All in the postage - item only £0.01

lucidamike

I have noticed that a number of sellers on ebay try and trick you into buying something with a low £0.01 price but make up the real price with postage at £20 .

Look at the MP3 sales for examples where there's lots of different models all at 1p but the postage cost varies

When I emailed ebay all they said was their standard reponse that we may have done something but for privacy reasons we cant tell you what we did


The only thing I have found to help is that you can set the postage price to be displayed along with the current price which makes it much easier to work out the all important total cost

Maybe the best way to handle postage costs would be to make all ebay sellers buy a accurate scale and provide true postal costs

bonvonnie

This is because ebay charge you a FVF (final value fee) a percentage of the auction amount for the goods sold. so if the seller sells the goods low, they pay less fees to ebay, as the P&P charges are not included in the FVF.

criminal_smile

MP3 player for £0.01. So it costs £20 to get it here. That makes £20.01, and the seller doesn't get ripped off by eBay fees.
Can you get one on your high street for that price? 'cos I know I can't

nalibz

I think that with postage there should be a limit for how much postage you can place on an item. For example. in the mp3 area the postage limit could be set to £5 top.

etc etc etc

if one was selling more then it could be placed in the wholesale section. or even a sub mp3 section for more items. Therfore if people placed the item in a dfferent section to use higher p&p prices their listing would be removed because its in the wrong section.

confused? i am!

lucidamike

I don't mind that the total price is ok, it's just that you tend to focus on the bid price and can forget the postage particularly if you bid in the last few mins of an auction.

It's like the £1 cheap air fares that turn into £50 when you add all the extras.

Most people would prefer to know the final price (I think Martin has spoken about this a few times)

bonvonnie

i have custmised my columns to show the P&P costs as well, as I always take into account the full price, not just the auction cost

soolin

lucidamike wrote:

I
Maybe the best way to handle postage costs would be to make all ebay sellers buy a accurate scale and provide true postal costs

But ebay don't require a seller to list accurate post and packing charges, just 'reasonable' ones. Since a seller could argue that they do have very high packing costs, maybe even paying someone to wrap and pack for them I'm not sure how ebay would check it.

As bonvonnie says, as long as you take into account both the actual cost and the post and packing when bidding you won't get caught out. Personally I don't really mind how someone breaks down the charges for an item, if it is within budget I will bid. However, I tend to favour sellers that list realistically with a proper auction price and a lower post and packing price, rather then the buy for 1p and pay £20 p and p.

The one thing i really don't like, and would avoid at all costs, is where they then have a line hidden in the auction stating that there is an obligatory insurance charge of £10 as well, I've started to notice a few overseas sellers doing that.

Soo

Colin2511

a lot of the 0.01p auctions and £20.00 postage are either fee avoidance, or location abuse (if you note a lot of these will be from Hong Kong or China) - it is something ebay have promised to crack down on ---but we are waiting, as customers will not have the same protection as if buying from UK buyer, and UK buyers stuggle to compete as legit ones pay fees for customs etc, and overseas buyers are avoiding this

Shugster

I personally refuse to pay more in p&p for the item itself. Also should the item go missing and you have to file a complaint, all you will get refunded is the auction price, so it does make this sort of listing more attractive to the dodgier sellers.

soolin

Shugster wrote:

I personally refuse to pay more in p&p for the item itself. Also should the item go missing and you have to file a complaint, all you will get refunded is the auction price, so it does make this sort of listing more attractive to the dodgier sellers.

With paypal you get the full amount repaid, including post and packing, if the item is not delivered.

Soo

spor7y

I've mentioned this before on previous threads.
A dodgy seller could send you a faulty MP3 player and he/she will only be obliged to refund the item cost not postage - so beware!!