eBay is close to announcing its first Seller Release of 2011, and changes to shipping are on the agenda. eBay is beefing up its label-printing functionality and will add FedEx to the carriers it supports, according to Sanjay Sethi in an interview on eBay Radio this week.
Currently eBay's shipping calculator supports USPS and UPS, and sellers have long complained about the absence of FedEx from its calculated shipping. Sethi said Tuesday that eBay would add Fed Ex "very soon." eBay's Shipping Calculator allows sellers to enter information about their products so that U.S. shoppers visiting a product page can see the exact shipping cost they would pay for that item.
Sethi also said eBay will add bulk label printing in April and would add First Class Mail International to eBay label printing soon after that.
During the holidays, eBay was able to extend its buying season by one day last year by persuading the USPS to give it estimated delivery times and then displaying actual delivery dates instead of the number of days. When seeing "5 business days" in a listing, "the math was too much for some buyers," according to Sethi.
When asked how accurate the delivery dates were, Sethi said "there is definitely room for improvement" and said eBay would make it much more realistic for sellers in 2011.
Despite the veiled criticism of the postal service in the interview, the USPS signed a new, five-year contract with eBay last month to provide online tools and marketing programs to help millions of small businesses. The new Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe said in a press statement,, "Our alliance with eBay continues to strengthen and grow. This new contract builds on the trust the eBay community has invested in us as their leading shipper of choice."
In his interview, eBay's Sethi said that, in October 2010, 45% of items sold on eBay.com had tracking, and by the end of 2010, it was at 61%. "That number had not changed in years," he said. eBay's philosophy is that each seller is a fulfillment service or warehouse, he said, and eBay needs to give sellers the tools they need.
Also of interest to online sellers, ShipRush posted on its blog that the USPS is changing the text "Delivery Confirmation" on shipping labels to say "Tracking Number" instead. The change will happen in the next week or so, and the postal service will display more scans for each package, instead of just one delivery scan.
The USPS has reportedly mandated that its workers scan each package as part of a new policy.
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