Posting item to Hungary

hats123

Hello all, I have sold my item on ebay, a HP Touchpad tablet - and the winner is in Hungary. I hadn't excluded foreign buyers, but I also hadn't included any pricing for foreign shipping etc, and the winner hadn't contacted me before bidding.

After the buyer won the item, he then emailed me asking to confirm the shipping costs to Hungary, he believed it would only cost around £3 (yeh right)! Obviously its going to cost more than this (in the UK I would only use Special Delivery for an expensive item and had said £10 for this). So I have checked on the Royalmail and I can use the International Signed for service (I hope anyway).

The address to be shipped to matches on paypal - how safe is this transaction? Am I definately going to be able to get a signiture delivery service to Hungary? The buyer has good feedback, and seems ok! Any pittfalls I have missed?

Many thanks for any advice at all!

soolin

Royal Mail will not be a suitable service, you need a courier.

We have a regular on here who might be able to advise you as many couriers exclude laptops. I think you need to pm hannyman- but if that's incorrect I'm sure someone will give you the right name.

Otherwise try the courier thread, but make sure you mention it is a laptop as you'll need a specilaist courier.

I know it is too late to be helpful now, but if you are allowing overseas bidders it really does pay to list the postal prices to avoid this issue. Then you could have sorted out all your prices before listing, rather than have to scoot around now trying to sort it out. Personally I think you are brave with a laptop going overseas, but I suspect I am overly cautious in my sales.

hats123

Hi, thanks for the reply - I didn't really want to send abroad, I assumed because I only included postage to the UK that only UK buyers would be permitted. I have since learnt that this isn't correct!
I was debating just cancelling the listing and not selling to the buyer.

victoria1986_2

Hi,

I have sent a laptop with parcelforce before. It has to go by road. Try Postagesupermarket's parcelforce Europe Service. I think that you can even choose to drop it at your local Post Office now as well.

Have'nt tried the Post Office drop off myself as yet. If you do use it, could you let me know how t goes. Think its really new as parcel2go and interparcel are not offering it yet.

Cheers

Crowqueen

hats123 wrote: »

Hi, thanks for the reply - I didn't really want to send abroad, I assumed because I only included postage to the UK that only UK buyers would be permitted. I have since learnt that this isn't correct!
I was debating just cancelling the listing and not selling to the buyer.

If you haven't made it explicit that you don't want overseas buyers I'm afraid there will be repercussions - the buyer can leave you a neg, report as a non-performing seller, hammer your stars, refuse to cancel the sale and CS won't remove them: they do sometimes but for that you either need to state on your listings you would not sell overseas or block them completely and be the victim of a glitch that has allowed them to bid for some reason.

Not stating anything will not get you far.

I don't blame you about being squeamish in this instance but you always need to make things obvious - buyers will assume any item they can bid on is fair game; they may or may not respect or understand verbal warnings, so it's always important to have your software blocks set correctly.

The member's name is Hammyman, by the way.

hats123

Looks like I have to send it then! Surely the buyer should check postage charges before bidding, theoretically couldn't I change a ridiculous amount for postage now? Not that I would!

davewinston

victoria1986 wrote: »

Hi,

I have sent a laptop with parcelforce before. It has to go by road. Try Postagesupermarket's parcelforce Europe Service. I think that you can even choose to drop it at your local Post Office now as well.

Have'nt tried the Post Office drop off myself as yet. If you do use it, could you let me know how t goes. Think its really new as parcel2go and interparcel are not offering it yet.

Cheers

Very expensive compaired to others.

Crowqueen

hats123 wrote: »

Looks like I have to send it then! Surely the buyer should check postage charges before bidding, theoretically couldn't I change a ridiculous amount for postage now? Not that I would!

Perhaps you should have thought about that possibility first and made sure your blocks were set. Selling something of that value is always going to be risky - and it's your responsibility to do the risk assessment before you list as you bear responsibility for a successful sale when it ends with a winning bidder.

You could charge an extortionate amount but that would only backfire on you.

hats123

The buyer expected shipping to be "around £3" - doing some online quotes we are looking at around £30/£40 for courier delivery - buyer is going to have a bit of a shock there! I've posted items abroad before, but people have always contacted me for a quote first - seems crazy to me not to ask first? Especially as I had UK postage as £10!

Valli

hats123 wrote: »

The buyer expected shipping to be "around £3"

That'll possibly be because of their exchange rates - they're on FORINTS not euros by the way!

hats123

Thanks! Fingers crossed then it goes smoothly!