Reduced postage for 2 items

judy2357

Buyer has just won bid for two small items from me and now wants reduced postage. I admit I have overestimated the postage slightly and by packing the 2 items together the postage will be much cheaper. I have returned the invoice knocking off 50p reducing the postage from £3.50 to £3 as a goodwill gesture. If I reduce it much more I am reducing my profit by selling to items to one person rather than two separate purchasers. Is it normal to half the postage and packing costs in this case?

Hermia

judy2357 wrote: »

Is it normal to half the postage and packing costs in this case?

For me it depends on how much the two items will cost to post. If the second item is very light and it won't cost much extra to post the two items together I will reduce the P&P by a large amount. If both items are heavy sometimes the postage cost is not much less so I will reduce the P&P by a small amount.

TurkishDelight

50p sounds fair to me.
You are also "saving" the paypal flat fee for one of the purchases which might be something to consider.
Always pees me off when I win a few things from the same seller and I don't get a discount- tempting to pay for everything seperately, but it's easier not to, and is a bit mean I guess.

cyberbob

judy2357 wrote: »

If I reduce it much more I am reducing my profit by selling to items to one person rather than two separate purchasers. Is it normal to half the postage and packing costs in this case?

So are you making your profit on P&P costs?

wookeyhole1

i always be fair with my postage discount and normally give 50% off second items and more off it they bought 3 or more items.

i find that if you give a better postage discount people are more likely to buy more and i would prefer to sell all my items to 1 person and only pay 1 paypal fee than say sell all 10 items to individual buyers and pay 10 lots of paypal fees especially if its low cost items such as 99p. imo

for example i used to sell alot of dvd's and give really good discounts if buyers bought more than 1. now because ebay have introduced free p+p on dvd's i am nearly always selling them to different buyers costing me more in fees

sinw

For me i guess i would give all the postage and packaging profit back for combining the two items, your not loosing anything by doing so and can only gain in reputation and feedback by doing so. maybe drop the buyer a line stating u think this is fair and u value there custom to maximise the feedback.

liam8282

You don't have to give any discount on the postage, the buyer was happy to bid on two seperate items so should be happy to pay the costs as they have bid.

If you were an ebay shop or a regular seller I would expect a discount, but these sellers usually advertise this in their sales.

When you don't regularly sell stuff on ebay, when calculating the postage cost you could include various amounts to make up the cost to yourself.

For example you could take into account the actual postage cost, the packaging cost, the cost of you getting to and from the post office (within reason).

If everything is clearly stated at the start of the auction, the bidder is happy to pay those costs and it is upto the sellers discretion if they want to give a discount.

judy2357

Thank you for all your replies, my purchaser has now paid and accepted my invoice.