Buyer from Russia, need advice on postage

hubb

Well I listed an item that was only available in the UK (ceramic cat) which was won by a 100% feedback buyer from Russia. No idea how this happened as I removed international postage from my listing, but checking the actual auction when over, all those countries were still in the drop down menu at the UK rate of £3.80.  I have had no experience sending to Russia, and with Hermes being totally unreliable of late I am wondering my cheapest option. The royal mail seem very hit and miss of late too so a bit worried on what to do as the buyer paid a decent price for the item so I don't want to lose the sale. Suffice to say Ebay make it very very complicated to set up postage options.

soolin

hubb said:

Well I listed an item that was only available in the UK (ceramic cat) which was won by a 100% feedback buyer from Russia. No idea how this happened as I removed international postage from my listing, but checking the actual auction when over, all those countries were still in the drop down menu at the UK rate of £3.80.  I have had no experience sending to Russia, and with Hermes being totally unreliable of late I am wondering my cheapest option. The royal mail seem very hit and miss of late too so a bit worried on what to do as the buyer paid a decent price for the item so I don't want to lose the sale. Suffice to say Ebay make it very very complicated to set up postage options.

Are you sure this isn’t via GSP,  Does the address actually show RUssia? All my listings show a vast amount of options for postage, yet at the moment I only have Ireland enabled, the rest are all GSP and will show the UK postage. 

Personally I wouldn’t ship to Russia and would prefer to take the hit and cancel.

hubb

soolin said:

hubb said:

Well I listed an item that was only available in the UK (ceramic cat) which was won by a 100% feedback buyer from Russia. No idea how this happened as I removed international postage from my listing, but checking the actual auction when over, all those countries were still in the drop down menu at the UK rate of £3.80.  I have had no experience sending to Russia, and with Hermes being totally unreliable of late I am wondering my cheapest option. The royal mail seem very hit and miss of late too so a bit worried on what to do as the buyer paid a decent price for the item so I don't want to lose the sale. Suffice to say Ebay make it very very complicated to set up postage options.

Are you sure this isn’t via GSP,  Does the address actually show RUssia? All my listings show a vast amount of options for postage, yet at the moment I only have Ireland enabled, the rest are all GSP and will show the UK postage. 

Personally I wouldn’t ship to Russia and would prefer to take the hit and cancel.

Yes, def Russia but she has 100% feedback.

soolin

hubb said:

soolin said:

hubb said:

Well I listed an item that was only available in the UK (ceramic cat) which was won by a 100% feedback buyer from Russia. No idea how this happened as I removed international postage from my listing, but checking the actual auction when over, all those countries were still in the drop down menu at the UK rate of £3.80.  I have had no experience sending to Russia, and with Hermes being totally unreliable of late I am wondering my cheapest option. The royal mail seem very hit and miss of late too so a bit worried on what to do as the buyer paid a decent price for the item so I don't want to lose the sale. Suffice to say Ebay make it very very complicated to set up postage options.

Are you sure this isn’t via GSP,  Does the address actually show RUssia? All my listings show a vast amount of options for postage, yet at the moment I only have Ireland enabled, the rest are all GSP and will show the UK postage. 

Personally I wouldn’t ship to Russia and would prefer to take the hit and cancel.

Yes, def Russia but she has 100% feedback.

Up to 2KG Royal Mail will be cheaper especially if postage is coming out of your own pocket if buyer has only paid UK postage. Also buyers can only have 100% feedback even Russian ones where stuff takes weeks to clear their customs .  Just check RM for current delay warnings and make sure you are careful with the address - does it show entirely in English characters? 

I would also recommend posting ASAP if you are going ahead with this, Russian buyers often open INR cases quite quickly to protect themselves  long before the item has managed to get through customs as they know customs will lose or ‘mislay’ some of their incoming post. You need to give yourself every chance of this getting there in good time .

