More Complaining About Shipping Costs

[CosmicBob]

I won a single comic in the latest All Star Auction. The hammer price was $104, add in the 12% juice and it comes to $116.48. They charged me $15.00 for shipping. I got the package today. The total shipping cost on the label was $4.90. They had used a priority mail box and wrapped it in brown paper. Apparently that brown paper was VERY expensive, $10.10, in fact - since the box was free.

 

I probably won't be buying anything else on the All Star Auctions.

[joe_collector]

I am getting on the wagon due to the increase in shipping profiteering. I see some books I like, email the seller and receive some outlandish shipping fee (that probably is putting his kid through Harvard).

 

And this includes fellow Canucks, who seem to be even worse than their US counterparts. Yes, I'll pay $16 USD for you to mail a comic across the province.

 

As I don't have the inclination to deal with scammers, I'm finding myself searching EBay much less, and may as well drop it entirely for awhile.

[FlyingDonut]

I am getting on the wagon due to the increase in shipping profiteering. I see some books I like, email the seller and receive some outlandish shipping fee (that probably is putting his kid through Harvard).

 

And this includes fellow Canucks, who seem to be even worse than their US counterparts. Yes, I'll pay $16 USD for you to mail a comic across the province.

 

As I don't have the inclination to deal with scammers, I'm finding myself searching EBay much less, and may as well drop it entirely for awhile.

 

That's why everybody should deal with ME! $5 flat rate shipping on all non-CGC books (combine up to 6 for the same price). $8 for CGC books.

[drbanner]

I won a single comic in the latest All Star Auction. The hammer price was $104, add in the 12% juice and it comes to $116.48. They charged me $15.00 for shipping. I got the package today. The total shipping cost on the label was $4.90. They had used a priority mail box and wrapped it in brown paper. Apparently that brown paper was VERY expensive, $10.10, in fact - since the box was free.

 

I probably won't be buying anything else on the All Star Auctions.

 

Well, at least they don't accept credit cards (or so I hear)!!

[ablue]

Joe Mannarino IMO is an nice honest man, who is not in the business to make his income on shipping.

You have to take into consideration administrative fees time taken to fetch your book, deliver it to the post office ect.This is not a free process.

Take other agency's for example, school admin. fees, or govt. fees ect, they are outrageous. I have to spend $50.00 for a transcript copy if I loose it from one of my past courses. Is that acceptable?

 

If you got a good book, at a good price, and received it in the condition you were told, there is no reason not to do business with them.

 

[Rocketeer]

You have to take into consideration administrative fees time taken to fetch your book, deliver it to the post office ect.This is not a free process.

 

Sorry,...don't agree, that's what the juice is there to cover, not shipping. The shipping should be a pure reflection of the cost to ship the item.

[joe_collector]

That's why everybody should deal with ME! $5 flat rate shipping on all non-CGC books (combine up to 6 for the same price). $8 for CGC books.

 

So Byrne me with the CGC books!

[ablue]

You have to take into consideration administrative fees time taken to fetch your book, deliver it to the post office ect.This is not a free process.

 

Sorry,...don't agree, that's what the juice is there to cover, not shipping. The shipping should be a pure reflection of the cost to ship the item.

 

 

You are right. Unless shipping AND handling was stated.

[joe_collector]

You have to take into consideration administrative fees time taken to fetch your book, deliver it to the post office ect.This is not a free process.

 

Then they should itemize it as such, instead of hiding it in the shipping.

 

If they have an Admin fee, then put it out in the open for all to see, as other businesses you list do. Otherwise, your business model and revenue should account for employee costs, and you shouldn't need to pad unnecessarily.

[lighthouse]

wow... and ablue sighting and greggy hasn't arrived yet... Maybe we need to call an ambulance for him...

 

And I agree on the shipping charge there. An estimated shipping charge is fine, and a lot easier to deal with than having to wait for the item to be packed up before you can even find out what it is. It never bothers me if I paid $8.00 and the postage is $7.10. It's very difficult to predict the exact charges that closely. But $15 when the postage was under $5 is ridiculous. And it's unethical. Because the consignors to the auction expect to get a certain percentage for the book. If the bidders know they will be overcharged by $10 and adjust their bids down by $10 to compensate (which they will) then the auction house just STOLE $10 from the person consigning the item.

