Posted on 26 June 2008 by Gary H
If you use the standard mileage calculation for deducting your automobile expenses for your eBay business on your tax return the IRS has some good news for you. Due to higher gas prices, the IRS has announced an increase from $.505 a mile to $.585 a mile for all non-remibursed business mileage driven after July 1, 2008.
The old rate of $.505 will still apply to mileage driven during the first half of 2008.
Photograph by Michael R. Johnson.
Popularity: 18% [?]
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Posted on 13 May 2008 by Gary H
Intentionally or not, eBay is providing a window into how your feedback percentage may change once their new Feedback 2.0 is rolled out in the US.
Feedback 2.0 has recently been launched in Australia. You can see how what changes may be in store for your feedback percentage by using eBay Australia. Here’s how to check.
Go to eBay Australia. Using the “Advanced Search” link in the upper right hand corner, do a search for “Items By Seller” inputing your eBay ID. Click your feedback rating at the top of the resulting page, and you will be able to see what your feedback percentage would be today under the new Feedback 2.0.
Under the system currently used in the US, my percentage is 99.9%. Under Feedback 2.0 it drops to 99.7%. Not a huge difference, but there are reports of some seller’s percentages dropping by as much as 2-3%.
As might be expected, as this becomes wider known, most of what you hear about this is going to be negative. However, it’s important to realize that for every seller who sees a decrease in their feedback percentage there will likely be another seller who sees an increase in theirs.
Kudos to Randy Smythe of My Blog Utopia for the heads up on this.
Photograph by absolutwade.
Popularity: 48% [?]
Posted on 16 April 2008 by Gary H
Earlier this afternoon eBay released their 1st quarter earning report for 2008. For the fun of it I thought it would be interesting to do some digging and post the 1st quarter stats for The Auction Rebel.
One thing quickly became clear. eBay certainly doesn’t need to worry that the blog is going to replace them in either earnings or popularity any time soon.
So without further ado, here the The Auction Rebel’s stats for the 1st quarter of 2008.
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Popularity: 27% [?]
Posted on 19 February 2008 by Gary H
eBay is currently testing a revised listing template in the US and UK. Reportedly, is is currently being tested on 0.25% of US listings and 2.0% of UK listings. So far I’ve only found one live listing utilizing the new template.
While I’m not impressed with it, currently it’s being tested on only a very small number of listings and eBay has already admitted they are having some problems with it, so I’m sure there will be some changes made before they implement it site wide.
There are two features that I’m sure are going cause another firestorm similar to that just created by the recently announced policy changes.
The first is the new “Meet The Seller” module which looks like this:
Nothing wrong with that. But, now lets look at what the module looks like when the seller’s DSRs have fallen below what eBay considers to be minimum standards.
Note the text in red. For sellers who haven’t already taken steps to improve their DSR scores this is sure to provide some impetus. It’s also going to add fuel to the firestorm still going on over eBay’s recently announced policy changes.
The second is the new tabbed module right below the “Meet The Seller” module. Currently four tabs are displayed - “Description”, “Shipping & Payment”, “Related Items”, and “Buy Safely”.
The “Related Items” tab is sure to create considerable controversy with sellers. While it seems to display a seller’s other listings, below that displays listings from other sellers.
Kind of like going into the local Chevrolet dealer to look at Silverado pickups and having the salesman drive you across town to look at a competitor’s Ford F-150s after he’s shown you a Chevy or two.
For those who think eBay’s management is still a few buffalo short of a herd, this isn’t going to do anything to change their minds.
Photograph by Hey Paul.
Popularity: 24% [?]
Posted on 11 February 2008 by Gary H
Long-time reader, and fellow eBay blogger, Walt Kolenda - aka Auction Wally - has asked if I would be a guest on his recently launched on radio show Auctionwally Radio and I’ve taken him up on the offer.
The show will air live tomorrow evening, Tuesday February 12, 2008, at 8 PM EST. Walt is an eBay Powerseller and we will be talking about a variety of subjects related to selling on eBay, to include where we find inventory, what works for us when selling it, how we got involved in antiques and collectibles, how we got started on eBay, what we find works best for us when selling there, and a number of other eBay related subjects.
