MSE News: Royal Mail caps stamps supply after stampede

downs523

If I buy some stamps now how long can they be valid to use? Is it indefinite? Or will current styles be phased out?

downs523

Is it worth buying bulk to resell on eBay?

Example:
1000x 1st class = £460.

Say you list them for £580 (£20 cheaper than the new price)
After Ebay and paypal fees (10% upto £40 and 3.4%) = £510.28

Profit of £50.28 excluding posting them.

poppy10_2

downs523 wrote: »

Is it worth buying bulk to resell on eBay?

Example:
1000x 1st class = £460.

Say you list them for £580 (£20 cheaper than the new price)
After Ebay and paypal fees (10% upto £40 and 3.4%) = £510.28

Profit of £69.72 excluding posting them.

This has been discussed on the other thread. You're unlikely to get anyone that will want to buy 1000 stamps in one go (business users won't use ebay to purchase their stamps, for personal users if they wanted to buy in bulk, they'd be stocking up now).

Realistically the most you could sell in one listing would be 100 - so that's at least ten sets of ebay insertion fees in addition to the percentage final value fee (10%) and paypal fees, ten sets of post and packaging costs, plus all the time and effort involved. Plus, as people are stocking up on stamps now, you probably won't sell in sufficient volumes until next year, by which time inflation will have eaten into your initial investment. Hardly going to be worth it, really.

poppy10_2

downs523 wrote: »

If I buy some stamps now how long can they be valid to use? Is it indefinite? Or will current styles be phased out?

Indefinite, Royal Mail have never stopped accepting any of their old first class stamps no matter how old.

Sledgehead

downs523 wrote: »

Is it worth buying bulk to resell on eBay?

Example:
1000x 1st class = £460.

Say you list them for £580 (£20 cheaper than the new price)
After Ebay and paypal fees (10% upto £40 and 3.4%) = £510.28

Profit of £69.72 excluding posting them.

You are assuming you can sell them all in one go. Chances are you will have to break them up, so you'll get no £40 limit on your ebay seller fees.
On quantities of 100, it works like this:


Your notional profit margin = 30%
Your gross profit margin = 26%
profit margn after ebay & paypal costs = 9%*
profit margin after P&P = 8%
proft margin after recorded delivery fees = 6%

5yr fxd cash isa with halifax = 4.5%

*The huge slump in margin following the ebay and paypal fees (~17%) is unintuitive as these fees apparently amount to 13.4% (+40p), but remember that these fees are charged not on your cost of goods sold but on your turnover - a much higher figure.

Is all that listing , ledgering and accounting really worth 1.5%?

And remeber, @ 580, you are only offering a 3.3% discount. I bet superdrug will be undercutting you. Match superdrug / ocado and you'll be making little more than a good fxd cash isa.

[some edits due to !!!! early math - sorry]

MarkLS12

scottishminnie wrote: »

Has anyone bought stamps for personal use online from Royal Mail? The reason I ask is that before Christmas when my local PO had run out of second class stamps (yes really!) I said I would just go and buy them online. The assistant informed me that only Small Businesses were entitled to use the online service to buy stamps and as an individual I was not eligible.

I do notice that the link above takes you through to the area for Small Businesses hence my question. I'd hate to incur the wrath of Royal Mail!

Your local PO was wrong.

I use the Royal Mail online shop all the time, have done for about five years. I'm not a business, just use them for occasional ebaying and greetings cards.

I ordered 100 2nd class last week, they arrived on Wednesday.

The only thing to be careful of is that some things have a delivery charge.
For example, a sheet of 100 stamps is free delivery, while 10 books of 12 stamps would have a delivery charge.

soolin

scottishminnie wrote: »

Has anyone bought stamps for personal use online from Royal Mail? The reason I ask is that before Christmas when my local PO had run out of second class stamps (yes really!) I said I would just go and buy them online. The assistant informed me that only Small Businesses were entitled to use the online service to buy stamps and as an individual I was not eligible.

I do notice that the link above takes you through to the area for Small Businesses hence my question. I'd hate to incur the wrath of Royal Mail!

Anyone can buy and if you spend over £50 the special delivery is free.

Sledgehead

soolin wrote: »

Anyone can buy and if you spend over £50 the special delivery is free.

Interesting as 40 books of 2nds @ £175 are wanting £1.45 in p&p

MarkLS12

Sledgehead wrote: »

Interesting as 40 books of 2nds @ £175 are wanting £1.45 in p&p

Yep, but a sheet of 100 2nds is £36 and has no P&P charge, so you could get four or five of them instead.

3010

rapido wrote: »

Some rolls are marked "self adhesive" and others "gummed".

Any clue what the other ones are?

e.g. "1,000 x 2nd Class Stamp Roll"

-rapido

Self adhesive is where you just pick them off and stick them onto stuff.

Gummed is the good old fashioned lick and stock ones. :drool: :drool: :drool:

hth