kcatthedog
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Post by kcatthedog on Dec 21, 2020 13:46:13 GMT -6
Hey,
I had some stuff on GS for a few months; nada, so listed on Reverb yesterday, sold 3 things already, so that is great.
But the reverb fees just never stop, and the CS explanation is so confusing, doesn't actually seem to make sense, like I was told the buyer pays the tax but I see a remittance charge in my invoice,
selling fee payment processing fee xborder fee payout fee currency exchange
Nice to sell but this was like 10-15% plus shipping costs, get this, they charge you a fee on the shipping cost, even though the service is provided by another company ?
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Post by svart on Dec 21, 2020 14:57:26 GMT -6
Hey, I had some stuff on GS for a few months; nada, so listed on Reverb yesterday, sold 3 things already, so that is great. But the reverb fees just never stop, and the CS explanation is so confusing, doesn't actually seem to make sense, like I was told the buyer pays the tax but I see a remittance charge in my invoice, selling fee payment processing fee xborder fee payout fee currency exchange Nice to sell but this was like 10-15% plus shipping costs, get this, they charge you a fee on the shipping cost, even though the service is provided by another company ? Just think of them as taxes and it'll be ok.. lol
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Post by Bat Lanyard on Dec 21, 2020 15:12:00 GMT -6
Yeah, several years back it was 3% or something. That's all crept up to "better than Ebay" status. The taxes thing sucks balls for sure.
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kcatthedog
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Post by kcatthedog on Dec 21, 2020 16:12:51 GMT -6
Ballpark the fees and shipping cost me at least 20%, but you can’t exactly inflate your asking price by 20%, buyers were automatically apparently discounting their offer by at least the estimated shipping price.
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Post by hadaja on Dec 21, 2020 19:05:55 GMT -6
First thing Etsy does when they buy a place is look at reviewing the fee structure. So be prepared for more changes with Reverb. Payment method will be next.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 21, 2020 22:52:53 GMT -6
Still better than the Discogs shipping policy. The Discogs owners are techbro douchebags who wanted to be the Amazon prime of records.
Sorry tech bros, I’m not shipping a rare record or cd based on weight and I’m not even taking credit card or PayPal payments for rare items, some valuable because they were signed by deceased persons or people banned by the INS from the USA, to even most of the Western world. Many countries have pesky customs fees the naive buyer of a 50 to 500 dollar record might decide not to pay, leaving me without the item. All the old days where people, contacted the seller, and bought cheap CDs to get to the shipping weight for country to country are over. I used to buy and sell boxes of CDs across the Atlantic.
Everyone in world being able to get the exact master and pressing of whatever title they want, no matter how rare is over so yuppies can get used copies of Rumours or Nevermind with the Brave New World deliveries of dog food, plastic crap, Panera Bread, and direct to video content. Pretty soon we will have to eat the dog food.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 21, 2020 22:59:13 GMT -6
I don’t want to derail this too much but that cut is fucking insane for expensive gear. What’s to stop a private sale or marking it up for reverb? Or is marking it up compared to a forum classified against the rules?
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Post by OtisGreying on Dec 21, 2020 23:33:57 GMT -6
I don’t want to derail this too much but that cut is fucking insane for expensive gear. What’s to stop a private sale or marking it up for reverb? Or is marking it up compared to a forum classified against the rules? Nothing. Reverb is a total scam for selling expensive gear, 7.7% is ridiculous for a fancy craigslist, it's literally just a website, and the buyer always has the power so they don't have to deal with any headaches. I will always mark up my gear to compensate for their greedy fees If I'm selling there. Then if selling on Craigslist or others with no fee's adjust the price down.
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Post by Bat Lanyard on Dec 21, 2020 23:50:58 GMT -6
I don’t want to derail this too much but that cut is fucking insane for expensive gear. What’s to stop a private sale or marking it up for reverb? Or is marking it up compared to a forum classified against the rules? Agree with you, man. But like the OP said, crickets for months and then sales in three days. Because of the fee increase and the tax add-on though, I've been paying more attention to the classifieds. Picked up a mic today that was a great deal to me and a great sales savings to the owner, added plus that the seller is a really solid person. I would call it yet another great thing about RGO. Seriously.
