So yeah, they responded to my email with the same info that Steve noted above. They are not going to change the item levels. Now however, it appears the prices went up again because the listing levels were returned. Wasn't the basic store subscription set to go from $6.95 to $9.95 and now it will be $11.95?
Yes I just received that email as well and its a good thing HipStamp changed their mind about the original Summer Update. Never tried e-bay because my neighbor has been using it for years and they do not really support the seller only the buyer and it is too complicated with too many fees. He was screwed and burned too many times. I Use to sell stamps and other collectibles on another collectible site but withdrew because their pricing kept going up and the support was nil as far as I was concerned so I thought I found a good home here until I read the "Update" Am happy that they are reversing themselves. Hope everyone feels the same because there is no perfect site out there. And btw I set up a Wix store to do this privately but didn't follow through with that because of all the marketing and knowledge of social media you need to have and I will not do social media unless my son helps me out with it. Have a good day to all and stay safe and healthy.
Looks like they upped the rates for each level a little bit. Featured was going to be $26.95 for 10,000 now it is going to be $29.95 for 100,000. I can live with that even though it is a 50% rate hike from $19.95. Wonder how my customers would react if I raised my prices that much? As it is I am probably going to have to raise my fees a little bit which I hate to do with this rate change and the Postal Service rate change.
I think it was all a ruse to make the 70 percent increase look like a bargain..... but it makes it manageable ... there is a name for that particular game......... (we had a name for most games at the SBA)....
Yes, the original proposed charge for a basic store was $9.95 and it has gone up to $11.95, but all in all, 24-bucks a year more is better than over $300.......
I moved to an annual subscription this morning so I could kick the can down the street for another year before bailing because of spectacular fee increases, outrageous reduction in listings and EBAY linkage debacle. Now according to a post above, they backed off on the reduction in listings. Maybe the plan was to generate some immediate cash flow by selling a bunch of annual plans. Why would they not make a general announcement to all about the “revised plans” as opposed to mentioning the latest plan to a lone subscriber?
Yesterday the annual increase for a premium store was $240. Today that price was increased 50% to $360 annually. The other store categories received additional benefits by retaining existing listing quantities which had been reduced. What did Premium stores get for this extra money other than the shaft? Did I miss something? If no more benefits, then please eliminate the additional $120 charge. Thanks.
The Featured Store also went up 50% from $19.95 to $29.95 and still keeping the 100k. We are getting the 'Free" HipValue added in which I don't really care about. I think the Premium Store already had it. Since they really can't add any extra value to the Premium I would think they would still increase since increases are going across the board, but not that much.
I missed the part of the email they sent me that showed a slight increase in the rate from yesterday - however as other's have said that I can live with - so long as I can stay in the Basic tier since I rarely go over 5000 items - I never reach the 10000 limit. I think I will switch to annual and grab the lower price now because I will make that up in less than 6 months of the new basic monthly rate - if I stayed on monthly. Perhaps that was their ploy all along to get extra payments in this month from as many seller as they could ?!
I have only been selling here for less than a year. I'm not "attached" to the site like other sellers who have been selling here for years. I also sell at the APS store. I like this site for the control I have over how an item is listed. I also like buying here. I'll look into Stamp Den - thanks for suggestion. I am Prosci certified in change management and how this change was announced could have been done better. Surveys done before the change of sellers from each of the tiers on how they think the change would impact their sales would have been useful. Also, there are key influencers on this site (forum), getting them on board on proposed change will lead to less resistance. I'm available to consult... for a fee, of course
Where do you see this, Rod? On eBay, to get 10K in listings per month, one has to open a 'Premium Store' which I'm seeing come in at $59.95 if a subscription.....$74.95 without.
Hi George, I'm eBay Australia. When managed payments was introduced, listings for a basic store increased to 250,000. (I did show AU on my earlier post).
To upload to any other site though, you need the images, and if you don't have them saved on your computer with each having a unique name, you have to go into the source code for each listing on Hip and download it. Way too much work if you ask me if you are talking thousands of listings being uploaded to a site that may or may not have the same kind of exposure as Hip. I'd rather spend the time taking my listings 40-50 a week for a year and bringing them over to my ebay store where I will never have enough items to come close to what my maximum allowance is. A year from now I'll see if its worth sticking it out o n Hip based on sales for the prior year. But that's just me......
Even though the powers that be backed off *this time*:
1. What's to say that a "nominal" cost increase wasn't the end goal all along, and this misdirection was simply a way to get the seller base more accepting, e.g., "Oh thank goodness they rolled back the listing changes; it's only a small increase".
2. For those staying, I hope you're at least seeing the writing on the wall and use this as an opportunity to plan an exit strategy. The whole "grandfathered in until the end of your annual term" blindsideded any number of sellers without recourse just due to the timing of the announcement vs. the expiration of their annual subscription. While this may not have impacted you directly this time, you may not be so lucky the next time.
