THE SHIPPING SCAM & Show It All. Please BRING IT ON ! Let's Talk I Want To Know...

At eBay I think that's called fee avoidance. The thinking is that low minimum bid + high shipping charges = lower listing fee (and final value fee, too, maybe?).

Some customers don't mind if the overall price is still good and some will steer clear because they resent the shipping charges.

I'm pretty sure it's against eBay policy but there's no way they can stay on top of it. You might wander around the eBay forums for more input there as well.

As far as mentioning it in your listings, that's probably a sticky area. No doubt, you can make a point of clarifying your realistic shipping charges but you may be on shaky ground if you go accusing fellow eBay members right in your listings.

My two cents, anyway.

How about something like this... Please feel free to help change/edit.

No Outrageous Shipping Fee's....
At Direct2UWholesale we remain Honest! We only charge you exactly what the Postal Carrier Charges us.
No Handling Fee's...
We figure things like tape and cost's into our starting price as honest sellers do.
No hidden Fee's...
Unfortunately there are sellers who do this. It is what eBay refers to as Fee Avoidance... and eBay is working very hard to provide buyers with a new tool called “Show It All " so that the customer will be able to view the true Total Fee's prior to bidding.
What is fee avoidance?
This is a trick some sellers have chosen to use. They avoid higher listing fees by starting their auctions very low or below their own costs. They in-turn place some outrageous fee somewhere else usually calling it a handling fee, and sometimes they add these costs too shipping. Most of them are adding it to both.
We don't rip off the Customer or eBay...
At Diect2UWholesale we treat the customer the way we want to be treated. Honesty, Integrity, and Customer Service is our Standard. We take care of the customer.

Well, I spell out my policies in the shipping info section, and just leave it at that. I don't try to politely expose the other guy.

It sucks, though. There have been times when I have wanted to point out my competitions bad prices or bad feedback or bad whatever. But I just try to take the high road. Now I think that I am getting a good reputation, I'm seeing a lot of repeat business and bigger sales, and I feel like business is really taking off.

But anyway, this is what I suggest:

No Outrageous Shipping Fee's!
At Direct2UWholesale we remain honest! We only charge you exactly what the Postal Carrier charges us. No handling fees, no hidden fees.
We treat our customers the way we want to be treated: with honesty and integrity.

And then maybe you should encourage the customer to shop around and compare total prices - item price plus shipping.

Without knowing "how much" over actual shipping it is hard for me to say if this is fee avoidance. I can tell you that you will offend alot of HONEST sellers with your post. I see you have only been around a few months so I will let you slide.
First of all you are by no means supposed to work your packaging costs into your starting price, though you are to include your Insertion Fee, projected FVF and Paypal fee's. As far as the low starting prices that is an EBAY SUGGESTED selling practice. They feel that a low starting price generates more interest which leads to more bids, people always want what someone else is bidding on!
I would estimate that 90% of sellers charge some sort of handling fee, that is business plain and simple. The same way you pay more to have a pizza delivered than if you had picked it up yourself.
I am a VERY honest seller my userID is moonshadow1313 if you want to check my feedback so good that I have OVER 40% repeat business!! I get approx. $1.00 for packaging and depending on the item that has to cover plastic sleeves or bags, cardboard, bubble wrap, Press n' Seal, envelopes, boxes, trip to Post office, but most of all for my time. Alot of work goes into selling (photos,listing,inventory,etc,etc,etc) and I don't think it is asking too much to want to get a few cents per transaction to pay yourself, especially to those trying to make this a full time gig.
Now I'm not saying that there aren't plenty of scammers out there taking advantage but you need to be very careful what you say especially in your listings. You would basically be telling your customers that anyone who charges you a packaging fee is dishonest and ripping you off and THAT is dishonest. You still charge it, you just put it in your start price where as they put it in their shipping. And yes it should be fair charging someone $20 to ship something that costs $5 is ridiculous.
If I were you I would avoid putting any of that in your listing. You could just simply say "Lowest shipping prices on ebay, Shop around and see" and if your competition is charging outrageous shipping your listings should speak for themselves. I'm not sure why your sales dropped so drastically, after christmas is actually a really busy time. People didn't get what they wanted and have money. You might try branching out and selling different things. You wouldn't believe the mish-mash of stuff I sell. If you can afford to drop your start price you would be surprised how well it works.
TO CAKES: by not pointing out your competitions faults you are not only taking the high road (good for you) but you also saved yourself from getting kicked of ebay! It's called bid interferance and a VERY BIG no,no!!
Sorry I know a bit long winded but I hate it when people give me short answers and don't explain their reasons. Good luck

