Postage & packing on a pram?

bluep

I've recently listed my travel system on ebay with a start price of £40 and a buy it now of £85 collection only. However the only person to show any interest lives north of Manchester (around 1.5 hours from me) and wants to know postage. Others seller similar things are charging from £15 - £25 and I think mine is quite heavy altogether (around 10-15kg) and bulky.

The auction is ending in an hour - what do you think I should quote them? Royal Mail say they take up to 20kg for £13 but I'm thinking a courier might be easier?

Has anyone got any experience of posting/couriering large bulky items and how would you recommend I wrap it - the only thing I can think of is trying to cobble together a large cardboard wrapping from lots of smaller supermarket boxes wrapped in a humungous load of brown tape!?

It comprises of:
a large folding buggy
a carrycot attachment
a graco car seat base (but not the actual car seat)
and various other bits and bobs like seat cover, head rests and raincover...

Jakejakejake

For couriering use payperdrop.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Nextday-PayPerDrop-Parcel-Delivery-Service-UK24-5-99_W0QQitemZ170098912018QQcategoryZ121879QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD1VQQcmdZViewItem
or i have just started using a new one called dewingbc - very good so far!
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=010&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWN%3AIT&viewitem=&item=200098351558&rd=1&rd=1

demonicangel

I sold my travel system which was the buggy and carseat a while back.

The postage came to just under £18 with a parcelforce code.

A courier will be easier seeing as they can pick it up from yours and deliever, thats what I done.

To get a rough idea of the weight, can you weigh it or look at similar travel systems online and get the weight that way?

I had the box from my one still and put the carseat in first and then the buggy, covered with loads of bubble wrap on tape on top. Use boxes and bubble wrap and it should be fine.

I belive you can get couriers on ebay but dont know any names.

One thing I will say is watch out for the size. Even though mine was 15kg altogether, I found a lot of couriers would only take under a certain size, parcelfdorce would out the cheapest for me.

HTH

natalie1974

I have used payperdrop on all 6 occasions recently when sending buggies/prams . Basically so long as the buggy turns up unscathed most buyers know that you wouldn't have the original box so as long as it doesn't turn up in just a black sack (like a buggy I bought the other week did !) the buyer will be happy it arrives in one piece

Jakejakejake

For packaging maybe corrugated card could work:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Corrugated-Paper-Roll-300mm-x-75mtrs_W0QQitemZ230113380273QQcategoryZ72359QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
Shorter, wider, cheaper Here: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Corrugated-Packing-Paper-10M-x-600mm_W0QQitemZ200097060966QQcategoryZ72359QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
And yes, tape it up a lot. If you can find a big box at the supermarket that would be good but im not sure if they would have one big enough.

Good Luck!

bluep

RE payperdrop - I don't understand...are they charging £5.99 no matter what the size of the parcel? I was planning to get some flattened cardboard from the supermarket (clean of course), wrap the buggy with most of the accessories in plastic, then try and fold the large pieces of cardboard round it and seal with tons of brown wrapping tape. Then do the same for the graco autobase...

The buggy itself is 13kg and with the autobase and accessories at another...5-7kg, I think all in all, 20kg would cover it.

lol. might be easier just to sell it in our NCT nearly new sale in a couple of weeks time and forgo the 25% they take!!

Jakejakejake

This one explains it better: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/UK-NEXT-DAY-PAYPERDROP-PARCEL-DELIVERY-SERVICE-MAX_W0QQitemZ170097731467QQcategoryZ121879QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

bluep

ah ok. That makes more sense. And what happens if the person is out when they deliver? Who pays the extra - does it sit with the receiver or can they collect from a depot?

Jakejakejake

My buyer has missed delivery before, there were no extra charges, all it takes is a call to local dhl depot. I also missed a parcel sent with them before - they just re delivered next day for free.

rose_sparky

Re large boxes, do you have a local shop that sells t.v's or washing machines?

Another idea is to scour industrial estates, in the evenings or week-ends. It's a good source of unwanted large cardboard boxes by their bins.