Here is what I have realized -----> When you sell on eBay and use PayPal you end up paying even more that you think and here is why: You list your item for $10 and it costs you $3 to ship it. You study everything well and you figure it will cost you 9% of the sale price to pay eBay (this does not include listing fees) and 2.9% + $.30 that will go PayPal. Totaling these will give you11.9%. You do the math and finally figure that it will cost you $1.19 to do this transaction and you will end up with $8.81 ($10 - $1.19 = $8.81). You decide this is good enough and so with a sigh you proceed. You sell your item, get paid with PayPal, buy and print your shipping label, and send off the item you sold. You think all is well until you go look at your PayPal account and you see $9.32.
Here is what has happened so far: Paypal collected $13 from your buyer. They charge you $.68 for the transaction ($13 x 2.9% + $.30 = .68) and deduct $3.00 that you paid for shipping. So . . . 13 - 3 - .68 = $9.32
You immdedately think that's not so bad and so you go list another item. Where is the problem? YOU HAVEN'T PAID eBay YET! You have already paid fees on the $9.21 in your account but you have to pay them again. eBay will invoice you monthly and they will charge you 9% of the sale price for final value fees, so in this case, $10 x 9% = .90. When you subtract that from what you see in your account you end up with $8.42.
THE TOTAL YOU PAID TO COMPLETE THE TRANSACTION IS $1.58 or 15.8% !!!!!!!!!!!! Surprise!
The worse part of all this is that a substantial part of what you pay for every transaction is actually fees on postage and fees on fees! OUCH!
