eBay UK push trackable delivery
1/10/2009 at 13:24
I had a rather strange marketing email from eBay yesterday, extolling the virtues of trackable postage “to help protect my eBay earnings”. If you missed it, here’s the text of the message:
If you sell items of significant value on eBay, wouldn’t you feel happier knowing that your earnings are protected? By adding online trackable postage to your listings, you can get full protection* for eligible items you sell on eBay, as long as they’re paid for with PayPal.
Why do I need online trackable postage?
Proof of delivery is one of the key requirements for an item to be fully eligible for PayPal Seller Protection*. If your eBay item cannot be tracked online, your sale may not be protected because you won’t have proof of delivery. So if by any chance the item gets lost in the post and the buyer makes a claim, you could lose out on your hard earned money. Online trackable postage starts from just 75p, which is worth the extra piece of mind.Help protect your eBay sales by adding online trackable postage to your listings:
- Log in to My eBay and go to your ‘Sell’ page
- Select your ‘Active’ listings and click the ‘Edit’ button
- Select a postage option such as recorded delivery, which includes online trackable postage
And don’t forget you can print and pay for your postage from your computer with PayPal’s online postage centre.
I feel pretty disturbed by this email. It feels like some kind of protection racket: “wouldn’t you feel happier knowing we’re not going to break your kneecaps?” We all know about PayPal seller protection, and the risks we take not sending packets with trackable delivery. But many of us make a considered decision to work like that:
- trackable delivery is an inconvenience for the buyer: who wants to have to queue at the sorting office on Saturday to pick up their 99p CD or packet of beads?
- trackable delivery is an inconvenience for the seller: it adds hours to our paperwork.
- if we’re selling smaller, cheaper or replicable lines, it’s often not worth it to bother even with recorded delivery; we’ll take the risk, self-insure, and deal with it if there’s a problem later on.
- 75p doesn’t buy you proper trackable insurance: half the time, posties sign for the package themselves and pop it through the letterbox: the only people who are truly better off from recorded delivery are Royal Mail.
- adding a fiver or more to every order for special or courier delivery is not economically viable for a huge percentage of us.
Trackable or not is a decision that sellers should be left to take: it’s our risk, our sales, our margins – so let us make the decision ourselves.
Then there’s how this sits with eBay’s other postage initiative, the one that says sellers in media categories and technology categories and accessories categories have to offer free postage. Frankly, it’s a damn cheek for eBay to say “offer free postage” in one breath, and “make all your items trackable” in the next: that’s another 75p or more that sellers with ever-tighter margins have got to squeeze into their start price. It’s not going to happen.
I hope very much that this is a misguided promo for PayPal seller protection, and nothing more. Perhaps the eBay reps who are now dealing with buyer complaints are finding things a little bit tougher than they expected. It must be hard for them, finding out that sellers who say “some buyers see eBay as a source of free stuff” are actually telling the truth – and that eBay has just committed to underwriting that. If we had everything sent recorded delivery, it’d be Royal Mail’s problem instead.
In their rush to out-Amazon Amazon, I can easily imagine a scenario where eBay mandate trackable postage on all listings. It’s easy for the huge sellers they seem to want to court these days, who are using home delivery networks as part of a larger mail order business. But if you’re an independent seller, often the post is all there is – all you want, and all your buyers want. They already killed off the sub-99p items, which decimated Crafts. Forcing sellers to use trackable delivery would all but kill the lower-priced end of eBay UK, and that can’t be good for buyers, sellers *or* eBay themselves.
Amanda Jay says
1:51 pm on 01/10/2009
You know im so pleased i left ebay when i did the rules get sillier by the week
Free p&P on some cats last time i checked they wanted to do this to books how crazy
Honestly and yeah OK to the trackable Have ebay ever tried claiming for missing recorded stuff??
NO i didnt think so ………..
still trading says
1:52 pm on 01/10/2009
Does any seller ever win a paypal claim? regardless of how its sent!
never mind the trackable bit is there any point of even having a return policy ,when in effect a buyer can have the use of an item for upto 45 days then return it via a paypal not as described claim!
