A UK dealer has eight realistic alternatives to Chrono24: eBay UK as a business seller (12.9% on the first £750 and 3% above, plus 40p and a 0.35% regulatory fee, with Authenticity Guarantee on watches of £1,500 or more); Watchfinder's curated marketplace (per-sale fixed fee plus commission, invitation-led, rates not published); Catawiki's curated auctions (12.5% seller fee plus a fixed amount); a traditional auction house such as Fellows (15% plus VAT, a £10 marketing fee and 1.5% loss charge per lot); a US marketplace such as Bezel (12% for a new seller, falling with volume, $225 minimum); your own website on Shopify (from £25 a month plus card fees); Instagram and WhatsApp; and the trade, dealer to dealer, at no fee but with no buyer protection and full AML responsibility on you. None of them replaces Chrono24's audience. Most of them replace a share of its cost.

All fees below were checked against the operator's own published page on 19 August 2026 and are quoted ex VAT unless stated.

The channels at a glance

Channel Who buys What it costs the seller Buyer protection / authentication Who holds the money Notes for a UK dealer
Chrono24 (baseline) Global retail, 22 languages €199-€2,199/month package by listing count, plus an unpublished dynamic commission Escrow, 14-day return Chrono24 escrow Priced in euros; package adjusts to your listing count automatically
eBay UK (business) UK retail, some export 12.9% up to £750 + 3% above, per item; 40p per order; 0.35% regulatory fee; 1.05-2% international fee; + VAT on fees Authenticity Guarantee at £1,500+, authenticator Stoll & Co, free to seller eBay managed payments Largest UK retail audience; fees charged on item price plus postage
Watchfinder marketplace Watchfinder's UK and US customers Fixed fee plus commission per sale; figures not published Watchfinder brand, returns per its policy Watchfinder Curated: invitation to established CPO dealers; launched UK 2023
Catawiki European collectors 12.5% seller fee plus a fixed amount, ex VAT; buyer also pays a fee Expert-curated lots Catawiki Auction format; weekly watch sales; Dutch company
Auction house (Fellows) UK and international bidders 15% seller commission + VAT, £10 + VAT marketing per lot, 1.5% + VAT loss/liability House catalogues and describes Auctioneer, paid after sale Good for scarce or vintage pieces; slow cash cycle
Bezel (US) US collectors 12% for a new seller, falling by tier; minimum $225 per sale Bezel authentication Bezel Dollar settlement, US shipping and duty
Own website (Shopify) Whoever you bring Basic £25/month (£19 annual); 2% + 25p card rate on Basic Yours You, via Shopify Payments Zero commission; zero audience
Instagram / WhatsApp Your followers and regulars Nothing None You Payment and AML entirely on you
Trade (dealer to dealer) Other dealers Nothing, or a negotiated split None You Lower price, fastest cash, HVD cash rules apply

Why would a dealer leave Chrono24 at all?

Three reasons, in the order dealers give them. The package fee is fixed in euros and rises automatically with listing count: Chrono24's own price structure page shows €629 a month at 100 listings and €2,199 at 1,000, and the tier moves up if your average active listings exceed the package by more than 10% for two months. The commission is dynamic per sale and not published; our earlier article explains what is and is not verifiable. And for a UK dealer most buyers are foreign, which means export paperwork, returns from abroad and a 7.5% US buyer surcharge on your price competitiveness.

Nobody serious leaves entirely. The question is what share of stock belongs on Chrono24 and where the rest goes.

Is eBay a real alternative for a UK dealer?

Yes, and it is the only one with a comparable UK retail audience. The business fee page (eBay UK, fees for business sellers, last updated 4 August 2026) puts Watches, Parts & Accessories at 12.9% of the portion of the sale up to £750 and 3% of the portion above £750, calculated per item, plus a per-order fee of 40p for orders over £10, plus a 0.35% regulatory operating fee on the total. Fees are on the total amount of the sale including postage and are exclusive of VAT. An overseas delivery address adds 1.05% (Eurozone and Northern Europe), 1.8% (US and Canada) or 2% (elsewhere).

On a £5,000 watch to a UK buyer that is £96.75 + £127.50 + £0.40 + £17.50 = £242.15, about 4.8% before VAT on the fee. On a £1,500 watch it is £124.90, about 8.3%. The tiering favours higher-value pieces.

Watches listed in the Wristwatches category and sold for £1,500 or more go through Authenticity Guarantee: you post to Stoll & Co, who inspect, tag and forward the watch; eBay pays the authentication and the next-day delivery to the buyer; returns go back through the authenticator. For a dealer that is a free condition report and a defence against the "not as described" return. We compare the two platforms line by line in Chrono24 vs eBay.

One UK wrinkle: private sellers on eBay UK pay no final value fee, and since 2025 their buyers pay a Buyer Protection fee instead, built into the displayed price. A business seller is competing in search against private listings priced on a different fee basis. Budget for that.

