Recent Increase to USPS First Class Shipping Rates to Canada - IMPORTANT!

[aimnabby]

I'm a high volume Ebay buyer, and buy almost everything exclusively online primarily through Ebay.  Most items I have bought are clothing for my daughter and most recently a ton of Christmas ornaments - over 50 packages.  I contacted Ebay to discuss the increase in USPS first class postal rates to Canada under 4 lbs and explained the average shipping cost was $4-7 US.  It's now almost double!!  Is anyone else on Ebay concerned about this from either a buyer or seller point of view? 

I think the USPS is greedy considering both sides of the border the economy hasn't recovered and business is hurting.  Having a postal increase - doubled certainly is a way to hinder if not kill business. 

What are sellers doing to entice buyers to shop with them?  What can a buyer do to alleviate some of the excess financial hardship associated to excess shipping costs?  Would it be fair to ask the seller to split or absorb some of the increase??? 

Thoughts???

[i*m-still-here]

I've posted about this quite a bit during the past weeks and so I'm glad to see I'm not alone.

My buying from the US came to a dead stop too.

It's not just the jump in cost, it's also the fact that you have to email every seller asking about cost and avoid the Global Shipping Program (GSP) along the way.

Sellers are also insisting on tracking now and that's fairly new as well.

For me it's OK because I'm about to sell everything I own and start travelling again (thanks to a recent improvement in health)...................., but it will take me a while and I have a lot of selling to do first.

These changes can only benefit Canadian sellers  UNLESS Canadian buyers leave ebay altogether.

It would be nice if y"all started buying Canadian............... but will you, or will you just go to the mall instead?

[enjoyabletreasures4u]

I read that you import into Canada and think shipping rates from USA are high?Try selling from Canada.Shipping is highway robbery.A small parcel under 500grms with tracking number to the USA  after my 5% discount as a NEW VENTURE  is $18.05.Worse is same parcel to Europe,Australia Or South America is same charge and NO TRACKING NUMBER.

Often shipping is much more then merchandise.

HOW CAN SELLERS WIN? It is very bad as is to tell customers it is 18.05 and that does not include any wrapping/packaging nor handling charge PLUS eBay now has a new thing where they dont ONLY take the listing fee.The final sale value commission (pretty high) and ALSO A PERCENTAGE COMMISSION on the shipping charges.JUST on the &18.00 shipping that customer pays We have to naturally pay it to the postal services  and pocket out additional 2.00++ to ebay as their commission for shipping.How can the poor seller survive????Sellers are Not making profits.eBay is grabbing any if there are any.

[enjoyabletreasures4u]

"I think Ebay's shipping calculator might be overestimating the shipping cost as well.  See my thread here titled "Display of some shipping fees are wonky".

You know WHY?eBays calculator IS OVERESTIMATING shipping?Because They ALSO charge a commission on shipping charges.Very few sellers are too busy trying to sell and do not Reconcile the final invoice.Most sellers just pay what they charge. It is already very bad that most sellers charge exact or often lower shipping rates to attract buyers.Bad enough that most do not charge for packaging and handling and yet eBay still wants a cut of something we sellers are already loosing money on.Shipping charges.I have just realized that for every order I ship out from Canada I have been loosing aprox.3.50 + high risks we have to take as there are NO TRACKING numbers anywhere in the world except to USA "expedited"eBay is no longer the place to shop. eBay is the ONLY one making profits NOT the sellers.

[bb_cool_stuff]

I know its easier said than done, but buy low & sell high.

Lower shipping costs to compete with USPS rates & add the difference to your product price if possible.

If that is not possible i would say that item is not worth selling online but could still be sold at a flea market, yard sale, kiijii etc.

[logic079]

I'm Canadian but from what i can tell if the US Government does not do anything to assist USPS with their money problems so they can continue to provide the service they had before (and improve) they are going to lose exponentially more from lost revenue from everyone that stopped buying because it became too expensive.

[brandeentertainment]

i for one like millions in the world live in the middle of no where so your talking a min of 2 hrs and 20 in gas for me to go to any store so i still find ebay is full deals..

shipping is just another obstacle to get around that's all ..... some people will pay and some won't just take good care of the ones that will ..

[cumos55]

Postal rates are what they are.

If you want it,  you pay......Rates will not go down... they have not gone down in the last 10 years...  and where will they go over the next ten years?

The USPS is in deep money troubles.

That we know..,

Yet they have a media mail where one can ship a book within the US for $4 to $5.  How much would the USPS make if they raise the media mail rate to $12 a parcel...

Why do I say $12?

The cost for shipping that same book within Canada can be as high as $13 to $14.... 

Canada Post has its problems   but nothing like the USPS.

Canada Post got rid of its book rate many years ago.

and... I expect that the USPS will do so at some day in the future.....if only to stop the money bleed.

The future...