Moonshawdow

I appreciate your responce. Long is good and what I asked for. I see where your coming from and you make some strong points. I'm only going to argue on one. A handeling fee is something a drop shipping company, or a trade assistant would charge. When you check out at Home Depot they don't add a 10 cent bag charge for each sack, or tack on a 1.00 cashier fee, or say "oh that box has some of our tape on it we need to charge you another $2.00 .50 cents for the tape and a $1.50 for the employess labor that applied it... Overhead fee's are figured in to the cost of business and added in to the price of the item before it ever makes it to the shelf. Same thing at the Flea-Market. eBay should not be different just because the item is on the web -vs-the shelf.

quote:

Originally posted by Direct2UWholesale:
Moonshawdow

I appreciate your responce. Long is good and what I asked for. I see where your coming from and you make some strong points. I'm only going to argue on one. A handeling fee is something a drop shipping company, or a trade assistant would charge. When you check out at Home Depot they don't add a 10 cent bag charge for each sack, or tack on a 1.00 cashier fee, or say "oh that box has some of our tape on it we need to charge you another $2.00 .50 cents for the tape and a $1.50 for the employess labor that applied it... Overhead fee's are figured in to the cost of business and added in to the price of the item before it ever makes it to the shelf. Same thing at the Flea-Market. eBay should not be different just because the item is on the web -vs-the shelf.

Any mail order company (which is essentially what we are when selling on eBay) charges a Shipping AND Handling fee, not actual postage. That's why you pay $3.95 per book when you order one online from a company instead of the $1.66 or whatever it would cost to send it media mail (which most of them do). Check out any online seller - order something from Sears or Penneys or whoever. A small handling fee is to be expected, is entirely honest and should not be objected to by any reasonable person. Spell out the fees in the listing and there is NO dishonesty unless the S & H fee is outrageously high in light of postage costs.

quote:

I'm only going to argue on one. A handeling fee is something a drop shipping company, or a trade assistant would charge. When you check out at Home Depot they don't add a 10 cent bag charge for each sack, or tack on a 1.00 cashier fee, or say "oh that box has some of our tape on it we need to charge you another $2.00 .50 cents for the tape and a $1.50 for the employess labor that applied it... Overhead fee's are figured in to the cost of business and added in to the price of the item before it ever makes it to the shelf. Same thing at the Flea-Market. eBay should not be different just because the item is on the web -vs-the shelf.

I disagree. It depends on how you price your items. I shopped at a grocery store that DID charge for bags. I could bring my own and save money - I liked that.

Overhead fees rack up the prices on everything.

I price my items based on the cost of that item. I absorb the cost of boxes and shipping material because I use free boxes 95% of the time, and my shipping material is very cheap.

I charge exact shipping and I add a 50 cent handling fee to pay for Priority delivery confirmation. If I were to absorb that handling fee into the cost of my items (as overhead) I would have to raise my prices. Customers that make combined sales would end up spending more money in the long run.

And eBay loose's $ on what is called Fee Avoidance. I don't think we will ever agree on where business costs should be placed and that is okay. It's what makes this world go around

I don't want to beat a dead horse here, but I certainly don't think that charging for delivery confirmation is fee avoidance.

Whether or not you include your shipping expenses in the price of the item or within your shipping charges, you still have to charge for it if you're trying to run a business and keep it afloat.

dmh is right -- any mail order company has to cover their shipping expenses.

