@louiezlane wrote:
"you'd probably get away with a shipping cost of around $50"
do you have intelligent advice to offer, or are you just pulling numbers out of the air? we didn't set the $91 price, CANADA POST does!
Show me where you can find international air mail from Canada Post for that item for $50, please.
Here are your options for Germany (the country I entered as the international destination for your listing I checked) for a 30x30x15cm parcel weighing 1.5kg:
Small Packet Int'l Air: $44.66
Tracked Packet (with all the bells and whistles): $64.59
The reason so many sellers love Small Packet Int'l Air is that it allows total combined parcel measurements of 90cm, which can accommodate a lot of different options, and has a 2kg maximum. It used to have insurance, but that's been discontinued, so you can either use 3rd party insurance or self-insure. There is no tracking but it's reliably fast.
Tracked Packet would work well for your expensive, breakable items, and you could offer it for not much more than $50 (using your available shipping discount and absorbing the extra cost yourself on high-priced items to attract more sales). It's not available to all countries, but probably the ones you'd be safest shipping to in any event. There were some issues about allowable dimensions when it was first introduced, but I think those glitches have been (finally) fixed.
And for the $91.15 you have shown for international surface shipping to Germany in that particular item, you could afford to offer Xpresspost to Europe and other international destinations for $82.96. In addition, there is a significant discount on Xpresspost if you use online labelling. I believe it is available to many more countries than Tracked Packet, although not Russia.
So I still don't understand why a china bowl and lid would cost $91.15 to ship to Germany by surface, unless it's very, very heavy or you're using a box that's over the combined 90cm total in dimensions.
If you can accept some advice, which I offer only to help, if I were selling the types of items you currently have listed -- fine china, etc. -- I'd use Small Packet International Air without insurance for items under about $75; Small Packet Air with 3rd party insurance for items between $75 and $150; and either Tracked Packet or Xpresspost for higher-value items (and only Xpresspost for anything over $250, with signature confirmation).
For all of these, I'd restrict my ship-to destinations based on a evaluation of risk in line with my own level of comfort. Some sellers have more tolerance for risk, or a higher volume that can absorb losses fairly easily. Your risk is of course also associated with the value and type of item you're shipping, not just the destination. Shipping $10 a piece collectible postcards or DVDs is a snap compared to $300 pieces of collectible china. If you're selling high-value breakables, you should carefully look at how to minimize the obvious areas of risk by developing shipping strategies attuned to your particular items. And as you've discovered, buying insurance will not be enough to avoid loss in some cases.
Your item category presents challenges, but can be managed. You started by railing against eBay for something that many of us felt was an avoidable issue. There is useful information from the posters here if you're willing to look at it.
