Tuesday was not an easy day for eBay as international fallout over its Stores policies continued.

In North America, sellers are upset with eBay's latest promotion and how it may effect the fees they pay for Store listings. The 2-day "Store-to-Core" promotion allows sellers to move listings from their Stores to the core (non-Stores) platform for 10 cents, a significant bargain over regular core listing fees (http://auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y06/m08/i15/s01).

But sellers say that 7-day core listings would expire after the new higher Store fees go into effect. While sellers who leave listings in Stores can relist them for 30 days at the current 2-cents per listing fee, those who move listings to core and then move unsold items back to Stores on or after August 22 will pay the higher Store listing fees.

One seller wrote to AuctionBytes, "Anyone who empties out their stores to go to auction format today will find that their auctions end on August 22nd. And what is August 22nd? The day the rate hike takes place! So any store owners will then be paying the huge increases to put their inventory back in their stores!" She recommended sellers who take advantage of the promotion run 5-day listings on core so they have time to relist unsold items in Stores with the current lower fees.

She said she believes the eBay promotion was motivated by eBay's desire to increase listings in light of a threatened boycott by sellers protesting the rise in seller fees and decreased visibility of Store listings.

ChannelAdvisor CEO Scot Wingo recommended sellers think carefully before taking advantage of the promotion, warning of delays in receiving credits - especially for sellers who use auction management systems like the one his company provides (http://ebaystrategies.blogs.com/ebay_strategies/2006/08/ebay_listing_pr_1.html).

Meanwhile, disgruntled sellers in the UK got the attention of the mainstream press with news of their August 15th strike. After media coverage - including BBC radio and television coverage - eBay UK was forced to post a message on its announcement board on Tuesday about the strike. The announcement began, "We've received a number of emails from eBay.co.uk buyers with questions about media coverage relating to a "strike" by eBay sellers. They have been seeking reassurance that they are still able to buy on eBay.co.uk. We want to let you know that it is business as usual for almost all our sellers and we encourage you to go about your buying as normal."

http://www2.ebay.com/aw/uk/200608151958522.html