure in a different hobby could move into cards (no idea if they even exist)
One of the large auction houses could start a new group that lists less prominent cards on EBay. (Memory Lane used to do this).
PWCC will have a following. Will see what percent of their business follows. I imagine those who list big $ items are more likely to follow because they can just list everything they want to all at once.
I am happy to never do a search again and see a card I am looking for only to see it is offered by that shady outfit. There are few in the hobby who care - so I am sure many will check out PWCCs auctions each month.
This will yield competition and there is an opportunity for someone to fill the void. Monthly EBay auctions with desirable graded cards organized in a logical way with great pictures was the combination that started PWCCs success. That is not impossible to replicate. However, it is harder than it seems because so far nobody else has.
There is a segment of hobbyists who will not pay a buyers premium. They will stick with EBay and many will never click on PWCCs website.
I agree with a lot of this. Only problem now is that eBay has the added tax premium that others do not, which makes it easier for some to justify the buyers premium when not being hit with the 10% sales tax.
Someone should fill the void. 4SCs is really poised to do it, I did not experience lesser returns when I listed but it may had to do of the timing at which I sold on each item I consigned.
Don’t have a horse in this race, but if any of these vault companies got in serious financial trouble, consignors cards would be at risk. Not saying it’s imminent, and definitely isn’t likely, but good luck getting your cards back as one or these companies was being liquidated. Examples of this in the wine business / offsite storage.