Once again, I must be the lucky one. I have sold and purchased in the neighborhood of 250 HO and N scale model railroad items via eBay and have never had problems with overpriced shipping charges or poorly shipped items. In fact, via the "new" eBay listing tools that have been in place for years, you enter the weight of the item and eBay will automatically calculate the actual shipping price via USPS. I think eBay also does this for UPS and/or FedEx also, although I ship exclusively via USPS since all of the packaging materials are available free of charge from the local post office. All of my buyers pay the exact shipping charge and I combine shipping on multiple items. I also can't remember the last time I haven't had the same experience with items I have purchased. If I were to ever ship a locomotive in an envelope or charge $20 shipping for a freight car, the resulting negative feedback would just about kill the ability for me to deal on eBay in the future. Jamie
I have purchased several items on ebay. the shipping has been fair in each case. I do include any s/h charges in my total bid. Latest item purchased was an Atlas Trainmaster DCC ready , new....$36 shipping was $8 . Okay shipping was about 2.50 more than I paid on my last engine, but hey $44.00 for the engine was fair and add $25 for a decoder and I have $69 into a decoder equipped Atlas engine. I agree totally with earlier posts, shipping is included in my total, higher the shipping lower the bid and lower the shipping higher the bid to whatever I am willing to pay for an item. Ralph.
I do if it is something I want that I cant get somewhere else. It has to be a good deal as well, including shipping. But, even tho Ebay has changed over the years for the worst, it is still a good source for some things as long as you do the math and be sure you get the deal you wanted to. I used to sell ALLOT on ebay,but don't much at all anymore. Just every so often.
I still occasionally buy something on FeeBay (That's what it is anymore). When you include the listing fee, the 8+% auction fee, the PayPal charges, and the shipping expense; it is no wonder that sellers charge high S/H amounts. You have to pass those expenses on to the buyer or you might as well give your items away. There isn't any way that you can make money anymore selling on eBay unless you got the items you sell dirt cheap originally. Personally, I'm thoroughly disgusted with eBay and would love to see an alternative means of disposing of my surplus equipment. As long as you consider the shipping/handling expense as part of your purchase price for an item and adjust your bid accordingly, eBay can still provide some good deals--especially for the "out of production" things that you really want.
Trainboard has their own auction pages here. I have bought a few items there and also Trainboards Trainstore. I feel I can always trust the guys who sell here.:tb-cool: .
I've been unsuccessful at contacting someone selling something I want here on trainboard. I assume this is not the norm, but it is kind of frustrating.
Here's an example of postage costs for ONE MT car weighing 1.5 ounces in a box weighing 1.4 ounces rounded to 6 ounces to account for stuffing the box with newsprint. I used hotrod4x5's and my zip codes for the calculations. According to the USPS website, 6 ounces can ship First Class for $2.07. But YOU have to supply the box, tape to seal it, packing material and labels if you don't print them online. If you save and re-use boxes, the box cost is nothing, tape is cheap as are labels and the packing material is the same newsprint as stated. So MAYBE your costs are $2.25-$2.50. That doesn't include your labor to package the item. Add delivery confirmation @ 80 cents, and your cost is over $3.00. And if you have to take it to the post office, add the expense of getting there. Parcel Post? $4.90! And you STILL have to provide the box, label, etc.! Add 80 cents for delivery confirmation for a total of $5.70! Priority Mail? $4.80 (purchased online at a discount!). And the Post Office supplies the box for free, you don't need to tape many of the post office boxes and the labels are printed when you purchase online. It takes maybe 15 seconds to assemble the smaller USPS Priority boxes. You will still use newsprint for stuffing and tape to hold the label on. AND, delivery confirmation is INCLUDED for $4.80! Shipping times: First Class: up to 3 business days; Parcel Post: up to 6 business days; Priority Mail: 2-3 business days. First Class and Priority are about the same time. Priority is only about a dollar more and you KNOW the post office watches Priority Mail more closely than First Class. Now add two more cars to the package for combined shipping at 10 ounces. First Class is now $2.75 + .80 delivery confirmation for a total of $3.55, not including your packing materials, etc. For Priority Mail, your postage cost is the SAME $4.80!! It's a no-brainer for me! When I sell on e-Bay, I round the postage up to $5.00. When I combine multiple purchases, I round the postage costs UP to the nearest dollar ($6.35 becomes $7.00; $7.85 becomes $8.00) That's the only "padding" I do. Most of the time, the combined package still ships for $5.00. Now that the post office offers Flat Rate in the small box, I can ship 3 or 4 locomotives for the same $4.80! Try THAT with First Class! I wouldn't consider sending any locomotives or rolling stock in an envelope, padded or not! It's just ASKING for trouble! And padded envelopes would raise your shipping costs by 60 to 90 cents or more for the envelope! It doesn't make any sense to use padded envelopes for locos or cars and I wouldn't buy from someone who uses them! My conclusion? Priority Mail is the way to go. Post office supplies the box, you print labels with postage off your computer AND you can just hand the box to your postal carrier or drop in the nearest mailbox! That's my opinion. YMMV! Darrell, quiet...for now