John Pemberton says
4:08 pm on October 2nd, 2009
http://reviews.ebay.co.uk/How-to-WIN-Paypal-Credit-Card-Chargebacks_W0QQugidZ10000000001744144
Savvy Paul says
1:55 pm on 01/10/2009
Hi Sue,
I got a similar email from eBay today, though with some subtle but important differences. Here’s the relevant text:
Proof of delivery is one of the key requirements for an item to be fully eligible for PayPal Seller Protection*. However, eBay items with a sale price over £150 (including postage) don’t qualify for protection unless you also have a signature confirming delivery*. So if by any chance your buyer claims that the item did not arrive, you could lose out on your hard earned money – as well as the item. Adding a signed proof of delivery can start from just 75p, which is worth the extra piece of mind.
Maybe someone at ebay / Paypal realised that the first email was a bit heavy?
Sue Bailey says
1:57 pm on October 1st, 2009
Hmm, that’s a very telling change, isn’t it Paul.
Savvy Paul says
2:19 pm on October 1st, 2009
And also confusing, as it implies that items under £150 do not require proof of delivery – Paypal’s terms state that this only covers ‘protection for unauthorised payment’ NOT ‘protection for item not received’.
From Paypal’s user agreement:
11.8 What is “Proof of Postage”?
Online or physical documentation from a postal company that includes all of the following:
a.A status of “shipped” (or equivalent) and the date of postage
b.The recipient’s address, showing at least the city/county or postcode (or international equivalent).
c.Official acceptance from the shipping company (for example, a postmark, a receipt, or online tracking information).
Or, if you have Proof of Delivery then you do not need Proof of Postage.
11.9 What is “Proof of Delivery”?
Online documentation from a postal company that includes all of the following:
a.A status of “delivered” (or equivalent) and the date of delivery.
b.The recipient’s address, showing at least the city/county or postcode (or international equivalent).
c.Signature Confirmation for transactions that total £150 or more (see Foreign Currency Amounts below for amounts in a currency other than Pounds Sterling).
So it looks like the Royal Mail Tracked service would be suitable for UK items under £150 – i.e. delivery confirmed but no signature required.
Sue Bailey says
2:11 pm on 01/10/2009
Mr Biddy said “how much did Royal Mail pay them to send that out?” I think he may have a point.
Richard says
2:18 pm on 01/10/2009
So not only so they want us to give Free P&P but now they want us to use a more expensive service….
Mwaahah ahahaha hahaha
Hillarious, you couldn’t make it up.
Kiss says
2:36 pm on 01/10/2009
good post Sue, I agree totally!
Steve Antony Williams says
4:35 pm on 01/10/2009
More lunacy from eBay. How many more insults will you put up with before you tell eBay where to go ?
Steve
http://www.ethicalcompanies.co.uk
Jimbo says
4:46 pm on October 1st, 2009
Like you did?
Chris Dawson says
4:49 pm on October 1st, 2009
I think Sue did quite a good job of telling em where to go with this post
We’re both quite vocal on occasion but all the time I’m making money I’ll carry on selling on the site and play the rules to my best advantage.
still trading says
6:18 pm on 01/10/2009
further to my post earlier I am becoming really curious,
has anyone here ever won a paypal claim
as a Seller?
Sue Bailey says
7:03 pm on October 1st, 2009
Yes. Short version of story:
~ buyer v dodgy from start, I had bad feeling
~ sent £30 order recorded delivery
~ buyer did chargeback
~ I spent inordinate amount of time sending info to PayPal
~ PayPal awarded buyer the money anyway
~ I phoned PP and went apeshit
~ PP said “oh yes, you do have seller protection on this” and gave me my money back.
TBH in terms of time spent, it would have been better for me to write off the £30 and get on with selling, but as the buyer was NARUed a week or two later, I tend to think I wasn’t the only person they’d done it to.
still trading says
7:17 pm on October 1st, 2009
ahh
so my suspicions are correct,
even if you do win its not worth it
Lino says
12:43 pm on October 2nd, 2009
We’ve even lost claims when the buyer admits in the Paypal Resolution Centre communication that they really HAVE received the item. They claim, they win, we tell Paypal, Paypal tell us the info is irrelevant as we have no tracking…
Sue Bailey says
12:46 pm on October 2nd, 2009
Yeah, I’ve had similar, Richard. My buyer denied all knowledge of a claim and said she didn’t even know why she’d been refunded… and fortunately she was nice enough to post me a cheque. If only they were all like that!
