Sellers on Etsy-owned clothing resale app Depop face late payments. Over the past few months, more and more sellers have reported that their payment dates have been delayed time and time again, with little response from Depop’s support team.
Depop, which Etsy bought for $1.6 billion in 2021, is like Instagram for second-hand pawnshops — sellers post photos of clothes and accessories they want to sell, which buyers can browse through hashtags and algorithmic recommendations . Buyers can make offers and, if the seller accepts, they’ll be paid — minus Depop’s cut — two days after delivery.
One streetwear seller, whose store is @fentoozler791, told TechCrunch that they had a $200 payment for multiple packages pushed back by more than a week. At first, the Depop app said they would be paid on Wednesday. every day, the app changed the payment date by another day, and several attempts to contact the Depop support team yielded no results.
“Depop did not respond with an actual written response until I sent another request threatening to no longer use their services. They didn’t seem to care until they realized they were going to lose my money from all the fees they charged me,” @fentoozler791 told TechCrunch. “I’m lucky that my pleading and long paragraph finally convinced them, but I never got a straight answer as to why this happened.”
Several other sellers have reported similar issues on r/Depop subreddit, X, Facebook and Instagram: Payment dates repeatedly repeat one day at a time without explanation.
“I just sold an item last night and dropped it off at the post office today and I’m worried I’ll have to contact Depop again after it’s delivered,” said @fentoozler791, who has been selling on Depop for over a year. “After this, I’m not sure I’ll sell on Depop anymore.”
When TechCrunch first raised these sellers’ payment issues with Depop last week, a representative said the company’s support team had a larger ticket queue than usual, but they didn’t know why sellers were struggling to pay. After further requests for comment, Depop told TechCrunch on Wednesday that it had uncovered an issue that caused these late payments.
“We are truly sorry that some sellers have experienced payment delays over the past week. We have identified an issue with our automated payment system which has now been fixed and all pending payments have been sent to the affected sellers,” said Depop. “These should be received within the next few days, depending on bank processing times.”
Depop said sellers who contacted its support team should have received a response by today, and that the company will proactively notify high-volume sellers.
In addition, Depop has sometimes set an unexpected additional fee, which is billed as a “buyer service fee”.
When TechCrunch asked Depop about the fee, a representative suggested that this might be a test — but the test is being applied unevenly across the app, meaning some shoppers have an extra few dollars to pay while others don’t. Depop’s Zendesk account had a page explaining the ending, but has since gone private.
The now-private help page said the 5% surcharge was for “feature upgrades, security improvements and performance optimizations”.
“What is our 10% covering if you need an additional 5% from the buyers as well?” said YouTube creator Just Old Things in a video. “You couldn’t blow up your company faster than what this Depop is trying to do.”
Depop isn’t as popular as other resale sites like Poshmark, but some prefer the smaller platform because it takes a 10% cut of sales, as opposed to Poshmark’s 20%. Vinted is also growing in popularity in the UK as Poshmark is no longer available there.
Despite its recent seller woes, data from Apptopia shows that Depop’s daily active users (DAUs) are growing. Globally, mobile DAUs are up 30% year over year for this quarter. Depop told TechCrunch that it gained 5 million registered users last year, bringing its user base to 35 million.
“We know that timely payments are critical to our sellers, and we’re making changes to our systems to ensure we can process higher payment volumes quickly as our community grows,” said Depop.
