Identifying Listings that Benefit Nonprofits

eBay Giving Works gives sellers a formal way to donate a percentage of their listings' proceeds to particular nonprofit organizations. The feature also provides functionality that makes it easier for buyers to find items that are listed by nonprofit organizations or that benefit nonprofit organizations.

Sellers can list items through the normal Sell Your Item flow on the eBay site, or through the API. A seller selects a qualified nonprofit organization and specifies a percentage of the item purchase price to be used as a donation. After the item is purchased, the eBay Giving Works provider bills the seller and sends the donation amount to the nonprofit organization on the seller's behalf. Nonprofit organizations can also list items on their own behalf through eBay Giving Works.

Note: There may be a minimum donation amount required for items listed through eBay Giving Works via the API or the Sell Your Item flow. This minimum donation amount may not be required for nonprofit charity organizations listing items on their own behalf. See the eBay online help at http://pages.ebay.com/help/sell/selling-nonprofit.html for specific details about this requirement.

Currently, eBay Giving Works is supported through the US, UK, and eBay Motors sites only. The Ad Format and Adult Only categories are not supported.

See the eBay online help for additional information about eBay Giving Works:

Selling to Benefit a Nonprofit Organization

http://pages.ebay.com/help/sell/selling-nonprofit.html

The remainder of this section covers these topics:

API Support for eBay Giving Works

Benefits of Retrieving Giving Works Information

Other Ways to List Charitable Items

API Support for eBay Giving Works

eBay Giving Works items are listed via the API through a partnership with the eBay Giving Works provider.

Adding a Giving Works Listing

Use these calls to add eBay Giving Works listings:

AddItem
VerifyAddItem

A seller must meet the following criteria to add an eBay Giving Works item.

Be a registered charity seller on the eBay Giving Works provider site (for example, MissionFish) with an account in good standing.

Note: Beginning in May, existing registered charity sellers will no longer be considered registered charity sellers until they agree to the new Terms & Conditions and create a donation account. Sellers can re-register on the eBay site.

Specify a valid nonprofit charity organization with CharityID. For information on retrieving the CharityID, see Retrieving the CharityID.

Note: A nonprofit charity organization can also be specified with CharityNumber, but CharityNumber is being superseded by CharityID.

Specify a percentage of the listing price to donate to the nonprofit charity organization with DonationPercent.

Note: There is a minimum donation amount required for items listed through eBay Giving Works via the API or the Sell Your Item flow. This minimum donation amount is not required for nonprofit charity organizations listing items on their own behalf. See the eBay online help at http://pages.ebay.com/help/sell/selling-nonprofit.html for specific details about this requirement.

Retrieving the CharityID

A list of valid CharityID values and their corresponding nonprofit charity organizations can be retrieved using GetCharities. See GetCharities for information on retrieving CharityID values with GetCharities.

Retrieving a Giving Works Listing

Use these calls to retrieve eBay Giving Works listings:

GetItem
GetSellerList
GetItemTransactions
GetSellerTransactions
GetSearchResults

GetItem, GetSellerList, GetItemTransactions, GetSellerTransactions, and GetSearchResults return the name and ID of the nonprofit organization and the requested donation percentage in a Charity object.

Currently, eBay Giving Works is supported through the US, UK, and eBay Motors sites only. The Ad Format and Adult Only categories are not supported.

Revising a Listing to Add Charity

Use this call to revise an active listing:

ReviseItem

Sellers can add a charity tag to an active listing under certain conditions. Because buyers may choose to retract a bid in an auction when a seller adds a charity, or a charitable organization may want to review items benefitting their organization, you can only add a charity tag when there are more than 12 hours before the bidding ends.

When you revise an item, you can add a charity to a non-charity listing, but you cannot remove or change the charity designation.

The rules for adding a charity to a listing depend on the listing type:

For an Auction listing, you can revise an item to add a charity if there are more than 12 hours left for the listing (whether or not the item has bids).
For a Fixed-Price listing, you can revise an item to add a charity if there are more than 12 hours left for the listing, and the item has not been sold.
For a Store Inventory listing, you can revise an item to add a charity if the item has not been sold.
You cannot revise listings to add charity for Ad Format listings.

Benefits of Retrieving Giving Works Information

Many buyers and sellers are dedicated to charitable giving for a variety of personal and financial reasons. Some buyers and sellers are particularly interested in donating to specific nonprofit organizations. Others just like to donate in general. A buyer may choose to do more business with nonprofit organizations, as well as sellers who give to nonprofit organizations or who support the same causes as the buyer.

Your application can benefit in several ways by retrieving eBay Giving Works information. For example:

Integrate the donation process directly into regular business processes.
Include information about a listing's benefiting nonprofit organization when presenting the listing to users.
To provide more robust functionality, use GetSearchResults with a SearchFlags value of Charity. For each item returned, use GetItem and inspect the response for each item returned to retrieve the Charity details. With this information, you can:
Create a report that compares the number of donations made to various charities, the donation percentages allocated to those charities, and so forth.
Create a report that shows all current listings that benefit a certain charity and the donation percentages allocated for each listing. This type of feature may be of particular interest to users who represent charitable organizations.
Create a report that lists all charities that were selected as donation recipients by eBay sellers within the last 30 days.

Other Ways to List Charitable Items

If a seller wants to donate a portion of an item's proceeds to a nonprofit organization but chooses not to use eBay Giving Works, the seller can use the item description to explain that a charitable donation will be made. However, in this case, the seller is responsible for sending the donation amount to the benefiting charity. The process is not managed through eBay Giving Works.

This also means that on the eBay Web site the item will not show up in search results for Giving Works listings, will not be promoted as a charitable listing, and will not be identified by the Giving Works icon.

Note: eBay has strict policies about listing charitable items through means other than eBay Giving Works. See the online help at http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/fundraising.html for specific details on those requirements.

Similarly, a nonprofit organization can still list items without using eBay Giving Works and use the item description to explain that the purchase benefits that organization. However, in this case, it is the responsibility of the buyer to confirm that the seller represents a qualified nonprofit organization.

If a seller describes an item as a listing that benefits a nonprofit organization but does not list the item through eBay Giving Works, the Charity object is not applicable.

User-Contributed Notes