I concur with your findings. Priority mail saves you time, gas and packing materials when you order their supplies (free), opt for postal carrier pickup at home (free), and use their on-line payment to print out mailing labels (discount from Post Office in-person rate AND free delivery confirmation (.75 if you request it at the counter),and weight charges if you can fit it into a Flat Rate box. And they do try for 2-3 day delivery domestic. Parcel post is a dog. The PO insists on truck shipment, even east coast to west coast, often misdirects the box at an interchange location; I've had to wait and file missing package reports 21 days after mailing (and numerous emails to try to comfort PO'ed (pun intended) ebay buyers (and I mean plural in that several boxes have gone missing, only to show up 25 days later!) FEDEX can, I say can, almost give you Priority Mail services at Parcel Post prices, but, they use their weights, not yours, and they bill you a week or more after the fact. They billed me 11 lbs for an 8 lb package a few weeks ago. I'm still figuring out how to challenge this given the lack of in-person interface, and the package is long gone (hopefully delivered and opened) when the bill arrives. So why use FEDEX? Try as I may to convince to ship a $700 brass loco priority (or even overnight), people want the cheapest way (truck bouncing, and loading/unloading football and all) to ship both cheap, and expensive brass loco items. Insurance covers lost packages, not a brass loco that's been shaken to death, so my dilemma, give 'em the parcel post option, but ship it FEDEX and maybe eat a little shipping cost; or hold their hands when a parcel post shipped loco shows up in pieces 3 weeks later? BTW, you can get postal service accurate weighing scales for $20-$30, I have two Digiweigh scales, both Postal Service accurate. i've always agreed my weights to the PO scale at the counters when I took a package to the PO. That allows you to charge fairly on ebay without getting stuck (exception maybe FEDEX)
I tend to list things like ebay auctions with the price added to the shipping and then ranked. Usually, with N scale cars, you're not going to get a good shipping rate unless you buy three or four or more from the same person. I don't think five or six bucks is all that outlandish for a nice, padded envelope or small box plus priority shipping, rounded up to make up for the hassle of having to go to the post office and ship it. I don't do any selling on eBay precisely because I don't want to have to monkey with shipping, etc.
Agree completely! :thumbs_up: Despite being the butt of a lot of jokes, the USPS is one of the best organizations anywhere and their Priority Mail products & services are a great value. Jamie ADDED INFO: I forgot to mention that most of the USPS facilities now have the 24-hour self service Automated Postal Center (APC). This allows me to walk into the local post office at 10:00 PM after all of my auctions have closed and ship everything Priority Mail (or first class or express mail) using my debit card. Piece of cake and I don't have to monkey with my work schedule to get to a post office during regular business hours.
One of the lesser discussed attributes of the Priority Mail option is how much the box weighs. The larger non-flat rate box comes in at about eight ounces, making it pretty easy to blow past the one-pound rate with just about anything. Good thing N Scale is so light. When I last sold on eBay, and we're now going on four years away from then, I liked to give customers a choice-- cheaper in padded envelope (and the shipping cost included the price of the envelope) or exact Priority Mail postage. Four years ago was, what, about 105 price increases ago as well, though. For the padded envelopes as well as the postage and of course those wonderful double fees (eBay and Paypal). I am still a bit annoyed with a recent transaction where four items with $5 shipping each-- the infamous "flat rate shipping service" which increasingly means "cheapest way I can do it"-- was "combined" to a $15 S&H charge. The box arrived with $5.50 postage on it. The seller got a positive overall (the stuff did show up intact), but the Detailed Seller Ranking I left wasn't pretty. The advice way at the beginning to figure shipping costs into the bid is pretty much my process as well. A one cent car with a $12.00 shipping cost is not going to attract my attention.