Simon says
12:47 pm on October 2nd, 2009
We nearly lost one where the buyer had even left feedback saying, “Thanks! Great Item!”
PayPal’s response – “His account might have been hacked”. Really. Why on earth would anyone hack someone else’s account and leave positive feedback…?!!!
Fortunately, PayPal were gracious enough to give us a “Good Will Gesture” and refund us the money, but I don’t know if the buyer also got the money back too.
John Pemberton says
4:10 pm on October 2nd, 2009
I have never lost a paypal claim. You need to make sure you know the rules and your business is geared up to supply data and evidence if something goes wrong. I wrote a basic ebay guide a while ago -
http://reviews.ebay.co.uk/How-to-WIN-Paypal-Credit-Card-Chargebacks_W0QQugidZ10000000001744144
Lino says
4:21 pm on October 2nd, 2009
John, how would my company approaches this?
We send approx 200 eBay orders per day (this figure will easily double towards Christmas). They are mostly low value items, and we make very low margins on them on eBay.
If I put prices up to cover additional shipping costs, I’ll be uncompetitive. Plus I’d probably have to pay for additional staff to send items trackable.
Debs says
7:53 pm on 01/10/2009
“75p doesn’t buy you proper trackable insurance: half the time, posties sign for the package themselves and pop it through the letterbox…”
I have to say the postman I had where I lived previously was guilty of doing this. Whilst I didn’t mind, it kind of made the point of sending something recorded redundant.
Emily says
9:05 pm on 01/10/2009
Recorded delivery is a waste of money. It goes with the normal first / second class mail so is no safer.
Most of the items I send recorded are never signed for – but seeing as the buyers haven’t claimed I guess they must have their items.
Mark says
9:33 pm on 01/10/2009
I agree with a very important part of Sues post.
Ebay are pushing “free postage”.
Sellers use cheapest postage option so as to gain sales.
Items take 3-4 days to arrive from sellers despatch.
Buyer dings sellers DSR’s.
Seller gets demoted in search.
Ebay state it is better for sellers to have free postage.
Anyone see the chain effect here?
As more sellers are forced to offer “free” (no such thing) postage.
The temptation to downgrade postage will strengthen.
This subject could do with its own post.
Mark
Debs says
11:03 pm on 01/10/2009
Also, I am against the principle of free postage as a buyer, as I know that there is no such thing and the postage cost is buried within the cost of the item which robs me of a discount should I wish to make multiple purchases of an item.
I used to buy my mailing bags off eBay for £9.99 for 100, plus £4.99 postage – next day courier. The postage cost of £4.99 was the same whatever quantity I bought, so I’d buy 300+ and pay just £4.99.
Seller now sells for £14.99 with “free postage” with NO DELIVERY GUARANTEES. It took 3 days for me to receive my last order.
I spoke to the seller, who told me that he felt compelled to include the postage cost within the cost of the item as it raised his search standing. The blatantly higher cost also helps offset the increasing eBay fees now that eBay has got rid of attractive powerseller discounts.
It’s a shame, because the seller is a nice guy who USED to offer a good service, but, because of the way eBay has forced him to do business, he has lost my custom.
Debs says
11:13 pm on October 1st, 2009
Additionally, I think other savvy buyers may realise that they are being stung by the way ‘free post’ operates and they may be retaliating by giving low DSRs in this category to make a point.
I might be tempted to do something like this if I was inclined to leave feedback.
Bigpoppa says
11:45 pm on October 1st, 2009
You are simply wrong. There is such a thing as free post, I know because we offer it on our websites and you only have to have a minimum order value of £10.
We do not include the cost of shipping in our items, shipping is an expense as is buying milk for the canteen, no difference.
By offering true free shipping, our business has grown over the past 12 months.
There are obviously cases where the shipping costs are included but I put it to you that they are mainly “back bedroom” businesses.