3. With eBay sync permanently broken, combined with the mismanagement and communication fiascos here as of late, and the inevitable legal entanglement because Hipstamp is not collecting sales tax on behalf of sellers as required by law, it's only a matter of time before things implode, in my opinion.
4. Re: George's question above, on eBay all stores subscription levels except "Starter" come with "an additional XXXX fixed price listings in select categories". Those select categories include stamps and collectibles. So for Basic you get 1,000 + 10,000 = 11,000 listings per month. For Premium you get 10,000 + 50,000 = 60,000 per month. As you list, if the listing is eligible for the select categories, it pulls against that quota, so you're not using up your base quantity that can be used across all categories until needed.
Enjoy your time here while you can, but the prudent seller is making contingency plans to be safe.
Interesting. I don't use Chrome (I use Opera or Firefox when necessary) but I will have to look at that. Still it looks like individual downloads for each store item, and then keeping the image file. Not all that much different than going through the source code. Once you know what the file name looks like, its pretty easy to do. In the old days before the mouse over that ebay and Hip do, it was very easy to copy an image and people were stealing images left and right. I worked for a guy who actually found a person listing the same exact things as he was, using his images. When it sold he would then purchase it from my friend at a lower cost. Doesn't seem that effective a way of doing business, but he did have no inventory cost outlay. I did download it and try it. Worked fine and as expected though it took longer to download than it would take me to find the image name in the source code.
Hi Gregory, HipStamp allows you to bulk export all your listings.
So, on your Members Area Listings page. There is a dropdown filter above the first listing, on the left, where you can select all your listings. Then use the EXPORT button, which hides at the bottom of the page, on the right of the buttons shown there.
Here is the latest response to about using the bulk lister. Is anyone else out there blackballed from using it??
Can you explain to me why? AGAIN, I have NEVER used the bulk lister before. I only ever used a zip file that had all 100,000+ records which I sent to you as per Mark. He was the one that called me, telling me where to download the free spreadsheet and to send my file to him in the zip file format. Why would you disable the bulk lister when I have never used it? Or, have you disabled it from all your paying customers? And then again, why won’t you put me in touch with Mark? Thanks Again, Len
Hi Leonard, Thank you for getting in touch. Unfortunately as previously discussed, we regret to inform you that we are unable to re-enable the Bulk Lister on your account even temporarily. I would like to sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this has caused and if there's anything else I can help you here with, please let me know.
How is this for a problem? It is going on two years now that my bulklister has been on temporary hold although I never used it before. And now they decided that I can no longer send them my zip file to upload but instead I can upload my items one at a time. As a result, my store has fallen from about 100,000 items to just over 50,000 items. Their reason is that I was causing them to much work?? Being slick about the whole thing, just before my subscription was about to renew I was told that I could use it again. Paid the money and again I was denied. At least now I know why they won't let me use it. Talk about a scam. Now I read they are cutting back the number of items for a store and charging you more for it-I always thought that someone was a little behind the IQ curve when they said I could load my items one at a time ( now over 40,000 more with a few 100,000 down the road. ) It goes right up there with pay more and get 1/10th as much for you money so they can improve the services that they think you need! Does anyone have a store on Ebay? I need to figure out how to start one, it can't be that expensive. Thanks, Len Len's Stamps and Stuff.
For those interested in bulklisting, you can export your items along with the image url If one needed said url to upload images to other sites, you could just use it in your upload file. Note that image requests from other sites could/can be denied. I believe this is tied to the infamous ebay sync. Another caveat is that the images here could be deleted if you were no longer a subsciber. my other experiences have shown me that it very difficult to download ebay images using an automated process. So you can using these urls with Rod Tilyard's chrome solution (above)
Ahhh, Column F is the image. I may play with this on a small scale of 100 or so listings to see what happens. I have not looked at the bulk lister for Stampden
I find it odd that nobody from HS has posted in here to let everyone know that they have reversed course. It's obvious that they saw the comments and such, one admin even posted early in the conversation. But nothing since then, they have left it to others to pass their message on. Considering the horrible communication from HS during the website upgrade debacle, this isn't surprising. We sellers are customers of HS, sure we are paying for that privilege, but without us sellers there is no HS. WE got them to that $3 million in sales per month, they could not have done it without us. I don't know if the fee increase was a "bait and switch" or just plain ignorance that guided them to a decision to TRIPLE the fees, then hiding notification of that increase by burying it at the bottom in a linked announcement that only went to sellers. I hate to leave here but I really don't feel that things will get any better. You would think that after all the problems that WE identified for the programmers during the website "upgrade" they would figure out that communicating with their sellers as customers is critically important. But they haven't. Why stay? I've already created a StampDen account and plan on giving it a try. We'll see if their communication and customer service is any better.
