Why My Ebay Listings Weren’t Coming Out Free

On numerous occasions during Ebay’s free listing promotion, I would try to post a listing, but it wouldn’t come out free. After much hair-pulling, I figured out this was only happening when I was trying to re-list an item that had not sold previously. Instead of coming out free, the listing was costing me what it had the first time around. However–I discovered that any time I developed a new listing from scratch, the insertion fee was always (appropriately) free.

How to Fix the Problem if your Ebay Listing Isn’t Coming Out Free

During Ebay’s free listing promotion, if you want to get your free insertion for an item you’re trying to re-list:

Next to the item in the “not sold” items list, instead of choosing the “re-list item” selection, choose the “sell similar.” Your listing page should pop up for you to change whatever features will be different for this listing–pricing, return policy, description, etc. You can either choose to make changes or to leave the listing specifics as they appear. When you reach the final “List item” page, you should see that your Total Fee is zero. (If it’s not, then you’ve got some other problem other than what I’ve experienced.)

In other words, for Ebay’s free listing promotions, re-listing a previous item you had for sale may not work. You’ll need to “sell similar,” instead–even if it’s the exact same item you’re listing.

Hope this helps.