You can listen to the broadcast live by going to Auctionwally Radio. If you a specific question you would like answered, or if you would just like to comment on what you hear, you can do so by calling (646) 378-1561. We both encourage you to call in and take part.
If you are interested in what we have to say, but can’t listen to the show live, Walt will have a link where you can listen to a recording of the show on the left sidebar of What’s It Worth shortly after it is over.
Photograph by Dave Smith.
Popularity: 21% [?]
Posted on 02 February 2008 by Gary H
While there are still some people whining about the eBay feedback changes that will be going into affect in the next few months, there is additional information about these eBay feedback changes that many sellers should view as having a positive impact on their eBay businesses.
Lisa Suttora from WhatDoISell.com in her recent newsletter reported in part:
“I attended the eBay Developer’s Call this week (open only to eBay Certified
Providers) and found out a couple pieces of information that had previously not been made public that you’ll want to know about:
1. In May, eBay will go back and retroactively give sellers credit for previous repeat customer feedback. (Not sure yet how far back this repeat feedback credit is going to go. I’ll keep you posted.)”
Additional remarks made on eBay Radio over the last day or two make it sound as though these retroactive changes will extend all the way back to the creation of each eBay user ID.
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Popularity: 24% [?]
Posted on 19 January 2008 by Gary H
If you have commented on a post recently, after you hit the submit button you saw the following error messages:
“WordPress database error: [Table ‘theauctionrebel_com.wp_post2cat’ doesn’t exist]
SELECT cat_ID AS ID, MAX(post_modified) AS last_mod FROM `wp_posts` p LEFT JOIN `wp_post2cat` pc ON p.ID = pc.post_id LEFT JOIN `wp_categories` c ON pc.category_id = c.cat_ID WHERE post_status = ‘publish’ GROUP BY cat_ID”
“Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home2/rebel/theauctionrebel-www/wp-includes/wp-db.php:160) in /home2/rebel/theauctionrebel-www/wp-includes/pluggable.php on line 391”
I’m working on finding the cause and implementing a fix, but being a devout non-techie, it’s taking longer than it should.
Until I get this fixed, any comments readers leave will still appear on the blog as they normally would, but you will be taken to this error message after hitting the submit button.
I apologize for the problem and it will be fixed as quickly as possible.
Photograph by SqueakyMarmot.
Popularity: 29% [?]
Posted on 30 December 2007 by Gary H
Beginning January 8, email notifications of new posts on The Auction Rebel will no longer be sent to readers who subscribed to the email notification service.
Email notifications were originally intended as a way to notify readers of new posts so they wouldn’t have to check the blog frequently to see if there was new content. The recent addition of full email feeds as a RSS option now allows readers to have the full content of each new post delivered directly to their email box making the old email notification service redundant.
If you are currently subscribed to the email notification service I encourage you to subscribe to The Auction Rebel’s RSS feed via one of the two options available. If you aren’t familiar with RSS feeds What Is RSS? provides a brief explanation and describes the two options available.
Photo by Thomas van de Weerd..
Popularity: 48% [?]
Posted on 27 December 2007 by Gary H
Just a short note to let readers know that there is now a new ‘print’ feature set up for The Auction Rebel.
Now if you want to print an Auction Rebel post you will not have to print the navigation and sidebar. Instead you will get a much cleaner and simpler layout. Hopefully this will mean more useful prints and a lot less ink used.
I also decided not to include comments in printing since I don’t believe most readers will want them included. If I’m wrong, let me know and I’ll change the set up to include comments.
To see the new print feature in action, just click on the printer link at the very top of this post.
Photo by Mirko Tobias Schaefer.
Popularity: 44% [?]
Posted on 29 November 2007 by Gary H
A couple of new features will be added to the blog over the course of the next month. In order to easily implement these new features, it’s necessary to change the appearance of the blog.
I’ll be making these changes over the next three days.
As a result of the tweaking of the new theme that will be used, if you visit the blog during the next three days, how it looks as you move from one page to another may change. Some strange looking error messages may also appear in the layout or in the middle of posts. These will be on the blog itself, and will have nothing to do with the performance of your computer.
As long as things go smoothly (they always do, don’t they?), everything should be back to normal by Monday morning if not earlier.
I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, but the changes will make the blog easier to navigate and, hopefully, readers will find the new features well worth the inconvenience.
Popularity: 38% [?]
