Excessive postage etc

cyberbob

GabbaGabbaHey wrote: »

So how much do you think that you should have paid?

Remember to include:
1) The actual cost of postage
2) The cost of the packaging material used
3) The cost (petrol or bus fare) of transporting the item to the Post Office
4) The salary paid to his staff for their time taken to package the item and transport it to the Post Office (you can use Minimum Wage when calculating this)
5) The salary paid to his staff for their time taken to respond to a Buyer (this means you!) who disputes a charge which they had formerly agreed to

How much does that come to, before you accuse him of being a "cheat"?!

Your missing the point you can charge whatever you like but if you overcharge expect to pay for it with DSRs or feedback. 2 or 3 low DSRs and you start to appear lower in searches and more and you risk suspension. So you'll end up losing more money in lost sales than the money your attempting to get via P&P charges. Also even without the DSRs if people feel conned you'll get less returning customers.

Some sellers just don't seem to see the bigger picture and have very poor business sense.

cyberbob

GabbaGabbaHey wrote: »

[
Postage is only one component of those expenses, but many people (including the OP) only look at the Postage costs and do not factor in the other expenses which constitute P&P.[/COLOR]

In any sensible persons view 3 times cost price is excessive

George666

GabbaGabbaHey wrote: »

No - but it is all part of "Postage and Packaging" (which is what eBay refers to). It includes all the expenses which the Seller has to incur in order to get the item to the Buyer.

Postage is only one component of those expenses, but many people (including the OP) only look at the Postage costs and do not factor in the other expenses which constitute P&P.

Hi I have said this before but I will say it again if you are going to comment on a thread could you please read the whole thread first or at the very least read the OPs first post and any updates the OP makes.
The OP may not be that bothered about the fact the item needed cleaning before it could be used and us disscussing if the postage was right or wrong is also a waste of time you must understand the next buyer might not leave the seller negative feedback or ask a forum what to do about the sale.
The next buyer this seller gets may just get the stuff they bought take one look at it and the postage costs and then never buy anything from ebay ever again and this seller may have already driven customers away from ebay that have not bothered to leave negative feedback or ask us for advise.
Cyberbob is right a lot of buyers will be confused by an item when it arrives that cost £2.14 to post, they will wonder why they have been charged £6.50 whether this is what it cost to send with petrol and parking costs added does not make a bit of difference to a confused buyer they will probably never buy anything from ebay again and if you sell on ebay this means that this affects you I may be wrong and I am sure Cyberbob will correct me if I am but this is the point he is making and it is a very good and valid one.
The buyers that this would confuse the most are buyers that have just made their first purchase from ebay if they never buy anything else as they feel like they have been ripped off this will affect all sellers on ebay and I am sure all other sellers who post on this forum will agree with me on this.
What makes this even worse is that the now seller admits they made a mistake with the postage but they are not going to refund the OP the seller is instead just going to keep the extra money as profit.
Sellers like this just drive away customers less buyers means less profit for people like me and other members of this forum who do their best to make sure that a buyer gets a good deal and more importantly feel like they have been dealt with fairly and therefore will come back and buy things from ebay in the future not just from us but from other sellers as well.
Sellers like the one that the OP has been dealing with need lots of negative feedback to warn other buyers not to buy from them otherwise we as sellers all lose out as this seller will drive customers away from ebay.
Remember if a customer gets a bad deal and feels ripped off they will tell everyone they know and anyone who will listen to them about it so it is not just one or two customers a seller like this could drive away it could be a lot more when you include a customers family and friends.

GabbaGabbaHey

George666 wrote: »

Hi I have said this before but I will say it again if you are going to comment on a thread could you please read the whole thread first or at the very least read the OPs first post and any updates the OP makes.

What a very bizzare statement. It seems evident to me that you are the one who has been negligent in terms of reading the whole thread and keeping up with what's been said.

My initial posting was a direct (annd so far unanswered) question to the OP - quoting part of their original posting - and my second was in response to somebody who made the common error of confusing "P&P" with "Postage".

George666 wrote: »

Cyberbob is right a lot of buyers will be confused by an item when it arrives that cost £2.14 to post, they will wonder why they have been charged £6.50 whether this is what it cost to send with petrol and parking costs added does not make a bit of difference to a confused buyer

Many buyers do stupid things, from paying more than they could have bought the item for in a shop, to bidding more than once on an item. If people are going to use a business like eBay (either as a buyer or seller) without fully understanding how it works and what they will be paying for, then in my opinion they are Too Stupid For eBay and deserve whatever they get.

