Need some postage advise as have not sold on ebay for a while

Inigo_Montoya

I am currently listing some 4k blu rays for sale & was hoping someone might already know which is the cheapest way to send these with tracking  ?

from selling a long time ago (i.e. when DVDs were still items people bought) I seem to recall that the weight of the DVD in a jiffy was usually over 100g but can occasionally be under 100g so I assume its the same with blurays due to there smaller cases

currently I have looked at parcel2go who qoute a price of £2.70 sending the item with Yodel Direct 

royal mail also seem to "tracked 48" for £2.70 for a "large letter" up to 750g

are these the 2 cheapest options ?

thanks in advance for any replies

soolin

If they are likely to sell for proper money then RM48 is a good service. If they are less than £20 then standard 2nd class LL is sufficient, buy the  label via eBay postage and about 75-80% of the time you will get delivery confirmation. If something doesn’t show as delivered proof of posting would be sufficient to reclaim your losses from RM.

I always look to see what other sellers charge, but I tend to work with sold listings, I try to be in the same region price wise rather than charge a lot more and potentially price myself out of the market. 

Inigo_Montoya

soolin said:

If they are likely to sell for proper money then RM48 is a good service. If they are less than £20 then standard 2nd class LL is sufficient, buy the  label via eBay postage and about 75-80% of the time you will get delivery confirmation. If something doesn’t show as delivered proof of posting would be sufficient to reclaim your losses from RM.

I always look to see what other sellers charge, but I tend to work with sold listings, I try to be in the same region price wise rather than charge a lot more and potentially price myself out of the market. 

yes that was the other thing I was wondering i.e. if even just 2nd class royal mail can provide some proof of delivery 

I seem to recall even 10 years ago or more royal mail started adding a scannable barcode to even basic 1st/2nd class mail but that it was a bit hit & miss whether the postie bothered to scan it before putting it through the letterbox

Back then I used to ask for a postage receipt for each item as I seem to recall it had the tracking number on it but obviously now this seems to have been automated with ebay bought postage labels

If you buy the label via ebay you do not have a physical receipt so what do you have to send to royal mail to make a claim ?

Spoonie_Turtle

Inigo_Montoya said:

soolin said:

If they are likely to sell for proper money then RM48 is a good service. If they are less than £20 then standard 2nd class LL is sufficient, buy the  label via eBay postage and about 75-80% of the time you will get delivery confirmation. If something doesn’t show as delivered proof of posting would be sufficient to reclaim your losses from RM.

I always look to see what other sellers charge, but I tend to work with sold listings, I try to be in the same region price wise rather than charge a lot more and potentially price myself out of the market. 

yes that was the other thing I was wondering i.e. if even just 2nd class royal mail can provide some proof of delivery 

I seem to recall even 10 years ago or more royal mail started adding a scannable barcode to even basic 1st/2nd class mail but that it was a bit hit & miss whether the postie bothered to scan it before putting it through the letterbox

Back then I used to ask for a postage receipt for each item as I seem to recall it had the tracking number on it but obviously now this seems to have been automated with ebay bought postage labels

If you buy the label via ebay you do not have a physical receipt so what do you have to send to royal mail to make a claim ?

They do for parcels, but not large letters.  I don't know how much the cheapest parcel costs compared with LL.

Postage bought online has a number on the label that can be put into RM's tracking tool - but I think with large letters it doesn't show anything.

Inigo_Montoya

Spoonie_Turtle said:

Inigo_Montoya said:

soolin said:

If they are likely to sell for proper money then RM48 is a good service. If they are less than £20 then standard 2nd class LL is sufficient, buy the  label via eBay postage and about 75-80% of the time you will get delivery confirmation. If something doesn’t show as delivered proof of posting would be sufficient to reclaim your losses from RM.

I always look to see what other sellers charge, but I tend to work with sold listings, I try to be in the same region price wise rather than charge a lot more and potentially price myself out of the market. 

yes that was the other thing I was wondering i.e. if even just 2nd class royal mail can provide some proof of delivery 

I seem to recall even 10 years ago or more royal mail started adding a scannable barcode to even basic 1st/2nd class mail but that it was a bit hit & miss whether the postie bothered to scan it before putting it through the letterbox

Back then I used to ask for a postage receipt for each item as I seem to recall it had the tracking number on it but obviously now this seems to have been automated with ebay bought postage labels

If you buy the label via ebay you do not have a physical receipt so what do you have to send to royal mail to make a claim ?

They do for parcels, but not large letters.  I don't know how much the cheapest parcel costs compared with LL.