(1) No delivery on Wednesday.....  deliver on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday

(2) Or... No delivery on Tuesday and Thursday... delivery three days a week

(3)  Or... Delivery on Monday, Wednesday and Friday in one week and Tuesday and Thursday the next week

Why????    Now one delivery person can do two routes.

And all of those new delivery vans....  Why???   Makes the delivery person more mobile...  and able to travel farther to do the same job  on the same number of  days.

Only with such adjustments  will we still have a postal service.

The USPS is fighting a losing battle....  Canada Post is doing a lot better... 

Things will change...  They have to change.... 

Our whole world is changing

[cumos55]

It costs less to ship oversize lettermail across a large city  than to drive and do a local pickup....

simply an example of how someone may try to save money  with a local pickup.

Save on postage and blow the money on gas..

Look  at price increases over the past 40 years....

Why not postal rates....

How many know why the price of bread doubled?.....  Because  it was decided to use wheat as the grain base for methanol production  as opposed to corn...

Why?  Because  farmers can grow wheat more readily than corn in Canada...  moreso in western Canada than eastern Canada....

Why methanol?  and the questions keep on coming

[cumos55]

What to do?

Canadian sellers  providing on eBay.ca what Canadian buyers want without buying from the US.

Canadian sellers  must adjust  with what they sell...

Canadians have looked south to buy and sell....

Perhaps it is time to look east and west.....

[bb_cool_stuff]

Yes, Yes.

The last few items i have purchased have been from Canadian sellers, two were local.

I am not finding the deals, in my category, Stateside any longer due to pricey shipping charges.

I'm sure there are still Great Deals across the line in many categories, but maybe for personal use & not for resale.

[Anonymous]

I find it very ironic about USPS increased insane hefty increase for rates to Canada. 

I just printed a shipping label via PayPal Shipping to ship a slide or 4x6" photo, weigh under 100g with Light Packet to USA for $2.78.  I got email from one of US sellers telling me that she has to charge $8.00 to ship the same size and weight to Canada!!

I asked her how is it possible that it actually cost $8.00 to ship it, she said she is using eBay Shipping to purchase the shipping labels.  I asked her why not go to the post office to buy postages to save $$$ and she said she didn't want to.  I told her to be prepeared to lose a lot of Canadian buyers.

I have one US seller that sell a lot of slides and charges only $3.00 and the actual postage is $1.65 in a bubble envelope which I received today.  This seller said she won't do what eBay expects the sellers do like using eBay Shipping &/or Global Shipping Program, no matter what eBay offers the so-called 50% final value fees, etc.  She said if she uses this services, she would lose 100% of Canadian buyers!!  She said that she got more Canadian buyers than US buyers for the last 5 years and she is not going to lose them just because eBay says so by using eBay shipping &/or Global Shipping Program!!

To think we complain that postage rates to USA was too expensive and now it is cheaper to ship them to USA than USA to Canada.  It may be cheaper for 100 or 250g but not 500g or higher.  Any small sellers in Canada who sell small items like 100g or 250g can do good business by selling to USA than across Canada if they want to use PayPal Shipping for all items.

Since I have over 10,000 orignal slides of celebrities and I am thinking of selling them on eBay as the postage rates to USA is very reasonable comparning to what the US sellers is offering for Canada at $8.00!

[cumos55]

eBay will say "Do `this"  and be successful

The bottom line is

"This is your business...  It is your business plan.

and above all ... you do what is necessary to make a profit.

An example..

Many Canadian sellers follow the principle of shipping with tracking  even with light weight items.

Option 1....They mail  a book weighing less than 500g at a cost of $10 to $12... and book is at $5.00

for a total of $15 to $17

Option 2 ... In turn oversize lettermail  would cost $4 to mail... and then the price of the book would be $11  to $13.

Sell 100 books at this price range  and sales are

$500 with Option 1

$1100 to $1300 with Option 2....

and if one parcel is lost  you are covered..... with a bulge of $600 to $800

There is a BC seller who ONLY sells books that weigh less than 500 grams on eBay.....using oversize lettermail  for postage.....

IT is like poker... Know when to hold... and know when to fold.

Make the right adjustments to make a profit....

[synetech]

The recent increases are indeed horrible. It is no longer financially feasible for anyone who is not rich to buy things on eBay. I know I certainly cannot afford to buy anything here anymore because the current shipping rates are frequently higher than the cost of the items I buy.

What’s confusing is that the USPS web site indicates that there are indeed cheaper options available (e.g., Media Mail for $2.53), yet everything now shows shipping prices to be a minimum of $10. I used to have to pay only $3-$5 when buying things from within North America, so paying a minimum of double is not going to work.

Even more confusing is that it costs just as much, and sometimes even more to ship something within Canada. Why would it cost $10-$20 to ship a DVD case two towns over‽ I could walk or take the bus there to pick it up for less!

