undercharged ebay postage

carly24

Hi all. I was wondering if anyone could help me. I'm new to this and ebay. I've sold three things so far. When I went to the post office I realised I overcharged on the postage. I'd put £1.20 but it only came to 69p! My sister said I should remember that packaging costs as does my time and effort. Anyway, because I'd reused a jiffy bag I thought it only fair to tell the buyer. She thanked me for being honest and said it was okay and not to bothe with the refund. The other two were 20p off the mark. Similar responses.

So, given that, when I next put an item up I put the price I previously had to pay for postage (69p) as I was going to reuse jiffy bags. Anyway I went to the post office and a top just a little larger cost £2.20 postage. Great! And a bundle of baby clothes cost an extra 60p. I posted the latter anyway. But it's been niggling at me - should I post the top as it was my fault anyway (ignorance of postage charges is no excuse) or tell the buyer.

I'm more inclined to do the former - send it anyway. The top went for £2.04 anyway! Just your views please. Thanks

elsien

Send it anyway and put it down to experience -it's not the buyers fault you miscalculated.
Then invest in a pair of scales, weigh the packaged item and check the prices and sizes for letters, large letters and packets on the royal mail website before you put the listing up on ebay. It's ok to stick extra on top for packaging etc, most buyers expect it but remember that buyers rate you on postage costs so if you put too much extra on buyers will give you less stars which will affect your ratings in the long run.

skivenov

Send it anyway. The thing with estimating, for whatever reason, is always going to make it "win some lose some".

carly24

Yes, you're right. It's not the buyer's fault. I'll send it anyway. One less bit of clutter I guess. I wish I'd sent it yesterday now.
Thanks for replying

elsien

Easily done when you first start - done it myself once or twice. I now own a cheap pair of electronic scales from Lidl which do the job pretty effectively.

Angie74

I've got one of the free size templates from royal mail when they were giving them away. Don't think they are now though, but you can buy them on ebay. it's been great for making sure my packages fit through the large letter gap. It's a big jump from 1.10 to 2.20 if you could have folded it different so the size and thickness goes as a large letter rather than packet. I used my template to make one for my daughter, you could make your own if you can be bothered. Just need some cardboard and the measurements. I use my kitchen electronic scales for weighing them.