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kcatthedog
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Post by kcatthedog on Dec 21, 2020 23:59:09 GMT -6
I am glad to make the sale but losing 20% and paying shipping are big cuts. The buyers are paying shipping by taking it out of their offer so in effect the seller is paying or losing money. Plus they include the shipping costs in the total used for each % cut.
you can set whatever price you want.
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Post by Bat Lanyard on Dec 22, 2020 0:25:02 GMT -6
I am glad to make the sale but losing 20% and paying shipping are big cuts. The buyers are paying shipping by taking it out of their offer so in effect the seller is paying or losing money. Plus they include the shipping costs in the total used for each % cut. you can set whatever price you want. At the same time, you get a fast sale and it is what it is. I've always thought this idea that you can sell a unit for 80% of what you paid for it a bit of a luxury.
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kcatthedog
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Post by kcatthedog on Dec 22, 2020 2:53:54 GMT -6
I am glad to make the sale but losing 20% and paying shipping are big cuts. The buyers are paying shipping by taking it out of their offer so in effect the seller is paying or losing money. Plus they include the shipping costs in the total used for each % cut. you can set whatever price you want. At the same time, you get a fast sale and it is what it is. I've always thought this idea that you can sell a unit for 80% of what you paid for it a bit of a luxury. Agreed grateful for that, I find you are lucky to get 40-50%, even mint good gear, so if Reverb takes 20% and buyers discount their low offers to offset shipping, you can do the math. Anyway, I needed the dough, 2012 computer is dieing etc. And I wasn’t using this gear so made sense to move it, now I easily have enuff for a new Mac mini, but may pay my mortgage penalty to break it, as the savings with lower % rate would triple my return over the next 18 months and put like $250 of found money monthly in my pocket: always good to keep things in perspective, there’s always more gear!
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Post by nick8801 on Dec 22, 2020 5:34:19 GMT -6
Reverb came out as a response to eBay and their ridiculous selling fees. It would be cool if another site popped up soon. I’m sure it will happen. If I had tech bro connections and some capital I would make one.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 22, 2020 5:50:26 GMT -6
^ I don't know it could be a very niche market to start another and i would imagine the overheads can be quite high with premises , staff , insurance , banking , online costs , marketing etc. Maybe this is why they sold the company to Etsy ? I remember Reverb started a vinyl arm to compete with Discogs
which was closed by Etsy once they purchased the company.
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kcatthedog
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Post by kcatthedog on Dec 22, 2020 6:06:32 GMT -6
Ya, feel for you bender, it’s painfully obvious how the ebays, PayPal’s and reverbs of the world see this as just an opportunity to squeeze your margins for them, to take way too much for their actual service, which is really pretty minimal. To hold your money, invested for a few days, pay you no interest for essentially a short term loan etc., etc.
The only consolation is selling if you are really motivated to sell.
I still don’t get as a non resident why I am paying state taxes other than being gouged, I consume no service, and the business and it’s employees that do, pay their taxes: its just a cash grab.
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Post by nick8801 on Dec 22, 2020 6:41:56 GMT -6
Also, I’ve found that if I get buyers on Reverb who are local (within 2-3 hours or so from me), most have been willing to do pickup for cash. I know it doesn’t cover either of us if there is an issue, but if I’m selling a high priced piece of gear, it saves both of us a lot of coin. I know that’s technically breaking the rules of Reverb, but I think we all agree they are not exactly out for our best interests at all times either. I just make sure I get to talk to these people on the phone a bit first. Most are very cool and appreciate the hook up.
