YDC Rules - Open Discussion

[PoppyGrove]

Firstly - Happy New Year to everyone. I hope that your celebrations all went according to plan and that you enjoyed them how you wished to.
For those that make New Year Resolutions - I hope that you're sticking to them.

Ours was a nice quiet christmas and Santa brought us lots of nice goodies. Our New Years was enjoyable - even though with neighbours setting off fireworks from 8 pm on towards 2 am - going out was not an option as we could not leave the dogs on their own.

I have done a calendar of YDC's for 2010 (see this thread) - hopefully this will help take out the guesswork for you and allow you to plan for upcoming YDC's. Although, if you're anything like me, and I'm the one that knows when they're to be - I still get caught out and end up being unprepared when we get to 6 pm on the listing Friday.

With the first YDC of 2010 fast approaching (29th Jan) and remembering that back at the start time of the November YDC - there was a query on some of the rules - http://meetup.ebid.net/showthread.php?t=131252. At the time, I thought it best to leave things as they were - sort of free for all, and open s discussion in the new year.

With some sellers choosing to include p&p in the start price and with others adding the p&p on top - should the maximum start price be 2 tier - say 99p for non inclusive p&p with say £1.50 start price for inclusive p&p. Its your YDC - you decide.

Should we set a limit to the number of times a specific charity can be nominated giving other charities the chance to benefit - perhaps smaller charities? If the same person is the winner each time - should they pick the same charity or pick a different one to last time - again perhaps allowing more charities to benefit?


Please leave your ideas, comments and thoughts - I'd love to hear your feedback on this and any other rule changes that you think should or could be applied. It would also be helpful to have your reasons why.

Am I passing the buck? Possibly - but the YDC is not me - it isn't one person - it is bigger than that - it is all of you. You are what make the YDC - and it is your thoughts that count which is why I'm putting it on the table for discussion.

Thank you for your time.

Proposed Changes to Current Rules


1 - Change the up to start price from 99p to £1 - to make it easier for our overseas friends to calculate the exchange rate - this will be for sellers who prefer to list with p&p as an extra

2 - An additional rule with a max start price of up to £2 ?? for sellers who wish to include the p&p in the start price.

3 - Change the Winners rule to exclude big ticket items eg T-Shirt etc as they are (by previous auctions) currently worth more and are expected to raise more than the current £20 ceiling.

4 - An additional rule that no charity can be nominated more than twice through the course of a YDC year - Jan to Nov. This will allow more charities to benefit from the YDC. If there is a special YDC in Dec - that woud be exempt from this rule - as would any other charity fundraising (eg BCC Pink) as they would have their own 'rules' as set by the organisers at the time and do not come under the YDC banner.

[tjsprinting]

goody goody, fun time fast approaching again.
there should be three major rules;-
SPEND
SPEND
SPEND

Its always for a good cause.

[CarnoustieCats]

Buy buy buy yesssssssssss .....

[bykimbo]

I think the rules should reflect the difference between inclusive and exclusive of postage, but I don't much mind how that's achieved or what the thresholds are. I just think if one's going to list things inclusive of P&P, it would be good to be able to set the start price at a level where the charity at least gets as much as it costs to send it!

[PoppyGrove]

I think the rules should reflect the difference between inclusive and exclusive of postage, but I don't much mind how that's achieved or what the thresholds are. I just think if one's going to list things inclusive of P&P, it would be good to be able to set the start price at a level where the charity at least gets as much as it costs to send it!

That sound reasonable enough - with the rules as they are - they only allow for listings at up to 99p PLUS p&p - with the charity benefitting from the start price up to 99p at least - more if it gets a bidding frenzy.

I can understand that if you opt to include the p&p - then a more realistic start price could apply. For me - I'm happy either way. Its just a case of adding an extra rule to cover that. It would be interesting to hear a few more ideas.

[PoppyGrove]

I've added a few more ideas / areas for discussion to my opening post and would be interested to have your feedback.

[leadhillsonline]

With some sellers choosing to include p&p in the start price and with others adding the p&p on top - should the maximum start price be 2 tier - say 99p for non inclusive p&p with say £1.50 start price for inclusive p&p. Its your YDC - you decide.

Should we set a limit to the number of times a specific charity can be nominated giving other charities the chance to benefit - perhaps smaller charities? If the same person is the winner each time - should they pick the same charity or pick a different one to last time - again perhaps allowing more charities to benefit?

Sorry but I hate 99p start, all my auctions end in 0 or 5 so why can't it be £1.00.
It's difficult to set a inclusive postage amount as the rate varies so much.
It is not often I put YDC listings up for the nominated charity so I do not think a limit on the amount of times a charity can be nominated is necessary.

[bykimbo]

I think a mechanism to prevent one or two charities from dominating would be a great idea. And I say that despite being an RNLI official! One of the things I loved about YDC when I first started using it was the variety of causes, large and small, that were benefiting. And how a small charity could receive a really significant amount of cash by their lights.

Something to keep the nominations fresh would be good. I like the idea of not being able to nominate the same charity two times running - that could be either over-all, or per "winner", I suppose?

There also seems to be an issue with the repeat "big ticket" items, as I see it. It's lovely that things like the signed t-shirt are so popular, but the rules do say that you should not expect your item to raise more than £10 if you wish to be included in the competition side... yet the same few items win over and over - the person selling cannot honestly say they thought it would make less than £10, can they? So it should, by the rules, be excluded (not from selling & fund-raising, just the competition element to win the right to choose next month). That looks to me as if the rules need to either be enforced more vigorously, and these items not be included, or the maximum expected amount needs to be revised.

[PoppyGrove]

Sorry but I hate 99p start, all my auctions end in 0 or 5 so why can't it be £1.00.
It's difficult to set a inclusive postage amount as the rate varies so much.
It is not often I put YDC listings up for the nominated charity so I do not think a limit on the amount of times a charity can be nominated is necessary.

Fair point - thanks for your input. The 99p isn't the hard set start price - and it is left up to the seller to pick any amount up to 99p. That said it could be changed to £1 if thats what suits best.

[bykimbo]

Sorry but I hate 99p start, all my auctions end in 0 or 5 so why can't it be £1.00.
It's difficult to set a inclusive postage amount as the rate varies so much.
It is not often I put YDC listings up for the nominated charity so I do not think a limit on the amount of times a charity can be nominated is necessary.

Lots of difficult things are worth doing.

I realise that not all YDC auctions are for the nominated charity, many (most?) are, so even though it doesn't affect you personally, it's still an issue worth discussing. For example, I love Help For Heroes and support them, but if Huddy won every time and proposed H4H for every single YDC I think that would be a shame, because smaller, less well known charities would miss their chance at the big cash.