Russian buyers do spend money though, a fair percentage of my Facebook sales go to Russian buyers . They often turn up to buy one thing and end up going home with three or four items. 

soolin

As mentioned above Customs are not in Russia and when you research postage you will get this warning

Customs

Russian Customs have advised that where there is insufficient or incorrect descriptions on CN22/CN23 declarations, items will be returned to senders . It is therefore imperative that specific descriptions of contents are given on customs forms, to enable clearance through Russian customs.

As for setting up postage options in eBay it is actually quite simple. Depending on which view of eBay you use there will be additional or international postage options. You can add as many as you like for the countries you haven’t blocked, the countries are all zoned so just price each accordingly, Europe, Zone 1 etc and remember that the US is now its own zone . You can still block Individual countries in your seller settings, I used to sell to Europe but always exclude Italy and Russia due to the amount of losses. 

hubb

soolin said:

hubb said:

soolin said:

hubb said:

Well I listed an item that was only available in the UK (ceramic cat) which was won by a 100% feedback buyer from Russia. No idea how this happened as I removed international postage from my listing, but checking the actual auction when over, all those countries were still in the drop down menu at the UK rate of £3.80.  I have had no experience sending to Russia, and with Hermes being totally unreliable of late I am wondering my cheapest option. The royal mail seem very hit and miss of late too so a bit worried on what to do as the buyer paid a decent price for the item so I don't want to lose the sale. Suffice to say Ebay make it very very complicated to set up postage options.

Are you sure this isn’t via GSP,  Does the address actually show RUssia? All my listings show a vast amount of options for postage, yet at the moment I only have Ireland enabled, the rest are all GSP and will show the UK postage. 

Personally I wouldn’t ship to Russia and would prefer to take the hit and cancel.

Yes, def Russia but she has 100% feedback.

Up to 2KG Royal Mail will be cheaper especially if postage is coming out of your own pocket if buyer has only paid UK postage. Also buyers can only have 100% feedback even Russian ones where stuff takes weeks to clear their customs .  Just check RM for current delay warnings and make sure you are careful with the address - does it show entirely in English characters? 

The buyer has offered to make up the extra postage as soon as I can get a quote. Yes, the Royal Mail option looks the best. The address is in Russian characters so will have to cut and paste to print

LM2020

You'll need the full address in English characters as well as the address in Russian so the post office can process it.

Spoonie_Turtle

Google translate will transliterate it for you if you copy and paste it - as well as the translation it gives, it will also show the transliteration into the roman alphabet (our alphabet).

hubb

Oh dear, it sounds a lot more trouble than it is worth but I really can't risk spoiling my 100% feedback as sales are hard to come y as it is on account of Ebay being dead. It looks like I will have to take the risk. Besides, the Royal mail will cover any loss up to £30 and the item went for £25.

Rantband

Are you sure of RM cover,I thought it was £20 or £50 and looking at costs RM International Tracked are £12 to £15.
It would be better to cancel sale with "problem with address" then you will get Ebay fees returned and only pay PayPal fees.

soolin

hubb said:

Oh dear, it sounds a lot more trouble than it is worth but I really can't risk spoiling my 100% feedback as sales are hard to come y as it is on account of Ebay being dead. It looks like I will have to take the risk. Besides, the Royal mail will cover any loss up to £30 and the item went for £25.

Rantband said:

Are you sure of RM cover,I thought it was £20 or £50 and looking at costs RM International Tracked are £12 to £15.
It would be better to cancel sale with "problem with address" then you will get Ebay fees returned and only pay PayPal fees.

Yes it’s only £20 that RM cover and anecdotally Russia isn’t the easiest place in the world to persuade RM to pay out for as RM are aware of issues with customs. If you do go ahead and send then as a precaution photograph the parcel and your custom declaration form showing your item code so that there is no way it can be argued that item was stopped due to Mis declaration.  

As above you can get a postal quote online via RM find a price.