George666 wrote: »

The buyers that this would confuse the most are buyers that have just made their first purchase from ebay if they never buy anything else as they feel like they have been ripped off this will affect all sellers on ebay and I am sure all other sellers who post on this forum will agree with me on this.

That's all fine if you want to sell to the feeble and insane, but any sensible eBay buyer will compare purchase prices inclusive of P&P (and even for those who cannot add two numbers together, eBay makes it easy to do this - you can sort your search results by "Price + P&P").

George666 wrote: »

Sellers like the one that the OP has been dealing with need lots of negative feedback to warn other buyers not to buy from them

On the contrary, it's the Buyer who really deserves the negative feedback here - he agreed to pay the stated P&P, and is now bleating about it.

jopwo_87

I bought a purse on ebay a few weeks ago and noted that the postage was quoted at £7. After i received the item i was dismayed to say the least when i find that the actual postage for the purse was £2.14.

The bag it was posted in was a standard mailing back bought for approx 10pence on ebay. After paypal have taken their chunk off the delivery fees (25pence approx) that leaves £4.51 to get the item to any post office within a 4 working day time frame.

Regardless of what way you look at it, thats a profit to the seller.

jasmineswhiskers

GabbaGabbaHey wrote: »

... he agreed to pay the stated P&P, and is now bleating about it.

So imagine if the P&P actually cost MORE than stated (I have done this before now :doh:), would the buyer pay the difference if asked? Errmm...no!

Peter_Lanky

jopwo_87 wrote: »

I bought a purse on ebay a few weeks ago and noted that the postage was quoted at £7. After i received the item i was dismayed to say the least when i find that the actual postage for the purse was £2.14.

The bag it was posted in was a standard mailing back bought for approx 10pence on ebay. After paypal have taken their chunk off the delivery fees (25pence approx) that leaves £4.51 to get the item to any post office within a 4 working day time frame.

Regardless of what way you look at it, thats a profit to the seller.

It is obvious that £7 postage for a purse is excessive, so why on earth did you buy it? How much did you expect a purse to weigh?

George666

Hi GabbaGabbaHey you ask why I asked people to read the whole thread or at least the OPs first post and any updates the OP posted.
I can see by your most recent post you have still not done this or if you have you maybe did not understand them so I will post the update that the OP has posted so you can read it and explain what it means for you.

jennyjelly wrote: »

Update: After a few emails back and forth the seller has admitted that the postage cost shown was accidentally left over from a previous listing (we've all done that I'm sure) and it should have been £3.50. Still refusing to refund the difference though - I think it didn't sell for as much as he thought it would and he wants me to return it for a refund because he thinks he might do better next time.

And no, I don't feel ripped off by the product, just by the postage, I don't like cheats.

I will explain this for you the OP got a bargain the seller did not really want to sell at that price so they never cleaned the item before sending it and took their time in sending it in the hope it would be returned or the sale would be canceled so they could try listing the item again then when the OP queried the postage the seller basically laughed in the OPs face and said well I made a mistake but I am keeping the extra money in the hope again that the item will be returned.
If you still defend the seller who clearly will not last long on ebay with an attitude like this then you must be the seller or know the seller.
To admit to ripping off a customer with postage charges by mistake even if they have got a bargain from you and then say, well that's OK by me I have just made some extra cash out of you is the work of a numpty of the first order do they not realise this is going to at best offend the buyer they could have at least tried to make up an excuse as to why the charges were 3 times the postage but why should they when they want the OP to return the item.
There are numerous reasons to give this seller negative feedback and luckily you don't normally find all of these mistakes in just one sale.
Just because the OP got a bargain there is no excuse for treating them this way ebay is an auction site and and by its very nature some you win some you lose the seller shound have started the bidding higher on the auction if they wanted more money for the item.
OP just give this seller the negative feedback they truly deserve and remember to give them all 1 star ratings as well and then move on that is my advise and I am sticking to it.

clancy

WOW Ive just seen a ralph lauren shirt with postage costs of £24.99 :-0

jennyjelly

DaveAshton wrote: »

They actually could have posted it on the 6th . The 7th was a Sunday, so it doesn't count as a day for printed postage reasons.

Still outside the stated 4 days, though.

Seller has confirmed it was posted on Monday 8th.

Now accusing me of extortion (I haven't made any threats or even hinted at low fb etc, no mention whatsoever).