Yet more baffling is that items from China are still available with free shipping. Why is it that items from the other side of the planet can arrive for free (and still have dirt-cheap prices for the items themselves), yet items here in N.A. cost so much and cost even more to ship just a couple of hundred mi/km? ?:|

There is definitely something seriously wrong with the system. I understand the USPS is losing money (I have not heard the same of CanadaPost), and I understand that people don’t mail letters and paper documents as much as before because of the Internet, but that’s a poor excuse. People still ship physical goods at least as much as before and in fact much more so than ever before, thanks to the Internet and sites like eBay. Moving physical items around is a business that will never go away (at least not until Star Trek transporters/replicators are invented). If they are losing money, then they are doing something really wrong.

Since the increases, I have practically abandoned eBay (other than the occasional cheap Chinese junk) and started leaning more heavily on local classifieds like Kijiji / eBay Classifieds / Craig’s List / etc. Unfortunately there are many things that cannot be found locally, so I desperately hope that the situation improves and postage rates go back down—then again, look at gas prices; several years ago they skyrocketed and got stuck up there :|.

[pierrelebel]

"What’s confusing is that the USPS web site indicates that there are indeed cheaper options available"

That is correct BUT many American sellers when shipping outside their borders want protection.  As such the select more expensive shipping methods.  Some sellers feel it has become too easy for buyers to claim non-receipt and get their money back.

"items from China are still available with free shipping'

That is easy to explain. The government of China uses China Post extremely low rate - well below cost - to subsidize exports.  In North America, taxpayers are not ready or willing to pay additional taxes to support "mail order" exporters.

[tobyshitzu]

There aren't cheaper options available from the us anymore, at least not available to normal ebay sellers.  Media mail is usa domestic only

Only 5 ounces USPS FCI to canada (like a dvd) is $8.55 at the post office or 7.70 online.  There is nothing cheaper.   Before jan that was $2 something..  A 3lb book is $20

[darryl24]

The shipping prices gone up has made me stop buying on eBay because it's no longer worth the high shipping cost, I used to buy a lot of fishing lures on here.

[naruto_gurl]

I'm STILL frustrated about this change that happened earlier this year.

I have been buying frequently on ebay.com since 2006 until this year... I refuse to pay high shipping prices such as $11 for a $1 item that used to cost $2 to ship.

Shortly after the changes came into effect, the majority of my favourite saved sellers have all raised their shipping prices so I no longer buy from them as I cannot afford to spend $20-$40 on a small item that used to cost $5-$10.

As well as most items I searched for on ebay.com did not even have Canada listed as an option to ship to which was EXTREMELY disappointing and frustrating!

I since switched months ago from using ebay.com to SOLELY using ebay.ca and refuse to buy from US unless I think it is impossible to buy elsewhere such as rare out of print books.

I now also use amazon.ca and etsy.com instead of eBay as they have a much better selection of items than eBay as well as increased quality.

Ebay has become extremely limiting to me since I am used to thousands of items in a search which now is reduced to a couple hundred and majority of which are not appealing.

Just PROFOUNDLY frustrated with all the changes made in shipping on eBay and have gone from purchasing $200 worth of items a month to now going a few months in between single purchases and only as a last resort.

I hope in the future shipping will be more attractive again especially on small items that could fit in an envelope because yes there are free shipping items from China but they do not hold up as well as the items made in USA.

*fingers crossed for next year* 😛

[lady.stark]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

I asked her how is it possible that it actually cost $8.00 to ship it, she said she is using eBay Shipping to purchase the shipping labels.  I asked her why not go to the post office to buy postages to save $$$ and she said she didn't want to.

---

I don't know where you got that info, but that is the contrary. The Post Office will still charge $8. Just verify it on usps.com, you'll see. With eBay shipping, the seller save at least 10% on shipping costs. AND it has Delivery Confirmation to Canada.

[marnotom!]

---

@naruto_gurl wrote:
 

I now also use amazon.ca and etsy.com instead of eBay as they have a much better selection of items than eBay as well as increased quality.

---

Fair enough, but how is the shipping charge from American sellers on Etsy cheaper than what it is on eBay?

[pjcdn2005]

---

@lady.stark wrote:

---

@Anonymous wrote:

I asked her how is it possible that it actually cost $8.00 to ship it, she said she is using eBay Shipping to purchase the shipping labels.  I asked her why not go to the post office to buy postages to save $$$ and she said she didn't want to.

---

I don't know where you got that info, but that is the contrary. The Post Office will still charge $8. Just verify it on usps.com, you'll see. With eBay shipping, the seller save at least 10% on shipping costs. AND it has Delivery Confirmation to Canada.

---

If they purchase a first class label online then they have to pay for and use First Class Package International  which includes tracking. A 5 ounce envelope to Canada would cost $7,70 if postage was printed on the USPS site. The same weight and same service purchased at the post office would cost $8.55

Or, for a 5 ounce envelope that met certain parameters, First Class Mail International could be purchased for $2.55. That service can not be purchased online and does not have tracking,

Do all U.S. sellers receive discounts on shipping or is it just TRS plus or maybe powersellers?