The source of the problem... fees! eBay and Paypal have dramatically hiked their fees... to the point that many sellers wonder whether they are trying to get rid of the auction business. This leads some sellers to try to preserve their profits by making money on shipping. Of course, eBay predicted this, and has policies to discourage the practice -- but I honestly wonder how frequently it's actually enforced. There are still many excellent, honest sellers on eBay, many of whom specialize in N scale. I would encourage would-be buyers to take a look, but please watch out for the following danger signs: 1. Feedback rating is less than 100% 2. Picture is blurry - hard to tell what you're getting 3. Text is brief, not informative, and full of abusive warnings 4. Text is typed in all capital letters 5. Text is full of spelling and grammatical errors 6. Seller will not accept returns 7. No policy is specified for combined shipping 8. Shipping charge seems high 9. Initial asking price for auction items seems high 10. Seller has fewer than 200-300 transactions as both buyer and seller 11. Username sounds juvenile or abusive Most of these are not damning in themselves (the showstoppers for me are #1 and #6), but the listings of the worst sellers on eBay typically have several of these danger signs. Caveat emptor.
If youve sold on ebay in n scale, ive probably bought from you. Just a few observations. Ive gotten items packed so professionally well its take me 30 minutes to unwrap it. Ive also gotten items packed in a. cigar boxes b. oatmeal boxes c. cereal boxes d. a $200 articulate rolled in toilet paper and left to fend for itself in a medium priority box (only four pieces!) e. a single box car packed in a priority 8x8x12 box (overkill??) f. a box packed with the sellers garbage (empty cig packs, a "used" paper plate, and empty water bottle) f. TWO concor 4-6-4's rolled together in newspaper g. with an extra bonus (a pornographic dvd!) h. at least 3 times empty i. wrapped in a shirt (getting rid of an unsold ebay item were we?) j. microtrain cars DUCKTAPED together (yeesh!) k. so musty and mildewy smelling I gagged
I love ebay...to an extent. I am an avid collector of all things C&O n scale. Sooner or later they all end up on ebay. Where else would I be able to find the ConCor C&O Hudson that I just found on ebay? I had only heard they made a few but never saw one.Until now. I remember once buying a couple of the Athearn shorty old time passenger cars at a decent price. Ihe seller had thousnds of positive feedbacks. Just a few negatives. When I go the details on shipping they had charged me more for the shipping than I paid for my ounce of N scale. I went back and finally found the"shipping calculator" in thr sellers third or fourth page of details. I left negative feedback as they did for me. My only negative feedback ever. I did notice the few negatives the seller had all had to do with extreme shipping charges.
That's my policy as well. When I'm buying, I pay close attention to what someone wants for shipping... don't let it suprise you
I have never had the unpleasant packing experiences you mentioned. I am one that uses bubble wrap, tape, seals the box. It will take a little while to get to the prize.
I look at a seller's feedback and see why it is not 100%. Most of the time it is retaliatory or undeserved feedback by bad buyers. I don't like all caps or long detailed rules. I do not accept returns. What I sell is new. There should be no reason to return it. I had one guy that said the loco I sent had a scratch on it. I told him to return it by Priority Mail insured and if it was in the same condition as when I sent it, I would give him a refund. He sent it Parcel Post and wanted his postage refunded. I got my magnifying glass out, and there was no scratch. I gave him a refund for the loco and postage and then added him to my "banned bidder list". The rest I agree with.
Add to Bryan's list: 12. Quantity of exclamation points exceeds quantity of any other character in the description. 13. Item is described as "RARE! SCARCE! HARD TO FIND!!!!!!!!!!!!!" (also, "!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"-- see #12). Now, on a relative basis compared to, say, molecules of water in a given ocean, even Atlas 5 inch straight track is "RARE!!!!" but in the N Scale world it sure isn't. Be very careful unless you really know that it's "RARE!!!!!" (the number of bids is probably a clue). 14. Seller refuses to combine shipments. Not the same as Bryan's #7, they do state a policy: no combined shipments. This is most common among the "drop and sell" outlets which are trying to make a large percent off of the consignee and a non-trivial amount of change from the buyer though unrealistic shipping charges. (Like $15 to ship a $3 car.) If "your system is not set up to combine shipments," then "my system is not set up to bid on your auctions." Worst buying experience was a Kadee HO car that had been wrapped in the remains of an inside out Priority Mail box and packing tape... mostly the packing tape. The jewel box was ruined, fortunately the car wasn't. The seller is no longer active otherwise I'd mention his handle. I think vilefile gets the "prize" though.
i buy and sell on ebay all the time. mostly good experiances, buy a few rip offs. but i still shop on there.