Sue Bailey says
11:49 pm on October 1st, 2009
Bp, you’ve said this before and it intrigues me. “true free post”: please define this? Either
1) you have a special deal with Royal Mail where you don’t pay for stamps,
2) you deliver everything you sell by some means yourself that costs you nothing (TARDIS, perhaps?), or
3) your selling price does indeed include the cost of postage. You didn’t put your selling prices *up* when you switched from paid-for postage to free postage, so you believe you have “true free postage” for the buyer. Other people mean “even if it’s free to the buyer, it still has to be paid for by the seller” – and I can’t see how you’re paying for postage if it’s not out of your profits. It’s just you’ve squeezed those profits a bit tighter to make postage *feel* free to your buyers.
Similarly, the milk for the canteen: either you’re popping over the fence and nicking it out the cow, you have a friendly farmer who gifts it to you, or it’s being paid for out of your profits.
Bigpoppa says
9:21 am on October 2nd, 2009
Free post from a buyers point of view is this:
Seller 1 sells item A for £21.99 with a delivery charge of £2.99…This is clearly not free postage.
Seller 2 sells item A for £21.99 with no delivery charge…This is free post.
The buyer spends less money by using seller 2.
From a sellers point of view, there is of course no such thing as free post but it’s only relevant from a buyers POV.
By providing true free post, average order value increases, brand loyalty increases and in turn profit increases.
It isn’t right for every business but works very well for us and many other campanies.
We often give away free gifts with orders, obviously we have to buy them but again as far as the buyer is concerned free is free.
I think where the confusion comes from is confusing free from a sellers POV or from a buyers POV.
As for the milk, I just nick it from the office next door…SShhhh
Sue Bailey says
9:24 am on October 2nd, 2009
Right. So from the seller’s point of view, the new free postage offer is coming out of profits.
I don’t think anyone’s confused. Sellers write from a seller’s point of view, and their point that “there is no such thing as free postage, someone always has to pay for it” is correct. Buyers are paying for it. They’re still paying for it even with your “true free postage” – because if you’d reduced your prices and costed postage separately, they could buy more than one item, combine shipping and probably pay less
Hereford United Fan says
9:53 am on October 2nd, 2009
I had an interesting interpretation of the posage rules yesterday with one customer.
He bought 3 of the same item 1 at a time. He then sent me an email asking for a postal discount which had not been applied because he bought them 1 at a time.
He wanted 1 posted to one address and 2 posted to another address and wanted the discount for the second and third items he bought.
I explained he could not have it as they were going to different addresses but he argued that it did not say that on the listing and he was right.
I gave him the discount anyway but ebay probably need to make this clearer.
Gerry007 says
2:00 pm on October 2nd, 2009
SUE,
Been down this route & the argument about ‘free’ Postage several times before….didn’t get anywhere then, so your turn..
katakitty says
8:13 am on October 2nd, 2009
Ordering packaging off of ebay is my No1 nightmare, I used to spend hours trying to compare prices, what a waste of my time. I now stick to 1 seller, send them an email with my total order and he comes back with a price and it all arrives next day. Simples
dd says
11:04 pm on 01/10/2009
Not everyone is professional seller who knows all the ropes and message clearly addressed those who sell items of SIGNIFICANT value not beads and cheap stuff. And ebay is right this time. It is not wise to send 100£ item without proof of delivery. If you are not professional and just sell something for one occasion, obviously there are plenty of people who like to take advantage of that and claim non-receipt. Usually sellers find this out hard way so credit for ebay for informing sellers.
Sue Bailey says
11:07 pm on October 1st, 2009
Incorrect. The message is clearly addressed to a registered business seller ID which sells items with an average value of €10.
ebuyerfb says
2:01 am on 02/10/2009
I don’t normally stick up for eBay but I honestly don’t see anything wrong with this email. I’ve been on both ends of the spectrum where tracking was a major expense for a $3.00 item and when it was negligible considering my items were selling for $600.00+. Being reminded that I’m on my own with the untracked $3.00 items doesn’t bother me one bit.
However the email that #3 is referring to is very disturbing to me and I can’t believe eBay would send something like that though I’m sure they did.