It's very easy to look around on eBay and see who the perpetrators of fee avoidance are. And if they can argue that they can break down their shipping charge into actual expenses, then that's probably still reason enough to avoid them because they clearly need a new business plan.

For instance, I sell comic books. I notice other eBay sellers who charge Priority Mail rates (or Priority Mail prices for Media Mail) for one comic book and that seems excessive to me, but only that. However, if they listed a single comic for 0.01 and charged $10.00 that would clearly be fee avoidance (whether that was their intention or not).

Direct2U, I actually think your description info in the second post sounds pretty good but there's still that possibility of it causing you trouble. It may make you a target for those who know you're talking about them. Keep in mind that eBay seems to make a lot of blind decisions based on the reports of members.

quote:

Originally posted by cakethings:
I don't want to beat a dead horse here, but I certainly don't think that charging for delivery confirmation is fee avoidance.

Oh, no, not at all. You must cover your actual expenses, more or less. I've recently started paying for shipping through PayPal and PayPal automatically charges 0.14 for Delivery Confirmation. I like having DC on every shipment so I've upped my shipping charges to make the difference. It's an extra 0.15 (I rounded up), which is nothing. And all of my customers who buy multiple things will only pay the 0.15 once on their combined invoice.

Point being, there's a huge difference between legitimate shipping fees and fee avoidance and many people can immediately see it.

Like Rick I'm a Pay Pal user and only pay .14 cents for Delivery Confirmation. And it has been factored into my starting costs.

quote:

Originally posted by Direct2UWholesale:
Like Rick I'm a Pay Pal user and only pay .14 cents for Delivery Confirmation. And it has been factored into my starting costs.

But then, if a person buys more than one item from you, aren't you overcharging them for delivery confirmation?

There is a formula for figuring in true costs. Anything extra the customer pays we give back. I have issued refunds for as little as .50 cents. If it's not earned honestly it's stealing.

I charge flat-rate shipping, but I almost always have the lowest shipping cost on my items.
I figure paypal and ebay costs/fees into my shipping, but as I said, I'm still usually the lowest shipping with comparable products.
I take a lot of pride in this, and don't hesitate to let it known to my customers/potential customers. And it works well for me. I'll see items of mine bid higher than the seller offering the same item buy it now, at a lower cost, simply because my shipping is $5, $10...or even $30 cheaper than the competition.


I say stick with it...my sales have slumped after christmas as well, but are fairly consistent, none-the-less.

Btw, what's your ebay site? I'd like to see what you offer

direct2uwholesale

Alright...I'm finally going to throw my two cents in.

A couple of years ago, I used to charge nothing, not a red cent above the shipping/delivery confirmation. No handling fee's. Nada!

Hubster thought I was crazy to not charge an additional "handling" fee as he saw how much time I put into my auctions. My best female friend in the world is a CPA and she stated..Donna from a purely business view, you gotta start charging a handling fee. It's the way business is done. Your time is worth money. The time it takes to research an item, design the ad and answering emails, your final value fee's to eBay and Paypal fee's.

Nike.com, CrateandBarrel.com, EddieBauer.com etc all have the fee worked into the flat fee and so should you. Do you question them when you buy from their sites? No, you don't. You just pay it and happy when the item comes.

Luckily, I have some great postal employee's that knew me from my many visits to the post office and they knew my business was eBay. (before the days of picking up at my door) One day it was quiet in the Post Office with no customers but myself and the postal workers were having a ball talking to me. Finally one of them said...Donna, when you sell items, what's your handling charge..I said, Charge? Exact shipping plus delivery confirmation. What about gas back and forth to the post office? What about tape to reinforce our priority mail envelopes and labels? What about all the time you spend answering emails and more? Your time is worth money. What about your fee's?

Well, finally it sunk in and I had one of those light bulb above the head moments...BAM!

