eBay to soon let sellers request "Immediate Payment" option whilst also offering combined postage

As an eBay store owner who likes to offer P&P discounts (or combined postage) for multiple purchases to the same customer, I have a really annoying problem which is that I cannot choose the “Seller Requires Immediate Payment” option when listing my items. This is because at the moment, any postage discounts offered by a seller are only calculated once a buyer comes to actually ‘pay’ for them items, not when they initially ‘buy’ them. This results in plenty of time wasters who seem to just like buying stuff but never actually want to pay for it. On the other hand, if you are a seller that likes to request “Immediate Payment” then you cannot offer any combined postage discounts at the same time. A lose-lose situation.

I don’t know if it is a good or bad thing to choose the “Immediate Payment” option as it may deter some customers, but I personally like it because at the end of the day if a customer has no intention of paying straight after they’ve bought an item then I’m happy to cut those people out. Auctions sales are different, but if it’s “Buy it Now” then to me it should be “Pay for it Now” also. I understand you can open ‘unpaid item disputes’ and claim seller fees back, but it’s still abit of a pain.

Anyway, I rang eBay today about this issue after one of many ‘sales’ I’ve made to a buyer with zero feedback who has still not paid after several attempts at contacting them asking for payment… and eBay told me that since they have had alot of other sellers complaining about the same issue, they are now looking into introducing a system where buyers can add multiple items to a cart or basket, see what combined postage discounts they will be entitled to (determined by the seller) and then pay for all items at once. And only then once the buyer has actually ‘paid’ will it show up for a seller as a ‘Sold’ item. Basically it will be similar to how it is on an ecommerce site.

I’m not sure how this will work for if a customer chooses to pay via cheque or postal order, buy I presume the customer will still be forced to select their payment method before being allowed to buy the item.

eBay did say though that it is not at the top of their priority list as there are other things re. DSR’s they want to sort out first, but this basket / cart system, is something they are working on. Glad they will finally do this!

George