Has anyone had issues lately with buyers seeing free shipping on their end when in fact it was not?

[sweetappleofyoureye]

A couple of times in the past month, I have had buyers win an auction or buy it now then when they go to pay it shows as free shipping on their end when in fact I have a calculated shipping option on my listing (no free shipping).  I believe it is the Ebay app that is showing this.    It is very frustrating because the buyer is unable to pay until I send them an invoice and also they insist on the free shipping that they see on their screen!  I'm worried about upsetting buyers and getting negative feedback over something that I have no control over.  I have had to write in my listing description that I do not offer free shipping and to please contact me for a quote if it does not show up, but is there anything else I can do? Does anyone have any pointers?  Thanks in advance! 

[femmefan1946]

The glitch has been reported from time to time. My apologies, I don't remember the cause or cure.

I did look at a couple of your items using dotCOM and 90210 as my zipcode, and shipping did appear on the Shipping tab.

There was no shipping amount given in your list on dotCOM as there was on dotCA, nor did any appear in the info above the description box next to the photo.

Perhaps the problem is mobile devices? These notoriously don't include all the information the seller posts.

And of course the buyer might be 'mistaken' since the shipping should be appearing (and in my check of the Kate Spade wallet, did) when the buyer goes to check out. (No, I did not buy it I stopped before moving to Paypal , sorry if that confuses your bookkeeping.)

But the shipping was there and if the customer did not want to pay that much she could just not proceed.

[rose-dee]

---

@femmefan1946 wrote:

The glitch has been reported from time to time. My apologies, I don't remember the cause or cure.

---

I too seem to recall this being mentioned, but like you, I can't remember details.  There are so many site issues on eBay at the moment, who can keep track of them all? 

What I did discover by accident the other day, while doing a test for a different purpose, is shown in the screen shot below.  I wonder if it's related to the OP's issue? 

I was on .com, searching by keywords that I knew would bring up some of my items.  That item shown does not have free shipping internationally, nor even to the U.S.  I wondered whether it had to do with the fact that the system recognized I was located in Canada, even if I were on the U.S. site, yet that doesn't make much sense.  

I've never seen this notice of international free shipping pop up before on my items; in fact I don't think any of my items have free shipping outside Canada.

I don't know whether a U.S. buyer would actually end up with free shipping if she purchased this item, since I haven't sold one of them lately (I haven't sold much of anything lately in fact). 

[momcqueen]

Any time that I offer free DOMESTIC calculated shipping on an item, it shows up as free international postage in search results elsewhere. It just does. My international shipping is also calculated but not free. I assume this is the reason and the bug lay in that. 

[pjcdn2005]

I was on .com, searching by keywords that I knew would bring up some of my items.  That item shown does not have free shipping internationally, nor even to the U.S.  I wondered whether it had to do with the fact that the system recognized I was located in Canada, even if I were on the U.S. site, yet that doesn't make much sense.  

This was brought up by someone else on the weekly board meeting a few weeks ago. Your listing does have free shipping to Canada and since you were on the U.S. site, you are considered an international buyer. It makes sense although the wording was changed just in the last few months and since Canadians often shop on .com, they don't always think of themselves as being 'international'.

I don't know whether a U.S. buyer would actually end up with free shipping if she purchased this item, since I haven't sold one of them lately

A U.S. buyer would pay the shipping cost listed for the U.S.  It's easy enough to check yourself. Just change your location in the shipping drop down when you are looking at the listing.

[pjcdn2005]

There have been comments before that the mobile app will sometimes show free shipping even when it isn't so that could be the problem. I haven't had that happen but I have seen other sellers commenting on it.

[mcrlmn]

I've seen it many times in the past month.
Checkout does not reflect the same.

[momcqueen]

No. A very different picture is presented at checkout.

The thing with the mobile devices is that it used to be that listings with shipping to Canada reflected the first domestic rate of the original post. So you'd see postage to the USA from the USA as your shipping cost if the item and seller were both from The States.

On the very outdated version of the ebay app that I'm now running on a very outdated device, the shipping in search results is properly reflected but, for example, if as a buyer I am trying to leave feedback for a seller who has combined shipping for me, it will come up as an automatic five-stars for 'free' shipping even if it was not. 

The FREE SHIPPING bug in search results is a problem for both buyers and sellers. If it lures buyers to a make a purchase that the seller cannot possibly honour with free postage because free postage never existed as an offer, this may lead to defects for the seller because the buyer is disappointed.

It also undermines the credibility of ebay as a sales platform because it is perpetuating errors in search results that make it look like some form of sneakiness is underfoot. 

[pjcdn2005]

---

@mjwl2006 wrote:

Any time that I offer free DOMESTIC calculated shipping on an item, it shows up as free international postage in search results elsewhere. It just does. My international shipping is also calculated but not free. I assume this is the reason and the bug lay in that. 

---

If you are looking at your listings on .com, it's not a bug in this case and has nothing to do with your shipping being calculated. You are seeing that someone in Canada (Canadians are international buyers on .com) would receive free shipping. If you change your shipping location then the listing will show the correct postage for that location.