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Post by EmRR on Dec 22, 2020 7:55:56 GMT -6
Yeah Bender, most of what you say mirrors my experience restoring and racking vintage preamps years ago. As soon as I’d get a production method down for a certain piece, there were always a couple hobbyist types who’d come in with something so cheap they couldn’t have been making minimum wage. But they were having fun! And building cred! None of them kept it up, but it shut me down. It’s an age old story.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 22, 2020 8:56:09 GMT -6
^ I don't know it could be a very niche market to start another and i would imagine the overheads can be quite high with premises , staff , insurance , banking , online costs , marketing etc. Maybe this is why they sold the company to Etsy ? I remember Reverb started a vinyl arm to compete with Discogs
which was closed by Etsy once they purchased the company. I’m sure they are pissed now because Discogs just shot itself in the face with the mandatory automatic shipping policy per country and weight
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Post by Deleted on Dec 22, 2020 9:34:51 GMT -6
Yeah Bender, most of what you say mirrors my experience restoring and racking vintage preamps years ago. As soon as I’d get a production method down for a certain piece, there were always a couple hobbyist types who’d come in with something so cheap they couldn’t have been making minimum wage. But they were having fun! And building cred! None of them kept it up, but it shut me down. It’s an age old story. That’s a big problem because it’s pretty much impossible for a hobbyist to restore or build a diy clone of many pieces correctly. Especially if they don’t know the internal calibrations and part tolerances. They often make it deliberately warmed over and distorted because it’s “vintage.” So there’s a crap ton of awful “RCA“ and “Western Electric“ tube gear I’ve heard, not to mention “SSL”, “TAB”, “Luxman”, 1970s “Sony” and others. For foreign vintage gear (there’s a lot of it for tubes and hifi) it’s the point where if they’re not a tech/ee who’s fluent in the native language of the service manual, they have issues even making it sound good and not like current bad tube gear and “bad warm” audiophile solid state hifi gear
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Post by ericn on Dec 22, 2020 14:54:24 GMT -6
Reverb came out as a response to eBay and their ridiculous selling fees. It would be cool if another site popped up soon. I’m sure it will happen. If I had tech bro connections and some capital I would make one. There will be somebody at some point who see’s the niche and then they will get bought out fees will go up, and somebody new will fill the void and the cycle will continue..... The thing is for so many of these newer enterprises the goal isn’t to operate at a decent profit, it’s to cash out when either somebody big or some private equity firm comes a knocking .
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Post by plinker on Dec 22, 2020 17:07:33 GMT -6
Years ago, back when the fees were small and Reverb was challenging Ebay's policies, I called Reverb and spoke with someone who was very helpful with my problem.
Now that the fees are much higher, the customer service and policies must really be incredible!
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Post by svart on Dec 22, 2020 17:15:20 GMT -6
Blows my mind that folks will readily pay 40-60% of their incomes in state/local/federal/sales taxes but balk at rising fees on a site they can avoid
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Post by kcatthedog on Dec 22, 2020 17:48:12 GMT -6
I think you are misinterpreting my point ?
Or I have been unclear, if you purchased something new plus shipping that represents the 100%, if listing on reverb costs you 20% of what the buyer pays and if that is 40% or so of retail, then reverb proportionately is doing very well for little investment.
I am progressively worried about my 2012 mbp and have opportunity to do some mortgage refinancing, local sites like Kijiji are a waste of time for anything except crap gear, and these items sat on fs for 3 months with no response. I listed on reverb as a test and immediately sold 3 of 4 items, so that’s good, but this is my first listing under its new fee regime , so am co concerned about total costs and this all happened fast over weekend when you couldn’t get answers to questions, so thought better to hold my nose and sell. To me, the most egregious fee are the taxes and the multiple $ fees and cross border fees, how do they represents costs to reverb?
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Post by OtisGreying on Dec 22, 2020 17:49:38 GMT -6
Blows my mind that folks will readily pay 40-60% of their incomes in state/local/federal/sales taxes but balk at rising fees on a site they can avoid Paying sales tax which is legally required by law is zero reason to restrain from critiquing a company getting greedy, like what? They inflated their selling fee's outside of just adding sales tax.
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Post by kcatthedog on Dec 22, 2020 18:13:00 GMT -6
I think he was referring to my comments: re: Paying state tax as a citizen of another country. This and exchange rates and all the other bogus reverb fees will just cause me not to use reverb, so the state loses those revenues and the business pays the price in lost business. I don’t see how that benefits the US business or the state?
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