What is the Watchfinder marketplace and can you get on it?

Watchfinder & Co., owned by Richemont, historically bought and owned every watch it sold. In 2023 it opened a UK marketplace for third-party dealers, reported by WatchPro and later extended to the US. The model described at launch was no monthly fee, a fixed fee plus a commission on each sale, and a curated list of established certified pre-owned dealers. The rates are not published and we could not obtain them; the entry route is an approach to Watchfinder, not a sign-up form. If you are an established dealer with clean stock and service records, it is worth the conversation, because the buyer is paying Watchfinder prices.

Catawiki and the auction houses

Catawiki runs expert-curated online auctions with weekly watch sales. Its published seller success fee is 12.5% of the hammer price plus a fixed amount, ex VAT, charged only when the lot sells, with submission free; buyers pay a separate protection fee on top. We could not load Catawiki's fee page directly on the day, so confirm the fixed amount before consigning. It suits vintage and mid-market pieces that benefit from an auction audience in the Netherlands, Germany and France, and settlement is in euros.

A UK auction house is the slowest channel and the most predictable on fees. Fellows, the Birmingham watch and jewellery specialist, publishes a seller's commission of 15% plus VAT, a £10 plus VAT marketing fee per lot and a 1.5% plus VAT loss and liability charge. On a £5,000 hammer that is £750 + £10 + £75 = £835 plus VAT, and the buyer pays a premium on top, which depresses the hammer. Use it for the scarce piece that needs a catalogue and a saleroom, not for a stock Datejust.

Bezel and the US marketplaces

Bezel is a US marketplace with its own authentication step. Its seller fee help page describes tiered commission by cumulative sales - a first $20,000 sale at 12%, dropping to 10% once past the $15,000 threshold for the next level - with a $225 minimum per sale. Settlement is in dollars, the buyer is in the US, and the watch is shipped there, so duty, insurance and the return leg are yours to price. For a UK dealer it is a way to reach US money without Chrono24's US surcharge, not a home market.

Your own website, Instagram and WhatsApp

A Shopify store costs £25 a month on Basic (Shopify UK pricing), or £19 paid annually, with a 2% + 25p online card rate, and no commission. It is the cheapest place to sell a watch and the hardest place to be found. Its real job for a dealer is to be the structured source Chrono24 and your own social traffic point at - Chrono24 will crawl a webshop with 50 or more offers, and a dedicated system can push to both.

Instagram and WhatsApp cost nothing and convert well for dealers with a following. The exposures are all yours: payment (bank transfer with no chargeback protection either way), authentication (your word), and money laundering. Cash at or above £10,000, including linked payments, puts you in High Value Dealer territory, and a watch bought from a stranger on a DM needs the same stolen check as one across the counter.

The trade

Dealer-to-dealer is the oldest alternative and still the fastest. No fee, no listing, payment same day, and a price five to fifteen points under retail depending on the piece. Subdial's Clubhouse, reported by WatchPro, formalises collector-to-collector trading at 12% commission falling to 6% with volume; the dedicated dealer systems - Elefta's marketplace, ChronoDesk's 0%-commission B2B platform - are trying to do the same for the trade. Most UK trade still moves on WhatsApp groups and at fairs.

The trade price is the floor every other channel is measured against. If a channel's fee plus its time to cash is worse than the trade discount, list it on the trade and move on.

How should a UK dealer split stock across channels?

Decide per piece, not per platform. A fast-moving modern Rolex or Omega sells anywhere; put it where the fee is lowest and the cash quickest. A rare vintage piece wants an audience that pays for rarity: Chrono24, Catawiki or a saleroom. Stock that has sat 90 days is costing you a Chrono24 tier and should go to the trade before it costs you the next one. Whatever you use, one system should hold the piece and pause its listings everywhere the moment it is sold, memo'd or sent to the workshop, because the cheapest channel becomes the most expensive the day you sell the same watch twice.

What we could not verify

  • Watchfinder marketplace fees. Described at launch as a fixed fee plus commission; no figures published.
  • Catawiki's fixed fee amount. The 12.5% is published; the additional fixed amount is on a page we could not load on the day.
  • Chrono24's current dealer commission. Dynamic and unpublished; see the Market Portal revenue calculator.
  • Bezel's full tier table. The help page shows an example (12% then 10%) and the $225 minimum; the full schedule is an image we could not read.

Sources

This is general information, not financial or tax advice, and it is not a quotation. Marketplace and auction fees change without public announcement. Verify every figure against the operator's current terms and your own agreement before listing, and take VAT questions on fees and margin to your accountant.

Milleso holds each watch as one record and feeds Chrono24, eBay, Shopify and WooCommerce from it, pausing every listing the moment a piece is sold, goes out on memo or enters the workshop, and records the channel fee against the piece so you can see what each channel actually returns.