Comments
Edit to add:
https://www.hipstamp.com/p/2022-summer
George
The Featured Store also went up 50% from $19.95 to $29.95 and still keeping the 100k. We are getting the 'Free" HipValue added in which I don't really care about. I think the Premium Store already had it. Since they really can't add any extra value to the Premium I would think they would still increase since increases are going across the board, but not that much.
Will this 1 year contract roll over to the next tier if we reach our limit ?
1. What's to say that a "nominal" cost increase wasn't the end goal all along, and this misdirection was simply a way to get the seller base more accepting, e.g., "Oh thank goodness they rolled back the listing changes; it's only a small increase".
2. For those staying, I hope you're at least seeing the writing on the wall and use this as an opportunity to plan an exit strategy. The whole "grandfathered in until the end of your annual term" blindsideded any number of sellers without recourse just due to the timing of the announcement vs. the expiration of their annual subscription. While this may not have impacted you directly this time, you may not be so lucky the next time.
3. With eBay sync permanently broken, combined with the mismanagement and communication fiascos here as of late, and the inevitable legal entanglement because Hipstamp is not collecting sales tax on behalf of sellers as required by law, it's only a matter of time before things implode, in my opinion.
4. Re: George's question above, on eBay all stores subscription levels except "Starter" come with "an additional XXXX fixed price listings in select categories". Those select categories include stamps and collectibles. So for Basic you get 1,000 + 10,000 = 11,000 listings per month. For Premium you get 10,000 + 50,000 = 60,000 per month. As you list, if the listing is eligible for the select categories, it pulls against that quota, so you're not using up your base quantity that can be used across all categories until needed.
Enjoy your time here while you can, but the prudent seller is making contingency plans to be safe.
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tab-save/lkngoeaeclaebmpkgapchgjdbaekacki
NB: 1. Export all your listings. 2.Copy the URLs in the image column of the saved CSV and paste these to Tab Save.
Interesting. I don't use Chrome (I use Opera or Firefox when necessary) but I will have to look at that. Still it looks like individual downloads for each store item, and then keeping the image file. Not all that much different than going through the source code. Once you know what the file name looks like, its pretty easy to do. In the old days before the mouse over that ebay and Hip do, it was very easy to copy an image and people were stealing images left and right. I worked for a guy who actually found a person listing the same exact things as he was, using his images. When it sold he would then purchase it from my friend at a lower cost. Doesn't seem that effective a way of doing business, but he did have no inventory cost
outlay. I did download it and try it. Worked fine and as expected though it took longer to download than it would take me to find the image name in the source code.
Correct so $21=11000 listing and much more sales. +250 auction
for $59 = 60,000+ 500 auction listings
So, on your Members Area Listings page. There is a dropdown filter above the first listing, on the left, where you can select all your listings. Then use the EXPORT button, which hides at the bottom of the page, on the right of the buttons shown there.
Can you explain to me why? AGAIN, I have NEVER used the bulk lister before. I only ever used a zip file that had all 100,000+ records which I sent to you as per Mark. He was the one that called me, telling me where to download the free spreadsheet and to send my file to him in the zip file format. Why would you disable the bulk lister when I have never used it? Or, have you disabled it from all your paying customers? And then again, why won’t you put me in touch with Mark? Thanks Again, Len
Hi Leonard,
Thank you for getting in touch. Unfortunately as previously discussed, we regret to inform you that we are unable to re-enable the Bulk Lister on your account even temporarily. I would like to sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this has caused and if there's anything else I can help you here with, please let me know.
How is this for a problem? It is going on two years now that my bulklister has been on temporary hold although I never used it before. And now they decided that I can no longer send them my zip file to upload but instead I can upload my items one at a time. As a result, my store has fallen from about 100,000 items to just over 50,000 items. Their reason is that I was causing them to much work?? Being slick about the whole thing, just before my subscription was about to renew I was told that I could use it again. Paid the money and again I was denied. At least now I know why they won't let me use it. Talk about a scam. Now I read they are cutting back the number of items for a store and charging you more for it-I always thought that someone was a little behind the IQ curve when they said I could load my items one at a time ( now over 40,000 more with a few 100,000 down the road. ) It goes right up there with pay more and get 1/10th as much for you money so they can improve the services that they think you need! Does anyone have a store on Ebay? I need to figure out how to start one, it can't be that expensive. Thanks, Len Len's Stamps and Stuff.
If one needed said url to upload images to other sites, you could just use it in your upload file.
Note that image requests from other sites could/can be denied. I believe this is tied to the infamous ebay sync. Another caveat is that the images here could be deleted if you were no longer a subsciber. my other experiences have shown me that it very difficult to download ebay images using an automated process.
So you can using these urls with Rod Tilyard's chrome solution (above)
Exciting???????
I repeat. "It's been nice being had"
https://www.hipstamp.com/p/2022-summer?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=email newsletter&utm_campaign=HipStamp Seller Update 20220711-as-duplicate