Now when eBay decides one day that buyers love tracking and that it’s an industry standard that all eBay sellers are required to follow, I’ll have a major problem with that.
still trading says
7:13 am on October 2nd, 2009
theres tracking and then theres tracking
Royal mail signed for
is trumpeted as being tracked , though its not really tracked at all,
its proof of delivery at best, and even that is suspect
ebuyerfb says
7:21 am on October 2nd, 2009
In the US we have “delivery confirmation” which is what satisfies PayPal (under $250). Usually it only records that delivery was made but about 5 – 10% of the time (back when I used to check on every item) nothing happens at all. Quite often the zipcode doesn’t match the one the item was sent to.
ebuyerfb says
8:01 am on October 2nd, 2009
I think I might have realized why everyone is objecting. Is your “Royal mail signed for” the equivalent of our signature confirmation (proves delivery and buyer is supposed to sign for it)? If so then I take back what I’ve said.
Chris Dawson says
9:31 am on 02/10/2009
I must be a really bad seller – I’ve just received BOTH versions at 9.03 and then at 9.10 this morning!
Strange thing is they were both to the same eBay user ID and on that ID I already ship EVERYTHING trackable anyway so I’m not sure what they’re trying to tell me!
Matthew (PayPal) says
9:35 am on 02/10/2009
Hi all,
This email was put together as a joint effort between eBay and PayPal. Here’s why:
- Despite the fantastically savvy readership of Tamebay, the vast majority of sellers do not know the ins and outs of Seller Protection (whether offered by PayPal or eBay). Our customer support centre deal with huge volumes of sellers who have lost disputes simply because they couldn’t provide a tracking number. The overwhelming feedback we get from this is that we need to do everything we can to educate sellers BEFORE something bad happens
- The email is only sent if the item listed is over £25 (fixed price) or in a category that typically has more expensive items (if it’s in auction-format)
- Royal Mail ain’t givin’ us nothin. We’re just trying to prevent sellers from losing disputes because we didn’t do a good enough job educating them about the policy.
Savvy Paul picked up on the other variation. If the item is above £150, then you need a signature, therefore, there’s a different version for these items.
My apologies if we’re frustrating you, Chris, but it’s done with the spirit of helping sellers win claims. I welcome any further feedback or criticisms as ultimately, we all have the same goals here, right?
Matthew
Chris Dawson says
9:43 am on October 2nd, 2009
Hey Matthew and thanks for the extra background
For the future if they’re being sent to sellers who have listed an item over a certain value it might be worth kicking off the email with “You recently listed an item worth more than £25…” to set the scene.
As I said I ship everything trackable just so that I’m covered, not that I can remember the last time I had to defend a claim – it was a long time ago. I’m honestly convinced that a signature works wonders for loss prevention and I’m all in favour for sellers of valuable items (or even low value if it can be cost justified).
Setting the scene in the email would however reassure sellers of very low value items that it’s because they listed something for £25 though
Matthew (PayPal) says
9:49 am on October 2nd, 2009
Excellent feedback Chris. Thanks very much.
JD says
10:36 am on October 2nd, 2009
Matthew (PayPal): ‘Royal Mail ain’t givin’ us nothin’
OK but you are getting a percentage of everything bought via PayPal.
So you do have another interest in upselling.
Chris Dawson says
11:14 am on October 2nd, 2009
To be fair from PayPal’s side they stand to lose more by backing sellers if a buyer does a credit card chargeback if the seller has protection than if the item is not sent trackable… Be a lot of tiny percentages on fees to balance coughing up for an item over £150
JD says
1:59 pm on October 2nd, 2009
@ Chris.
They will be getting at least 5%.
@ Matthew (PayPal).
Just had a quick look at online postage. Spotted a small typo (there may be others). It says max compensation for First Class recorded is £36. It is in fact £39.
Chris Dawson says
2:04 pm on October 2nd, 2009
5%? Not from me they won’t!
The 20p per transaction is already paid whether I add 75p on for recorded delivery or not.
The max anyone can then pay is 3.4% which is 2.55p, but I get a merchant discount so in reality it’s a lot less than that.
JD says
2:08 pm on October 2nd, 2009
@ Chris
From RM !!!