 

That's outright theft, plain and simple. If I overcharge on my own item, it doesn't really matter, it's my money anyway. But here the auction house is STEALING money from its consignors. And they could well find themselves facing a class action lawsuit...

[Bonds25]

That's way too excessive. I'd email them, and I'm sure they will take care of you. When I ship packages out and the shipping cost paid by the buyer is $2 or more too much, I'll email them and offer them a refund.

[davidking623]

Flat rate shipping is the only way to go in my judgement It puts everyone at a even playing feild and that way they know what to bid based on what they are charged!

I understand all the statements in this thread but if someone wants to charge you 15.00 dollars just include it at the cost of the bid if that is the book you want.

 

Davidking623

[lighthouse]

Flat rate shipping is the only way to go in my judgement It puts everyone at a even playing feild and that way they know what to bid based on what they are charged!

I understand all the statements in this thread but if someone wants to charge you 15.00 dollars just include it at the cost of the bid if that is the book you want.

 

Davidking623

 

That's exactly what bidders do... which is part of what makes an auction house doing this so wrong... How many items have they sold for consignors with this kind of shipping overcharge? We're probably talking about thousands of dollars they have stolen from their consignors.

 

I'm not worried about CosmicBob here. He got overcharged, yes, but that just means he will adjust his bids later so the total price he pays matches what he wants to spend. The person who got screwed here is the consignor, who had their money outright STOLEN from them by the auction house...

[jbud73]

And the beat goes on. I just fininshed a little Ebay buying spree, 10 Items including 4 CGC books all off of 8 different sellers. On average I was charged 50% over what the actual shipping cost was. THE ONLY PERSON TO GET CLOSE WAS LIGHTHOUSE - WHO WAS AS IT TURNED OUT BANG ON AND PACKED FOR A NUCLEAR DISASTER-

 

When taken in combination I was overcharged a total of $38.00 for all the transactions - I mean you dont notice it transaction to transaction, $2-3 bucks, but hey the books were well packed etc. Sometimes you do, as illustrated in the above example. I think the worst was Neatstuffcollectables whos Ebay auctions are there the trap ebay comic newbies into bidding a few dollars on each book, and hen realizing that he is charging $3 to ship the first book and $1 for everybook after that

In my case, on 16 books my total bid was $1.25 FOR ALL OF THEM, with shipping it came to just over 20 bucks. Now imagine if I had bid $1.50 for each book these were filler issues of ASM and Spec from the late 90s.

 

I have noticed a trend, the larger auction houses will nail you and profiteer on shipping because they think they can because they are bigger, just like buying something from Macy's when you can get it cheaper elsewhere you are paying for the big Ebay name with 15000 transasctions etc.

 

And this BS about the warehouse and processing cause they are big. PLEASE I can bet you dollars to donuts (er sorry FD) that the money, or difference that they recoup from profiteering DOES NOT MAKE ITS WAY INTO THEIR REVENUE DECLARATIONS

 

My advice, don't stop ebaying, just do it smarter. Buy of the established middle tier collector dealer and there are alot of them on these boards - Flying Donut - Rob - Darth - Lighthouse - Tkg - etc etc etc The only person to blame if you keep going back to the big boys and get nailed on shipping is yourself.

 

The arguement that they have the books in some cases is true, but if you do your research, I mean its not a lazy mans hobby and find it with a reputable dealer you will always be better off. Or factor the over charge into your bid. After about 25 transactions you should have an idea what it costs to ship comic books to your area from pretty much everywhere in North America. If the posted shipping is $10 too high then dont give in and bid it up, let another sucker take the remember in most cases the book will come up again. If you simply have to have it then careful what you wish for cause you may get it, as in paying the rent of your favourite large auction house. What do you mean it was only $8 over to ship, Well you and the 100 other auction winner that week all paid $8 over shipping think about it you just paid Ebay fees and a good portion of someones overhead for the month. In effect you are paying them to rip you off everytime you come back.

