This has been a difficult decision because our site has been free for non-feature auctions since we launched 3 years ago. We are more or less being forced to charge for auctions on our site.
Please note, this will not affect anyone bidding on our site. This is for auctions placed on our site only!
Let me say the fees for placing auctions on our site are very minimal, especially compared to ebay. We are charging a minimum auction placement fee only. There will be no percentage based on the ending auction amount. The fees are based on the amount you specify the auction starts at. The fees are: .01 - 9.99 = $0.20, 10 - 24.99 = .$0.35, 25 - 49.99 = $0.85, 50 - 199 = $1.95, over 200 = $2.95.
If you started an auction at $10.00, your final cost would be 35 cents with us. If you placed the same auction on ebay your initial cost would be 55 cents. But let’s say the auction ended at $40.00, you would incur an insertion fee of 55 cents. But by the time the ending auction fees were added, you would incur a fee of $2.17 on ebay. Our fee structure is not in the very least close to ebay’s fees.
The main reason we have been forced to charge for auctions is because a handful of sellers are placing many auctions that run over and over again. This is taking a lot of space, and band width, which costs us money. But the worst part of this is that they are starting the auctions near retail, which is not a true auction. Most don’t even receive 1 bid, and then they just re-auction them over and over again. Unfortunately there is no way of stopping this unless we charge for auctions. I’ve tried to reason with people over the years to start auctions low so that they can have successful auctions, but some people are only intent in using our site as a store.
Truthfully when we launched choochooauctions.com it was our intent to charge for auctions. But around a month after the launch my first provider offered me a deal to give the site to me for free if I agreed to run banners on the site, which I did. I didn’t feel it would be right to charge for auctions since ours were free at the time. Later he pulled the banner ads, and we have been paying for the sites ever since. Thus it will take quite a while to recoup the expenses we have incurred over the past three years.
The fees go into affect today. I apologize for the short notice. This was actually supposed to happen yesterday on the 1st of the year, but due to problems we could not get this done until today.
If you are a new user and came mainly because of our advertisements for free auctions, please email me at trainman@traincity.com. I will issue you some credit towards free initial auctions.
We sincerely appreciate everyone who has participated on choochooauctions.com. We hope you understand why this move had to be made, and please stick around. There will be lots and lots a of great trains found on choochooauctions in the future.