Matthew (PayPal) says
9:45 am on 02/10/2009
Chris,
You definitely shouldn’t be getting the email if you’re already offering trackable postage. Also, the emails are capped at 3 per year, so let me check and see why you’re continuing to get them.
Thanks,
Matthew
Hereford United Fan says
9:49 am on October 2nd, 2009
Matthew I got it and send items using Royal Mail tracked. I understand why though. Ebay has not got an option for Royal Mail tracked….
Sue Bailey says
9:55 am on October 2nd, 2009
FWIW, I got the email on a seller account that has never listed anything over £25, and only ever sells on eBay.fr anyway
Savvy Paul says
9:50 am on 02/10/2009
@Bigpoppa “By offering true free shipping, our business has grown over the past 12 months.”
Should that read: “By accepting smaller margins, our turnover has grown”?
In all seriousness, I understand the emotional pull of free shipping (from the buyer’s pov). We do the same on our website.
I also understand the math.
Noel says
9:52 am on 02/10/2009
It’s just another step to eBay getting a slice of FVF for every penny that is involved in a transaction, this will further the push towards postage being included in the listing price, and Paypal being the only payment method on the site, even though they can’t enfore that, they can make it harder to take any other form of payment.
Mark T says
10:11 am on October 2nd, 2009
Then why did they not just charge FVF’s on the postage?
And let the sellers define individually how much postage would cost.
I am still wondering if this logic they have used will ever be explained by Ebay?
Mark
Debs says
1:05 pm on 02/10/2009
“I don’t think anyone’s confused. Sellers write from a seller’s point of view, and their point that “there is no such thing as free postage, someone always has to pay for it” is correct. Buyers are paying for it. They’re still paying for it even with your “true free postage” – because if you’d reduced your prices and costed postage separately, they could buy more than one item, combine shipping and probably pay less”
You took the words right out of my mouth, Sue
Bigpoppa says
4:46 pm on October 2nd, 2009
Lino says
4:07 pm on 02/10/2009
@ Simon, you mention:
“Fortunately, PayPal were gracious enough to give us a “Good Will Gesture” and refund us the money, but I don’t know if the buyer also got the money back too.”
Do you still get these Good Will Gestures? We used to get these when Paypal believed us (and thought the buyer was being unreasonable), but haven’t for the last year or so. These days, things are very black or white. No tracking, no refund.
Simon says
4:13 pm on October 2nd, 2009
I don’t remember exactly when this particular claim was – if I took a guess, I’d say it was about 12 months ago… we haven’t had any more of those good will gestures for a while either, but then, I’ve never been so sure I was being ripped off!
John Pemberton says
4:12 pm on 02/10/2009
I send every item over £5 via Royal Mail Tracked. For the items under £5 about 10% are reported as not arriving. Sending tracked also allows you to give the customer a positive experience and keep them from sending email every hour asking where the item is. Also it allows you to give data to paypal for any claims.
Simon says
4:16 pm on October 2nd, 2009
As I understand it, Royal Mail Tracked doesn’t get a signature from the recipient, correct? So, does PayPal still support claims if the item still gets reported as “not arrived”? Or do you have to claim from Royal Mail?
Just curious.
Lino says
4:22 pm on October 2nd, 2009
John, what sort of price am I looking at to send an item Royal Mail Tracked?
Bigpoppa says
4:36 pm on October 2nd, 2009
It varies on your volume, weights etc. You hould expect to pay somewhere around £2.00 to £2.90 per item. I think our is currently £2.82, we don’t use it that often as it can take upto 3 days and the insurance level is no higher.
Lino says
9:27 am on October 5th, 2009
Thanks Bigpoppa, doesn’t sound like the additional costs are worth it.
Sue Bailey says
4:26 pm on October 2nd, 2009
Sorry John, I disagree, and with my buyer’s hat on (which I wear more frequently than a seller’s one these days), I actively avoid sellers who insist on sending everything trackable, for the following reasons:
1) trackable post is a pain. If I’m not in, I have to go to the post office to pick it up. I work from home and I consider that an inconvenience; if I worked from work, it would be a deal-breaker and I just wouldn’t do it.
