Update to terms and conditions feedback

1:24 PM

Let us know in thread your thoughts!

@Rory - Sustainable Design Studio @PPCapiSpain @CitSciWorkshop @Thomas Peterberns | Johannplasto @Fritz @easymoulds Would be interested in your thoughts if you have any

I've always wondered but never got around to asking if shipping can be excluded from the 5% fee. I'll review the slides too, you've probably mentioned it there.

Various points. 5%. This has begun to be applied with the new bazaar. Previously it only applied to goods only (not shipments). On our part it is more effort, but we know that the bazaar must get funds for PP, so it seems to us a correct decision.:)

8:40 PM

What I don't quite understand is the NO communication with the client buy emails, websites, etc... Many of the sellers have websites where the information is expanded.

8:44 PM

It is also very easy to contact outside the bazaar...Google...:)

1

Honestly, I suspect that you will see many problems with the collection of PP commissions. How many sellers have not yet paid the commission for March? I honestly think it would be more effective for the bazaar to charge a "fee". For example, €50/month and a minimum of 6 months. It would be paid before publishing anything. It's not a lot of money, it would greatly simplify your invoice issues and PP would ensure payment.

PPCapiSpain

Various points. 5%. This has begun to be applied with the new bazaar. Previously it only applied to goods only (not shipments). On our part it is more effort, but we know that the bazaar must get funds for PP, so it seems to us a correct decision.:)

HI @PPCapiSpain , thank you very much for the feedback! Yes indeed the fee applying to shipping as well is new. This has to do with 2 things: first is the administrative burden of calculating the fee only on the goods. This is more difficult to do on the new Bazar. Second is that the platform is providing the service of processing both the goods and the shipment - so many platforms apply the fee in this way. For example you can think of the stripe fee - this applies on both the goods and the shipping. (edited)

PPCapiSpain

What I don't quite understand is the NO communication with the client buy emails, websites, etc... Many of the sellers have websites where the information is expanded.

Yes we understand that many sellers post this communication details on their posts, but this would no longer be allowed. It's like if an Airbnb listing allowed - "hey just call me !" (edited)

9:03 PM

Contacting with the customers directly was fair before, as the payment issue was huge - the Bazar was rejecting 50% of payments so it was fair that that sellers had to process the payments separately. (edited)

PPCapiSpain

Honestly, I suspect that you will see many problems with the collection of PP commissions. How many sellers have not yet paid the commission for March? I honestly think it would be more effective for the bazaar to charge a "fee". For example, €50/month and a minimum of 6 months. It would be paid before publishing anything. It's not a lot of money, it would greatly simplify your invoice issues and PP would ensure payment.

All have paid for march so far! We have considered the subscription fee in the past. The downside of this is that it does not allow the bazar to capture the value from increased sales from the same sellers - only from adding new sellers. And we have a small number of sellers that are actually processing a significant amount through the bazar. So this would not be advantageous. (edited)

Joseph

HI @PPCapiSpain , thank you very much for the feedback! Yes indeed the fee applying to shipping as well is new. This has to do with 2 things: first is the administrative burden of calculating the fee only on the goods. This is more difficult to do on the new Bazar. Second is that the platform is providing the service of processing both the goods and the shipment - so many platforms apply the fee in this way. For example you can think of the stripe fee - this applies on both the goods and the shipping. (edited)

Correct. We talked about this point when we received the March bill with Kate. And we already told him that he was well

Joseph

All have paid for march so far! We have considered the subscription fee in the past. The downside of this is that it does not allow the bazar to capture the value from increased sales from the same sellers - only from adding new sellers. And we have a small number of sellers that are actually processing a significant amount through the bazar. So this would not be advantageous. (edited)

greats news...

