How is ebay shipping determined

[Brian Ashton]

Hi

Want to sell off a bunch of stuff on ebay. But was wondering how shipping costs are determined. Is it done through ebay where I say how big and how much something weighs and they determine it... or do I have to enter in a specific cost for a variety of areas around the world...

[Brian Elfert]

Ebay has a system where you can enter the size and weight and the system will calculate shipping costs for each person. You can also just use a flat rate for shipping that covers the whole USA. You will make money with a flat rate on some addresses and lose money money on some addresses unless you set the flat rate high enough to cover the farthest location. You can also use Priority Mail flat rate and charge everyone the same. Personally, I would not sell to anyone outside the USA unless you have something very unique that wouldn't sell for enough to a USA buyer. The seller takes on a lot more risk when selling overseas if the package never arrives or arrives damaged. Cheap shipping methods can take weeks to arrive. In certain cases, Ebay and Paypal won't release your money until the item is delivered.

Ebay can be a tough place to sell these days. Ebay is 100% slated towards the buyer these days. If a buyer complains about a item they usually win and the seller loses. There are scam buyers who will say they never got a package even when they did get it. My brother had someone pull this scam on him, but somehow he proved the buyer really did get the item.

[Jim Koepke]

As Brian said, limit your sales to the U.S. If someone outside the U.S. wants it they can contact you and you can decide on an individual basis.

I had some odd parts and the only inquiries were from outside the U.S. Priority Mail flat rate has rates to other nations. One was cheaper to send by first class envelope since it was a small screw.

To Help prevent some of the scammers I always send items insured. If someone wants to commit fraud, I would rather it be the Post Offices problem. They are more likely to be able to offer a room and board arrangement for the scammer.

jtk

[Bob Rufener]

Your question as been well answered but also keep in mind that ebay (unless their policy has changed) charges 10% of the selling price as their fee. The fees have gone from nominal to quite high as I found out after selling some items. They really don't advertise their charge and it is not easy to find it out.

[Michael Mahan]

Your question as been well answered but also keep in mind that ebay (unless their policy has changed) charges 10% of the selling price as their fee. The fees have gone from nominal to quite high as I found out after selling some items. They really don't advertise their charge and it is not easy to find it out.
that & Ebay gets % of the shipping price that comes outta yer pocket too !
figure total costs they take is about 25% of the sale as there are also Papal fees witch is Ebay as well

[Brian Elfert]

Ebay started charging their percentage on shipping too because sellers were scamming Ebay by charging 1 cent for an item and then charging an exorbitant shipping fee to get around the percent owed to Ebay.

[Brian Ashton]

thx all that was very helpful.

[Jim Matthews]

I compute all eBay shipping based on USPostal service flat rate boxes.

The boxes have fixed sizes, and the same price for shipping anywhere in the US.

Big stuff is better handled directly with the buyer, using a shipping company.

When in doubt get the buyer to pay over the estimate, and refund the difference.
It's nearly impossible to get compensated, after a sale if you get shorted.

You can also include a nominal handling fee, to offset what PayPal gouges for shipping.

[David Weaver]

Not that it will help brian, but what does etsy charge? There's a fair bit of gear on there.

My mother sells stuff on etsy. She originally sold things on ebay but her items are not high $$ value compared to the shipping and she cut that out.

Figure ebay charges for shipping for two reasons:
1) it generates more revenue
2) it was common before they did for folks to have a $2 item with $10 worth of shipping for two reasons - 1- because they didn't want to pay ebay transaction cost fees, and 2, they didn't want to actually refund a buyer anything despite offering a return policy. Everything on ebay now is pretty much a flat cost of total sale including shipping charges to get rid of the game playing.

I don't love it. I sell a lot less stuff on ebay (never sell for money, but ebay was facilitating my ability buy and try various things without it costing me too much). When I lose a little on shipping and then also have to pay fees on everything and lose a few bucks on the sale of something, it's a whole lot less convenient and they can just stuff it unless there is something out of the ordinary (like a pile of frictionite hones) that needs to be exposed to the number of eyes ebay has.

If they could've stayed private and kept fees reasonable, I'd be a happy customer, but if they would've stayed private, maybe they wouldn't have had enough money to grow and expand services.

[Judson Green]

20¢ to list an item for 4 months, 3.5% of sale. At etsy

[David Weaver]

I can live with that.

[Judson Green]

Hand tools are listed, not sure about finding a part for one. And quite alot of this kind of stuff.

282768 282769

[David Weaver]

I've bought a couple of planes and sharpening stones off of etsy without issue. What's up there long term appears to be stuff that's either junk or out of line on price. Ebay is the same on a larger scale, maybe more organized, but ebay was a lot like etsy is now at first.

I just haven't sold stuff there, but my mother does all the time and she's pretty easy to confuse sometimes.

I think I'll take my whole party over there. Thanks for the info!

[Mike Henderson]

I went and took a look at etsy. Prices are just out of line. One advantage of an auction is that it finishes with the actual market price of the item and it finishes in a fixed amount of time.

Mike

[David Weaver]

That's true, until you get something that you like on ebay and everyone else does, too. When someone gets into my position (where I have everything I need, and I just would rather have nicer versions or better made), getting nicer things on ebay puts me into the same group of people who also know what's good and will pay for it.

On etsy, there can be 100 listings, but still a lowball or two that are worth picking up.

For example, there was a norton combination washita stone with a razor hone on there for about a week once for $32. I watched it and looked past it. The razor hone was worth more than $32, but there's few people looking on etsy for that kind of stuff and I eventually bought both of them. The pair would've gone for $100 on ebay.

There are also, though, plenty of listings of cracked out planes on etsy for $125. But those are on ebay, too.

I've gotten to the point as a buyer on ebay where I nearly exclusively buy items that have just been listed as BIN. I set my searches up that way because you can find things that were listed lower than an auction will take them. But you have to find them quickly and you can't sit around long and think about whether or not you'll buy them of they'll be gone.

[Brian Ashton]

I've gotten to the point as a buyer on ebay where I nearly exclusively buy items that have just been listed as BIN. I set my searches up that way because you can find things that were listed lower than an auction will take them. But you have to find them quickly and you can't sit around long and think about whether or not you'll buy them of they'll be gone.


I used to do that a lot. Probably the best one I came across was a full set of lie nielsen HSS chisels in a leather role BIN for $150. Only thing that had me wondering was the coco bolo handles. At that time I didn't thing they had made coco bolo handles. By the time I found out (about t30 mins later) they had made a few handles that way the auction was done and dusted