2) sellers who insist on sending £5 items by recorded delivery don’t trust me. I don’t care if that’s actually the truth or not: it’s how those T&Cs make me feel. I won’t do business with people who don’t trust me.
3) I don’t “email every hour asking where my items are” anyway, and to be honest, I find sellers who insist on sending everything recorded often abdicate their responsibilities to the courier anyway. I am SICK of sellers who go “here’s the tracking number, you deal with it”, because it’s not my job to get the item delivered, it’s yours.
still trading says
11:42 am on October 3rd, 2009
we would much rather send everything regular mail
as Sue says its a royal pain in the arse sending royal mail signed for especially,
the admin, the palaver , plus the downright bollocks produced for the return you get, using royalmail signed for is just not cost effective
still trading says
11:53 am on October 3rd, 2009
I might add we only send recorded/ signed for, simply because some buyers seem to want it that way,
as far as we are concerned its free money to Royal mail,
and a total waste of our time and effort,
we would much rather just refund the odd loss we have using ordinary mail.
as have to bugger about with signed for,
and still have to refund even more when using recorded, because the buyer cant be bothered to answer the door, or go down to the mail office to collect,
another thing that boils our piss is where do all those flaming uncollected items end up ? we get about one in 3 returned
Lino says
9:39 am on October 5th, 2009
“where do all those flaming uncollected items end up ? we get about one in 3 returned”
I would imagine there are a fair few postmen who have some successful (and very profitable) ebay accounts
AM says
11:15 am on 03/10/2009
Re ”And don’t forget you can print and pay for your postage from your computer with PayPal’s online postage centre”
1 So i put my local and very small post office out of bussiness as the funds will not show as a profit to the tiny PO,
2 doing it this slows down the whole process of posting for us and does makes extra work, we tried it.
Though i do sell some items for under £10 and always send signed for, Because i was a buyer before a seller and felt it fairer on both sides, Also i didn’t want a Darling buyer to say the item didn’t arrive and get the item free.
Though buying from ebay people are looking for the lowest possible price.
We have had buyers try it on but we just put in the tracking number on paypal and won rightfully but my partner is so organised and has a royal mail recorded delivery book and puts the item number in the book.
When we have real claims its taken a month minimum to receive funds back and it relies on the buyer completing a form, or it did.
If its low priced and we are busy we do forget.
Though as i keep banging on about……….
BUT THAT DOESN’T MATTER NOW THAT PEOPLE CAN TRY COSMETICS AND RETURN IT WELL IF THEY FEEL LIKE RETUNING IT AT ALL.
I asked ebay to clarify if Cosmetics that had been used could be returned as i saw food and opened software couldn’t be returned.
The response was well i cant really answer that yes i think its best if do accept USED returns to be on the safe side for 14 days to allow buyers to realise they can return an item!!!! Though he / she wasn’t SURE!!!!!
I avoid clothes as i can returns would happen allot, Though at least they can be re sold (though imagine allot are returned in a very poor state and then rows start, then negs etc
This is insanely above and beyond the letter of law. Now ebay push buyers to offer free postage and also push them to send signed for!
How the hell are people, good people meant to make
Stressed out and fed up seller
AM
Gerry007 says
4:03 pm on 05/10/2009
Maybe this will help us all..!!!!
http://www.collectplus.co.uk/about_collectplus.php
radams says
2:47 am on October 6th, 2009
‘The movement of parcels is provided by Home Delivery Network Limited ‘
Pretty much guaranteed to harm your DSRs then.
Simon says
11:14 pm on 07/10/2009
Royal mail Tracked and signed for seem to be mentioned as the same product but they are different. You need a large volume to use the tracked service and it’s a 3 day service.
We use normal signed for via royal mails software. it’s very quick to process orders once you work exporting / importing addresses but you need to spend 10k plus / year. discounts over 500g are good.
from experience we’ve found that signed for works. occasionaly people moan about having to sign but without it ebay items dissapear at a high rate.
We’re experimenting with p&p inclusive prices – same overall cost but the DSR shows that the buyers are happier on all levels by a significant amount, in some case we’ve increased the price slightly to cover the FVF and that makes no difference. And we need that little extra on the DSR to maintain our discount.