Common reasons comms have and likely would still need to go off Bazar until the platform serves certain functions are 1) customer requires paying in USD 2) Customer requires customizations 3) Customer requires PO 4) customer requires wire transfer

It would be very important to activate PayPal. Surely the sales would increase through the bazaar

CitSciWorkshop

Common reasons comms have and likely would still need to go off Bazar until the platform serves certain functions are 1) customer requires paying in USD 2) Customer requires customizations 3) Customer requires PO 4) customer requires wire transfer

and proforma invoice in some cases

I am grateful with PP's investment and understand the reason for enforcement of fees. I do however feel strongly with the ban on email, not because I want to take conversations off the bazar to avoid the 5% fee, but when selling a Shredder Basic or Injection Machine you really need to build confidence with the buyer. I would say 80% of my sales of these machines are done after I have had a 15-30min introduction call to answer any questions the customer may have or help build confidence so that an NGO, Individual or Business is willing to send several thousand dollar upfront, internationally, often needing to wait week/months before receiving the item. I think until, video calling is added to the bazar, a move to keep all conversations text based will damage my sales. I would happily as Capi says, spend £50 a month to enable this feature and not have that kind of restriction. Although this move is to prevent sales leaving the bazar, I think 3-4 5% sales of £2000+ bring in far more money than 5 £200 sales. for the Bazar. My other concern is that the Sustainable Design Studios strength is our build guides for our machines. For us, allowing the customer to see what the process of building is before purchasing will increase their purchase likelihood, but it requires for us to display a website link. However I feel this is less of an issue when compared with the primary point.

10:21 PM

You do say that the PP bazar shouldn't be an advertising platform, but I'd rather spend £150 a month on the Bazar as a fee/ad/subscription than send £150 to google every month like I do now.

10:25 PM

Deep down though I just wish the 5% was easier to enforce without cutting features. I would argue, add the features that currently cause people to go off the bazar and you hopefully should have better sales through the bazar naturally.

One final note. I'm not sure comparing with eBay is a good comparison. I the bazar is more like an online car shop like autotrader.co.uk , what is the most expensive thing you have bought on eBay...through their platform? £990 for me, and it was from a company I trusted, I could have got it from their main page, but was just cheaper on eBay so that's why I went for it. They however take responsibility for the seller, if the seller doesn't deliver. The PP Bazar doesn't do that.

CitSciWorkshop

Common reasons comms have and likely would still need to go off Bazar until the platform serves certain functions are 1) customer requires paying in USD 2) Customer requires customizations 3) Customer requires PO 4) customer requires wire transfer

Hi David thanks for this feedback. A few things to note/questions:

Regarding #1, because you setup your stripe in USD (now it's up to the seller to decide this), the customer is actually transacting with you in USD. So there shouldn't be a reason to go off the Bazar for this.
Regarding 3# , could you explain that a little bit? Is there a reason you couldn't provide this to the customer as an attachment in the messaging system ahead of a purchase?
And regarding #4, we do understand there are cases where an organizational customer might require bank to bank transfer. In these cases, you can contact the bazar team and reference the message conversation where this was discussed.

(edited)

#1 - I'll look into it, I was not under the impression that Stripe did anything more that convert when sending funds to me after accepting a transaction in Euro. I also cannot list things natively in USD, so I need to track and re-price all listings every 2 weeks or so to stay on market trends. #3 - Customers provide a PO based on an invoice, so I would need to go off-Bazar to generate that. A service like Paypal has the ability to generate invoices and estimates that can convert to invoices once accepted. Maybe Stripe can offer some extension like that.

Rory - Sustainable Design Studio

I am grateful with PP's investment and understand the reason for enforcement of fees. I do however feel strongly with the ban on email, not because I want to take conversations off the bazar to avoid the 5% fee, but when selling a Shredder Basic or Injection Machine you really need to build confidence with the buyer. I would say 80% of my sales of these machines are done after I have had a 15-30min introduction call to answer any questions the customer may have or help build confidence so that an NGO, Individual or Business is willing to send several thousand dollar upfront, internationally, often needing to wait week/months before receiving the item. I think until, video calling is added to the bazar, a move to keep all conversations text based will damage my sales. I would happily as Capi says, spend £50 a month to enable this feature and not have that kind of restriction. Although this move is to prevent sales leaving the bazar, I think 3-4 5% sales of £2000+ bring in far more money than 5 £200 sales. for the Bazar. My other concern is that the Sustainable Design Studios strength is our build guides for our machines. For us, allowing the customer to see what the process of building is before purchasing will increase their purchase likelihood, but it requires for us to display a website link. However I feel this is less of an issue when compared with the primary point.

