eBay Canada bowed down to CRA

Bad news for eBayers in Canada, as eBay Canada announced that they received a court-authorized requirement from Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) that requires the account information and sales data of Canadian resident eBay members who meet the following criteria:

• Sales of more than $20,000 and at least 24 sales transactions in any of the calendar years 2006, 2007 or 2008, (irrespective of membership in eBay’s PowerSeller program); OR
• Sales of more than $100,000 in any of the calendar years 2006, 2007 or 2008, regardless of the number of sales transactions.

So if you have received a letter from eBay titled as “eBay to comply with Canada Revenue Agency request”, congratulation, you finally have made yourself to the CRA’s list.

Oh, what about privacy? Forget it! When it comes to Government and Money, who cares about privacy!!

You better check here if you are a serious eBayer or a serious eBayer wanna-be.

New Seller updates on eBay

Just received an email from eBay informing me that there are some new seller updates coming in June. I quickly took look at them. Most of them are quite positive, at least from a seller’s point of view. Here are some of them that I think are very good move.

The new eBay item page

The new eBay item page includes 4 important changes:

• Bigger, better pictures, with photo zoom coming later this summer
• Real-time countdown timer for Auction-style listings
• Key information right upfront
• Cross-merchandising: Sellers’ relevant listings show up on other each other’s item pages.

New eBay product pages

A new way to get your products more exposure to the buyers. See more details here.

List items with multiple variations such as size and colors

A new type of multi-qty fixed price listing that will allow sellers to consolidate variations of a product in one low-cost listing. Very useful. Unfortunately, it will be only available in Men’s and Women’s shoes first and other Clothing, Shoes, & Accessories later. Not include the products I am selling.

Package tracking info

Package tracking links right from My eBay—print labels on PayPal and tracking links will show up automatically, or you can upload your own tracking information.

Return policy and handling time

It will be required in the listing in June. However, the deadline for updating your Good ‘Til Cancelled listings extended to mid-September.

Customize item specifics

To help make sure interested buyers find your listings, eBay is now making it possible to create your own Item Specifics when the current choices don’t cover your item.  However, it also suggested that always use the eBay item specific choices first, and add your own only when there are no appropriate alternatives.

Seller manager will be free to all sellers

Good news for the small sellers but doesn’t impact the ones who have the eBay store because there is no overlap here.

Check and Money Order will be banned

That means all transactions will have to go through Paypal. There will be no other way around. Good and smart move, eBay.

Overall, it doesn’t look like as big as they did last year but these certainly are the good changes to the sellers. Hopefully, they keep that way and think about sellers a little bit more, IMO.

You can also see the full coverage from the following link.

http://pages.ebay.ca/sell/April2009Update/Overview/