 

Oh and 'house where's my feedback hahaah thanks for the book and not gouging me on the shipping too bad you were the only one.

[OldGuy]

Joe Mannarino IMO is an nice honest man, who is not in the business to make his income on shipping.

You have to take into consideration administrative fees time taken to fetch your book, deliver it to the post office ect.This is not a free process.

Take other agency's for example, school admin. fees, or govt. fees ect, they are outrageous. I have to spend $50.00 for a transcript copy if I loose it from one of my past courses. Is that acceptable?

 

If you got a good book, at a good price, and received it in the condition you were told, there is no reason not to do business with them.

 

Heritage doesn't rape on the shipping. I'd say about one third of the time they have actually under charged me. There is no way to justify a $10.50 "handling" charge on $4.50 shipping. I don't care how "nice" someone is, rape is rape. If Bubba had a nice smile on his face and was stroking your hair in a loving way I don't think it would make it any easer taking it up the poop-shoot.

[Darthdiesel]

There is no way to justify a $10.50 "handling" charge on $4.50 shipping. I don't care how "nice" someone is, rape is rape. If Bubba had a nice smile on his face and was stroking your hair in a loving way I don't think it would make it any easer taking it up the poop-shoot.

 

 

$10.50 for lube? Still a rip off, IMO

[lighthouse]

There is no way to justify a $10.50 "handling" charge on $4.50 shipping. I don't care how "nice" someone is, rape is rape. If Bubba had a nice smile on his face and was stroking your hair in a loving way I don't think it would make it any easer taking it up the poop-shoot.

 

 

$10.50 for lube? Still a rip off, IMO

 

The more I think about this, the more irritated I get... I imagine a lot of folks here have never sold anything on consignment. It takes a lot of faith in the person or company doing the selling.

 

I haven't made much of a secret of the fact that Donut has been selling some of my stuff on consignment throughout 2003. We agreed in advance to what his cut would be, and how the various fees would be handled. If he were to suddenly raise his shipping charge from $5 to $8, the person suffering wouldn't be his buyers. It would be me. Instead of him getting his percentage from the sale he would be getting his percentage of the sale PLUS the first three dollars of the transaction.

 

When you consign an item with a company that tells you they have a buyer's premium of 12%, you are agreeing to accept 89.286% of the amount the buyer is paying. You have entered into a contract based on the fact that you will receive your 89.286% of the price. If your item fetches a hammer price of $89.29 and the buyer pays their $100 plus shipping, then you got what you contracted for. However, if the buyers know they are going to be jacked for a $10 shipping overcharge, and the hammer price is now $80.36 (which totals $100 after the buyer's premium and the $10 shipping overcharge), you're out $8.87. That's your money they just stole from you. They agreed to take 11.714% of the total as their commission, but instead they took 19.64%.

 

That's not a handling charge. That's theft.

 

I've never consigned anything to the auction house mentioned. But you can bet if I had I would currently be looking into my options to get my money back. If the overcharge is systematic, they are not only subject to civil claims, but likely criminal prosecution as well... An occasional error is not a big deal. But if they are doing this consistently, they are looking at mail fraud and federal charges that carry VERY large fines and sentences in federal prison...

[greggy]

Mmmmm....actually on topic but I swear they mentioned on their site that most items get sent out for fed-ex. Considering I had to pay $25 for 2 CGC books, it better be the case! And no...they don't take credit cards!

[OldGuy]

But if they are doing this consistently, they are looking at mail fraud and federal charges that carry VERY large fines and sentences in federal prison...

 

At least you would still have Bubba to "comfort" you.

[CosmicBob]

Mmmmm....actually on topic but I swear they mentioned on their site that most items get sent out for fed-ex. Considering I had to pay $25 for 2 CGC books, it better be the case! And no...they don't take credit cards!

 

Mine was US mail, since I have a PO Box. I've sent stuff to the East Coast, Priority Mail. A single CGC comic does cost about $5.00 to send. But then there's insurance (which wasn't on this book) and tracking (which wasn't on this book).

 

But they did send it out quick. I sent the check in last Tuesday and got the book today.