Postage bought online has a number on the label that can be put into RM's tracking tool - but I think with large letters it doesn't show anything.

royal mail small parcel (under 2kg) is £2.99 (online price) which is more expensive than tracked 48

so if large letter doesnt not have tracking then looks like tracked 48 is the cheapest with tracking

big confused now as what you have said seems to contract what  soolin said about large letter having delivery confirmation (most of the time)

if the oarcel is over 100g then 2nd class LL is currently £1.85 so paying £2,70 instead isnt that much extra to pay for the tracking (if you dont get it with LL)

Spoonie_Turtle

Inigo_Montoya said:

Spoonie_Turtle said:

Inigo_Montoya said:

soolin said:

If they are likely to sell for proper money then RM48 is a good service. If they are less than £20 then standard 2nd class LL is sufficient, buy the  label via eBay postage and about 75-80% of the time you will get delivery confirmation. If something doesn’t show as delivered proof of posting would be sufficient to reclaim your losses from RM.

I always look to see what other sellers charge, but I tend to work with sold listings, I try to be in the same region price wise rather than charge a lot more and potentially price myself out of the market. 

yes that was the other thing I was wondering i.e. if even just 2nd class royal mail can provide some proof of delivery 

I seem to recall even 10 years ago or more royal mail started adding a scannable barcode to even basic 1st/2nd class mail but that it was a bit hit & miss whether the postie bothered to scan it before putting it through the letterbox

Back then I used to ask for a postage receipt for each item as I seem to recall it had the tracking number on it but obviously now this seems to have been automated with ebay bought postage labels

If you buy the label via ebay you do not have a physical receipt so what do you have to send to royal mail to make a claim ?

They do for parcels, but not large letters.  I don't know how much the cheapest parcel costs compared with LL.

Postage bought online has a number on the label that can be put into RM's tracking tool - but I think with large letters it doesn't show anything.

royal mail small parcel (under 2kg) is £2.99 (online price) which is more expensive than tracked 48

so if large letter doesnt not have tracking then looks like tracked 48 is the cheapest with tracking

big confused now as what you have said seems to contract what  soolin said about large letter having delivery confirmation (most of the time)

if the oarcel is over 100g then 2nd class LL is currently £1.85 so paying £2,70 instead isnt that much extra to pay for the tracking (if you dont get it with LL)

What I said applies to buying directly from Royal Mail.  I've not bought postage through eBay so soolin's knowledge there is definitely more complete and up-to-date than mine.  

soolin

My large letters bought using eBay postage - and most of mine are under 100g so are currently £1.15 , have a number, called a tracking number but actually just a delivery confirmation.  The number is uploaded automatically to the eBay system and looking at my order page I was guess about 80% show delivery confirmation . 

In case of loss *and* an INR claim you would need to get receipts for them from a post office or mail centre. Officially my advice would be to always ensure you get that POP , in reality a lot of mine just gets out in a Post box as I don’t have time to wait in a 40 minute queue every day at the PO. 

kalsha

Also don't forget the prices are going up on 2nd October!  A lot large letter prices are affected.

Inigo_Montoya

soolin said:

In case of loss *and* an INR claim you would need to get receipts for them from a post office or mail centre. Officially my advice would be to always ensure you get that POP , in reality a lot of mine just gets out in a Post box as I don’t have time to wait in a 40 minute queue every day at the PO. 

ok I see what you mean - you buy the label from ebay but still go to the post office & get a proof of posting receipt 

tightauldgit

Inigo_Montoya said:

I am currently listing some 4k blu rays for sale & was hoping someone might already know which is the cheapest way to send these with tracking  ?

from selling a long time ago (i.e. when DVDs were still items people bought) I seem to recall that the weight of the DVD in a jiffy was usually over 100g but can occasionally be under 100g so I assume its the same with blurays due to there smaller cases

currently I have looked at parcel2go who qoute a price of £2.70 sending the item with Yodel Direct 

royal mail also seem to "tracked 48" for £2.70 for a "large letter" up to 750g

are these the 2 cheapest options ?

thanks in advance for any replies

Just as an aside if you haven't sold for a while you might find that it's really difficult to get anything approaching decent value for blu-rays once you factor in postage. I think the Music Magpies of the world have basically destroyed the market for anything that isn't fairly rare. 

Inigo_Montoya

I had a 2nd class large letter item arrive today & have just confirmed for myself that there IS delivery confirmation

if you look at the following picture taken of the postage label there is a tracking number after the letters "PRN" 
https://ibb.co/926STfQ
(I have removed some of the details to protect my privacy)

when I entered that number into the royal mail website it shows delivery confirmation
- you are obviously reliant on the postie taking the time to scan it which may not always happen 

this was an item bought off ebay so I do not know if you would also get this from a postage label bought at the post office
- I assume if you ask for a postage receipt at the post office it will list the PRN tracking number on it ?

also the QR code is accepted by a QR code scanner app & ait lso contains the tracking number along with address details