USA Postage

Archergirl

I have sold a £10 item to the USA, the cheapest eBay postage it £17.99, can I still go to the post office and buy a stamp for it or is it to do with Tariffs?
If it's Tariffs I will have to cancel the sale.

flaneurs_lobster

Here's the Royal Mail information about new arrangements for mailing stuff to the US - good luck!

https://www.royalmail.com/usapersonalupdates

soolin

Archergirl said:

I have sold a £10 item to the USA, the cheapest eBay postage it £17.99, can I still go to the post office and buy a stamp for it or is it to do with Tariffs?
If it's Tariffs I will have to cancel the sale.

It might be worth trying the PO if they are knowledgeable about filling out the tax and IOSs forms (assuming you need advice on them)  , I am surprised though that ebay even offered you the chance to buy a label as all my label pages have the warning:

'Due to changes in US customs regulations, all Royal Mail services to the US on eBay Labels are temporarily disabled.'

Archergirl

soolin said:

Archergirl said:

I have sold a £10 item to the USA, the cheapest eBay postage it £17.99, can I still go to the post office and buy a stamp for it or is it to do with Tariffs?
If it's Tariffs I will have to cancel the sale.

It might be worth trying the PO if they are knowledgeable about filling out the tax and IOSs forms (assuming you need advice on them)  , I am surprised though that ebay even offered you the chance to buy a label as all my label pages have the warning:

'Due to changes in US customs regulations, all Royal Mail services to the US on eBay Labels are temporarily disabled.'

This is what I have............

UPS Express Saver | Drop-off Up to 20 kg with max length 97 cm, max width 76 cm and sum of length and girth not to exceed 300 cm. Powered by Packlink.

Yes

No

Up to £60.00

28 Oct - 17 Nov

£17.99

I'll go to the post office tomorrow but might just have to stop sending to the USA

se2020

Just a warning..

I just sold an item to the USA.
£85 in value plus £4.80 International postage.

This was listed ages ago and I had forgotten about it.

The only ebay postage options are UPS at nearly £20.

Going onto the royal mail site lets me send as a large letter for £4.20 (un-tracked) BUT I HAVE TO PAY THE IMPORT DUTY FOR THE BUYER!
That's coming to another £9

I'm not sure how to get around this in future?
Can I add the £9 to postage for the USA only?
Or will I just have to block the USA?

goodfella66

This is all Trump's "Beautiful" Tarriffs. Use the Ebay Global Shipping Program in future. Let them deal with the hassle. As long as you post the item to their warehouse in Lichfield and they receive it...you're covered.

It costs more to the buyer, so you won't sell so much abroad, but I won't go back to sending internationally myself again.

soolin

goodfella66 said:

This is all Trump's "Beautiful" Tarriffs. Use the Ebay Global Shipping Program in future. Let them deal with the hassle. As long as you post the item to their warehouse in Lichfield and they receive it...you're covered.

It costs more to the buyer, so you won't sell so much abroad, but I won't go back to sending internationally myself again.

Even before the tariffs I haven't sold to the USA for years. I got fed up of long involved conversations about the cost of postage and how they want it sent cheaply- only to moan three days after posting that they have no real tracking and their item hasn't arrived. Many years ago, and I've posted about it on here before complain bitterly and even report me to ebay as I had charged them for 'overseas' postage when they weren't overseas as they were in the USA . They couldn't see that whilst the USA was their home, to the rest of the world it was overseas. That wasted an incredible amount of my time trying to stay polite despite some rather unpleasant emails. I suspect the issue of cost might be much improved now though as I'm still on a lot of USA forums and their own postage costs seem to have shot up alarmingly in the past 5 years or so. 

I also had cases opened after less than a week when there was little or no chance item would arrive in that time, but ebay estimates said it would.

It's global shipping all the way for me now and whilst I do very occasionally get the 'where' my item' email I can just refer them to ebay. 

misterthrifty

I have just had my first sale to the US since the changes. I spoke to my PO who are very helpful, the duty seems to depend on which state the item is going to, which is why they don't provide prices for the whole country. In my case the value of the contents was £40, they entered it on the PO system which came up with duty of £5.50, I will contact the buyer to check they want to pay it, though it's going to be difficult to collect through ebay. Whether the parcel actually gets there is another matter!
On a different point, with these problems posting to the US and deliveries to Canada on hold due to a postal strike, the whole of North America is no go for sellers.

Archergirl

goodfella66 said:

This is all Trump's "Beautiful" Tarriffs. Use the Ebay Global Shipping Program in future. Let them deal with the hassle. As long as you post the item to their warehouse in Lichfield and they receive it...you're covered.

It costs more to the buyer, so you won't sell so much abroad, but I won't go back to sending internationally myself again.

I thought it was the seller not the buyer that has to pay the Tariffs though........

martindow

Archergirl said:

I thought it was the seller not the buyer that has to pay the Tariffs though........

That's what Trump would have you think!  Tariffs are import taxes so they are going to be paid by US consumers in the form of higher prices.  Trump hopes manufacturing will return, but if this happens, it takes time to build factories, train staff and get production going.  Meanwhile their cost of living is likely to rise.