Hi @Rory - Sustainable Design Studio let me think a bit about this video calling and guides website link and revert tomorrow.

1

I would agree with Rory on the depth and detail one needs to go with clients to help them with details and earn their trust. Current client vectors for me are 2 cold calls through phone, two contact form emails from my site, and several messages on the Bazar, a couple of which are asking about custom sized machines and would break new terms.

CitSciWorkshop

#1 - I'll look into it, I was not under the impression that Stripe did anything more that convert when sending funds to me after accepting a transaction in Euro. I also cannot list things natively in USD, so I need to track and re-price all listings every 2 weeks or so to stay on market trends. #3 - Customers provide a PO based on an invoice, so I would need to go off-Bazar to generate that. A service like Paypal has the ability to generate invoices and estimates that can convert to invoices once accepted. Maybe Stripe can offer some extension like that.

Ok so regarding the PO, does it works like this? 1. You generate a pro-forma invoice/quote 2. Customer sends a PO based off this invoice to accept your pro-forma invoice/quote 3. You generate a final invoice for them to pay

Yes, so if the Bazar can provide me tools like this, then it would help retain transactions there.

And wouldn't it be possible to generate these items (pro-forma/quote/invoice) as you normally would with customers outside the bazar, but attach them as PDF's to the Bazar messager? (edited)

yes but wouldn't that be a violation of terms? It has my business info on it, phone, address, site, etc. created by another payable platform.

My first reaction is no it doesn't violate the terms. But i guess that it technically does because you are sharing your contact information. If you are soliciting payment based on bank to bank transfer on the invoice, then yes that part clearly does and would need to be asked about first.

11:32 PM

The "spirit of the law" here is really more about the intent to use the messenger. We have sellers who immediately upon receiving a message from the buyer says "Send me an email at yadayada@plasticplastic.com". This is what we are trying to prevent because then we have no idea if that ended up in a transaction.

11:35 PM

In the case where a buyer would say "Hey can you send me a quote for x things", then this could be done with a PDF attachment through the messenger , which is fine. The payment terms on the quote could say "payment required through the Bazar platform" for example.

11:36 PM

If the buyer says they can't do payment through the Bazar, then this is one of those cases where sending an email and asking bazar@pp for being able to provide the bank to bank details would be appropriate

@Joseph bare in mind an official quote would need contact details on the PDF.

Ya that's what @CitSciWorkshop is saying

Ah sorry, jumped the messages

11:38 PM

Just another point I thought "send me a video of how it works" is a common one.

11:38 PM

You can't share videos only JPGs.

11:39 PM

Don't think pdf is currently supported?

Rory - Sustainable Design Studio

Don't think pdf is currently supported?

Yup pdf works!

Ah cool

Rory - Sustainable Design Studio

You can't share videos only JPGs.

Yes would have to be shared as a link - can be a YT vid for example (private if you want)

True

Having the buyer have access to the contact details for example through a pro-forma invoice is not a problem - it's really about the intent to use the Bazar for communicating and conducting the payment where at all possible

11:42 PM

Perhaps we could write in the policy times where it is OK to send direct details (in a pro-forma invoice for example) (edited)

Yeah that's fair. I know you guys are not mean about it and I think as long as it's transparent and not ruining the seller or buyer experience it will work.

11:44 PM

I guess there is the carrot or the whip. Both work, but one hurts the donkey

11:44 PM

I do love the attention this getting though. Feels like a new chapter for PP

Yeah i think it's now the policy will be a bit more restrictive but allows for exceptions when those are communicated. If that ends up happening a lot (because the features are not built in), then we can look at changing certain areas.

11:47 PM

We will learn through this if there is a big gap somewhere

11:51 PM

Alright going to sleep over here in europe

11:52 PM

thanks for the feedback so far - will checkin tomorrow !

