Ebay Question

[AshleyAnn]

I made my second ebay purchase last week and now I have a problem. The seller listed it as a $30.00 shipping charge (I'm pretty sure it was a flat fee not calculated shipping). I bought it and paid the $30 shipping. She took it to the post office yesterday and discovered even the slowest method of shipping is going to cost $70 even when she shrank the box down as much as possible. She said she checked UPS and Fedex and they were both even more. She said "please let me know what we should do because your satisfaction is the most important to us.thank you."

This was an item that orginally was listed as pickup only in my hometown and I considered buying and having a friend pick it up and ship it to me so I estimated shipping myself and found as long as the box wasn't oversized the shipping through USPS would be $25.00. Its got to be only an inch or two too big.

Is there a solution I'm not seeing? I can't afford to pay more in shipping, I don't think I can expect her to pay so much for shipping, but I REALLY want the item. I emailed her back and gave her a suggestion to rearrange the parts of the item that may make it smaller and fit in a smaller box and asked if that didn't work if she'd consider selling me just parts of the whole item but I'd still rather have the complete item (not even sure how that would work since I bought it on a CC that is now shut off and I don't have a method to pay for it if they refund me the entire amount) I don't even know where Ebay stands on the issue - I read it as her mistake but I'm not sure.

[JTsMom]

It is her mistake, and she is obligated to ship it to you at the quoted amount. If she doesn't, you could file a non-performing seller report on her.

ETA: I would keep encouraging her to re-package it, or possible to just take it into a UPS store, and see how much they would charge to package and ship it. Is it possible she doesn't understand the oversize rules?

[clc053103]

This has happened to me before, I underestimated shipping of an item (not intentionally, I made an error). and I ate the shipping cost- she stated the shipping as $30- she needs to ship that item to you regardless of what it costs her. Look at it this way- if she charged $30 for shipping and it ended up being $10, she would not owe you a refund. she stated the shipping price and you agreed to it and paid it. It's her mistake and you can expect her to ship you the item- unless she said "$30 shipping is estimated, buyer will need to pay exact shipping once determined" or something like that. She needs to ship you that item as stated in the terms of the auction.

[veronica]

Ebay says you can not charge more than your listing states and it is against rules to ask for more, especially that much more.

That said, you can't physically force the seller to ship it. I suggest trying to work with her as much as possible-even suggest for her to repackage and try again. After all, it is her responsibility to list her items correctly and she should have had a valid shipping quote. I had the same thing happen to me almost two years ago on one of my first ebay purchases and it was a nightmare.

I did eventually get the seller to admit they listed it incorrectly and that was against policy to ask me for $90 more! When I did receive the boxes (two large ones), the postage on them was half of the original amount so I just about went nuts on them! It was awful...I feel your pain and hope it does work out amicably.

[AshleyAnn]

I decided to ask if she could ship it in 2 shipments since it comes apart at the middle. It should cost around the $30 I paid to ship both boxes. I've been very patient so far - I 'bought it now' over a week ago and she just took it to the post office yesterday so I'm feeling a bit annoyed since I emailed her the night I bought it that I needed it ASAP.

I'm thinking its only an inch or two too big but without seeing it I can't fix it which bothers me - I'm a problem solver and an engineer at heart.

[KrisM]

Yes to all the PPs. Ebay doesn't allow sellers to ask for more money after a sale. She should have figured shipping correctly before listing.

But, no one can force her to ship it to you. If she doesn't, you can:
1. leave appropriate feedback (sellers can ONLY leave positive, remember)
2. file a non-selling seller report with ebay (http://pages.ebay.in/help/policies/non-selling-seller.html)
3. report her for asking for more money (http://pages.ebay.com/help/contact_us/_base/index_selection.html)

If it's something you really want, you can try to make a deal with her for the additional money. If you agree to pay more, have her refund you and reinvoice you so that it's all paid together. That way, if there is an issue later and you need to file with paypal, you can.