Yep, MY time is worth money. I'm not saying my charge is exorbitant. It's not like my buyer is spending 10.00 to ship a tshirt. But if you buy that t-shirt from me on eBay...know what? You're shipping charge is clearly stated on the auction as $5.00. (Priority shipping + Delivery confirmation via Paypal at .14). And to me the seller? Delivery Confirmation is worth it's weight in gold. And .14 is a bargain! Especially with all the scammers around nowadays...delivery confirmation is a necessity.

The rest goes to line my pocketbook and pay FVFs to eBay.

Now to the discussion of your competition, the paragraph and getting your auctions to BRING you moolah!

Rick, you're right..it's called fee avoidance with eBay and is a reportable offense. However, you have to remember that eBay turns a blind eye ALOT of times.

I think the paragraph would bring you attention that you might not want to have from your competition.....negative attention.

The flip-side of the coin. It's a intelligently worded paragraph and if bolded would make a statement to those considering buying from you.

Now your auctions versus your competition.
The problem as I see it is this..think on it.

With the shipping costs now shown in the searches...how can you GRAB the customers to look at your ads to SEE your paragraph and not go to the lower priced auctions with higher shipping?

Sub-titles? That's more moo-lah that you'll be spending. If you had an eBay store, the sub-title (which isn't search enabled unless buyers choose the in-depth search) is pennies and might be worth the cost if you can 80 character get your words to BRING the customer to your auction.

A regular eBay auction? I know a subtitle on that type of auction is throwing money away.

Have you considered the Buy It Now Auction?
My thing with this is...If I want something on eBay, I very rarely wait around for an auction..I look for Buy It Nows and grab it.

Your competition has three different types of auctions up and running. So he must be successful at each type of auction or he wouldn't be running them. Right? He's running auctions to bring them to his buy it now auctions. Plus, he has a store which help him out too.

Here's a link of items similar to yours (and including yours)

http://search.ebay.com/search/search.dll?sofocus=bs&sbr...prchi=&fsop=1&fsoo=1

Click the above link for an quasi-example of what I'm talking about. Many different and successful ways of selling your specialty. It is always wise to keep an eye on the competition, not to copy them. But to see how they are successful doing certain things that you might not thought of implementing. Think on which works best for you and fly with it!

Now I've bookmarked your site so I can come back and buy one of those Tinker Bell items for my daughter...but in order to buy, I have to make money and it's that time of the day..to get started working.

Peace,
Donna

Suthrnjewl
Posted February 02, 2006 05:40 AM
Quote
Alright...I'm finally going to throw my two cents in.

Very eloquently said...and an Excellent post.
I appreciate your research and suggestions.

Just for the record I do include these cost's although I apply them to the starting cost of the item and avoid the use of the term Shipping Fee. I pay eBay there fair share. I expect a shipping fee from the eBay seller who is having the items he's selling drop shipped from another state or country. Example... I bought a Hard Drive for a lap top on eBay. The seller is here in the states the part I ordered was shipped from China. I feel the fee is for the time it took him to place the order on my behalf with his supplier, a connection I would not otherwise have access to.

My beef is with the sellers who start the item at a penny and sock it to the customer somewhere else... shipping & handling fee's. They don't have to pay the higher listing fee, and they take all the attention with there low price. They are ripping off eBay and they are creating an untrustworthy market place reputation for eBay. When I talk to new eBay users the first words out of their mouths are always... and I repeat always " by the time I paid the shipping and handling I could have gotten it cheaper at the store "

I would like to see buyers get honest postage fee's with NO padding of the cost's. Then the customer can look at the total cost of the item and decide if it's a good enough deal for them to want to bid. Instead they take a look at a cheap auction then see the outrageous fee's and 1/2 off them walk away from eBay completely.

Sellers should protect the eBay market place. We get the advantage of excellent advertising which we could not afford in private business. We need to protect our reputations and our customers. This is our store and no one will want to come in and shop if they think there getting ripped off by sneaky postage & handling scams. Professional sellers need to ban together and make this an honest market place. It's in our own best interests.