Thanks everyone chipping in this thread. It helps a lot to hear your concerns and worries. as @Joseph said we're trying to make the Bazar the best possible marketplace for as many buyer and sellers as possible. In order to do this, the Bazar needs to be financially sustainable so we can invest more money in it, grow the team and potentially pay for ads at some points. That's why I would go beyond the details of the terms and conditions and simply try to be fair here－if a sale is started on the bazar it is fair that 5% is sent to Precious Plastic. Be sure that this money go straight back on the Bazar. We won't bother you for contact in the invoice after the sale has happened. We will ping you though if you straightaway take the conversations outside of the bazar. Also as much as possible it would be great to transition toward more "Click & Buy" machines and products not necessarily requiring customisation. I know it is not super easy but a lot can be done in that direction.

9:17 AM

Let's grow this thing

Like said above, all great improvements, really appreciate! I think PP is not the first business that struggles on the B2B side with "education-heavy" products -people ask questions beyond the scope of an FAQ - or are just too busy to read (which is fair enough in B2B context) As I talked already with your current researcher on that topic, as more customization you allow to render within the platform as easier it gets to process machines/moulds within it. Think of the ebay style checkout where you can update shipping rates after the initial purchase is done. I think ebay is a great reference where many professional/ B2B sellers interact and they focus on smooth transactions in there/ offer the tools that makes it attractive to checkout with them.

Fritz @easymoulds

Like said above, all great improvements, really appreciate! I think PP is not the first business that struggles on the B2B side with "education-heavy" products -people ask questions beyond the scope of an FAQ - or are just too busy to read (which is fair enough in B2B context) As I talked already with your current researcher on that topic, as more customization you allow to render within the platform as easier it gets to process machines/moulds within it. Think of the ebay style checkout where you can update shipping rates after the initial purchase is done. I think ebay is a great reference where many professional/ B2B sellers interact and they focus on smooth transactions in there/ offer the tools that makes it attractive to checkout with them.

Thanks for this feedback fritz! Your feedback about customization was extremely helpful.

@Crea-Cregy Pinging you here as well to see if you have any thoughts

Hi Joseph. I am not really expérienced and helpful in website Making. However i m Reading à Book nowadays called "objectif client" translated from bill Price and David Jaffe. Its exactly where you are and Making the most enjoyable customer s expérience.

2:12 PM

2:14 PM

OK people ! We have updated the terms and conditions based on the feedback above. We tried to make things clear, however there may be scenarios that pop up that we didn't think of. In general they are written in a way that is clear and restrictive, but creates the path of emailing the bazar team to access situations on a case by case basis. We believe this is the best way to go while we figure out exactly where the lines have to be drawn, with the goal of increasing transactions on the Bazar for everyone. Same link

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1isunZetO6mcbEwM0oTTuAj1dh91U5RXHTdWz4E2yK_o/edit Very much appreciate the feedbacks as we are building this platform for the community ! (edited)

Thanks for taking in our suggestions!

I will go ahead and remove phone numbers and emails from our listings.

For future revisions, we propose to improve the last point, and try to offer security to buyers (and sellers). I'm not sure how it could be done...

@Kat maybe send a message on verified channel on slack about this? Many sellers there that might benefitting from this conversation (mark, pp Melbourne etc..)

1

I removed the information about other ways of contact with me from my offer. I still don’t understand why you are taking 5% fee from shipping also. IMHO it’s not fair because you are not offering or organizing shippings - only sellers do that.

Some thoughts about terms; thinking of what the team is wanting from us sellers, and what sellers need to be able to use the site effectively. We're also looking at this while the function of the new bazar is just now really being tapped into by sellers. So we're arriving at a new step where what we all need is clarity and trust, and processes that drive that. I believe that as a paragraph in the terms, instead of requiring case by case approval of messaging, that the team accept that sellers may use their full contact info, website details and resources, etc. in order to provide service for any requests by users in good faith, and agree to close transactions initiated in any way by contact on the bazar in good faith. That involves sellers agreeing to use the bazar as much as possible, and provide feedback and help in expanding the Bazar's base of effective tools. All of the rules and policies also apply.