FEES, including taxes for selling Canada to the U.S. hit almost 20% of actual selling price of item

[shallow_karl]

A $100 item shipped for $25.00 to the U.S. will incur fees of around $24.62 (19.7%) because despite the blamket claim of 13.6% fees on "selling" prices, the fees levied on shipping, foreign shipments and taxes (both paid by customer and seller) boost the actual cost of selling to 20%.  It works out better for costlier items, as cheap items are hit harder and cheap items carry the same listing cost as higher-priced items.  Must make it hard for commodity-based products with lower prices and low margins to be profitable at all?

Add-on the percentage charged when Ebay sends money to a bank, converting it from U.S. to Canadian and including the listing prices, the percentage is even higher.  I wonder if Ebay will add another fee if they have to collect tariffs?

[marnotom!]

It’s stated quite clearly on this eBay help page that final value fees are “calculated as a percentage of the total amount of the sale, plus a per order fee”:

https://www.ebay.ca/help/selling/fees-credits-invoices/selling-fees-managed-payments-sellers?id=4822

I don’t know about you, but if a friend offered me twenty-five bucks to list, sell and ship a $100 widget of his on eBay, I’d hold out for a better offer. $25 isn’t worth all the time and energy I’d have to put in.