[momcqueen]

No, no. I thought of that. This was not that. I found it existed around Christmas as I had international buyers who were expecting free shipping on international purchases when their shipping costs were specified in the listing yet showed up as 'free' in the search. When I too searched my own item with their country as my ship-to, it created the same erroneous 'free' result within the search page. I reported it to ebay a few times. But thank you. Yes, I play with that drop-down ship-to menu all the time, and I'm trying to recreate it at the moment but cannot. Everything is fine right now. I'm not finding any anomalies. But I will pay closer attention to that so that I'm not leading anyone astray in my answers here. 

[pjcdn2005]

Sorry, I misunderstood.

But I still don't think that would have anything to do with calculated shipping vs flat rate.

[momcqueen]

Good to know. I thought it might since, when that error was cropping up for me as a seller, it seemed to happen only to the items I had listed with free calculated domestic shipping but that might be a red herring. Those might have been only the items I noticed were coming up incorrectly as free shipping because they tended to be high-demand and commanded more attention that some of the regulars in my inventory. 

[pjcdn2005]

---

@mjwl2006 wrote:

Good to know. I thought it might since, when that error was cropping up for me as a seller, it seemed to happen only to the items I had listed with free calculated domestic shipping but that might be a red herring. Those might have been only the items I noticed were coming up incorrectly as free shipping because they tended to be high-demand and commanded more attention that some of the regulars in my inventory. 

---

Well...I don't see how the two could be related but it is just my opinion.  But, if it is free domestic shipping then it isn't calculated ?? You must mean free domestic shipping and calculated international shipping. 🙂

[momcqueen]

Yes and no. Both were calculated on these listings I'm talking about from back in December but I was offering free domestic by Expedited only; Xpprespost changes would still apply. Know what I mean?

[sweetappleofyoureye]

Thanks for your replies. For me it happened a couple of times when I had calculated shipping. The buyer is not able to calculate the shipping from their mobile device and when they go to checkout it says the cost of item + free shipping. I am not aware of this until I get a message from the buyer saying they are unable to pay for the item and request an invoice. When I send the invoice with the item amount plus shipping, I get a response of "I thought shipping was free?" Then I look bad...lol. So the buyer can't actually automatically purchase the item with free shipping because the shipping is not actually free. It's a real hassle and I don't like looking like I'm offering free shipping then charging shipping. That being said, it seems to only be happening from mobile devices using the app and now that I have changed to fixed cost shipping, it is clearly stated, and I haven't run into the issue again. Disappointing though because I prefer calculated shipping so I don't lose money when shipping to more rural areas. Does this all make sense?

[momcqueen · Accepted solution]

Oh, yes. Again, familiar territory. I used to see this as a buyer when making purchases on my mobile device BUT it is possible that your buyers are not being entirely honest with you. As far as I can recall, the item listing shows actual shipping cost right up until the moment they buy it and then go to pay at which point the calculations fail and, without the ability to calculate a cost, the default says error and then 'free' but they know it wasn't ever really 'free' anyway. (Make sure you save their correspondence so that if those buyers ever try to nail you with a low DSR on that feedback, you can apply to eBay to have it removed because it's not your fault.) The other thing that tI was talking about happens in search results from time to time but now, I think, within ten days for me. As to what led to that error, be sure to tell them it's a bug and that they need to update their software to ensure they are running the latest eBay app on their device. Or if using their browser, to switch to the app. and then also ask them to report it to tech support. Taking these steps will drive home the idea you're not trying to pull a fast one. But e polite about it. Make sure they understand it's not you, but a technical error. You can report it as a seller but, I think, the glitch has more to do with what the buyer is doing at their end. 

[sweetappleofyoureye]

Yes, thank you. It does seem to be an issue with the eBay app on mobile devices.

[sweetappleofyoureye]

Yes, I've had it both ways. I had one buyer send me a screen shot of what they were seeing on their end and sure enough it said free shipping although on my laptop it did not. I honored it anyway because I'm just starting out and I can not afford any negative feedback. You are right though- Being polite is always good :). Thank you for your response! I really appreciate the feedback 🙂

[momcqueen]

You are very welcome. (I'm sorry I didn't do a better job proofreading my reply before hitting 'post' because now I see at least three typos that will live forever in posterity but my children were running amok at the time.) But, yes, whenever there is a bug like that and it puts you, as a seller, in a difficult position, it is important to log all communication with the buyer and also if you have the time at that time to call ebay Customer Service and get their instructions too on how best to proceed. (And take notes on that call.) In the same situation, I too usually opt to keep the buyer happy and take the loss. In the long run, reputation is more important than profit. I think? 

[krivak.2007]

I have had this happen a couple of times with US customers saying that an item is listed as free shipping when it was not. I just had an Italian customer PAY for a $115 (about 7 items) order one at a time with no shipping included despite the fact that I sent an invoice with shipping included. Not even sure how he did it. I'm awaiting my customer's response.