Change in shipping destination mid-auction

[hanknchuck13]

I'm a buyer and for the last month or more I've encountered an issue with shipping settings (I think) during an auction.

Here's the situation: I see an item of interest and the listing shows it ships to Canada (and shows the estimated cost). I bid with no problems at all. Towards the end of the auction, within the last day or two, I return to the auction to increase my bid and the listing is now showing it may not ship to Canada and it prevents me bidding on the item. It doesn't happen with every seller. Also, I check the shipping details and Canada is no longer listed the long list of countries they ship to (when at the beginning of the auction Canada was listed). I'm not sure if a setting has changed on my end or the seller's but it's getting frustrating to say the least.

Has anyone else encountered this or know how it might be resolved? I've contacted both a seller and eBay to discuss but it's fruitless. 

Thanks,

M.

[marnotom!]

Sellers usually can't make changes to auction listings once bids are in place.  Is the shipping method for these listings stated as "eBay International Shipping"?

What sorts of items have you been trying to bid on?

[msau4301]

If you go back and forth between looking at .com site and .ca that could make a difference. Are you always looking from the same place?

I know back when I used to buy here more often I used to get frustrated being on .com and seeing items I wanted and wasn't able to bid on so now I only look on .ca where I know they will usually ship here.

I have a number of sellers I've followed for years, bought from many times and now their items don't even show for me anymore since they've stopped selling outside of US due to higher fee costs.

On a side note, if it is strictly auctions you are looking at/bidding on a seller can't make any changes (even to shipping locations) once there are any bids on an item. I know this part as a seller since I've had people ask to add their country but I can't once auction is active with bids.

[reallynicestamps]

"eBay International Shipping"?

EBay International Shipping is fairly new and has some glitches that need ironing out. And in some cases beaten with a heavy mallet.

The seller is only shipping to Glendale IL, at which point their responsiblity for delivery ends*.

That may be confusing a bot somewhere.

You can Message the seller and ask his permission to continue bidding. Most will be happy to oblige.

*EIS is a Seller Protection program.

[marnotom!]

The reason why I asked about the shipping method and the nature of the items in the auctions was because earlier today, I was doing some searching for mobile phone listings.   Because I accidentally started my search with my shipping location set to the US, I found that some listings where eBay International Shipping was being used had Canada on the shipping exclusion list along with the likes of Libya and the Russian Federation.

I seem to recall some posts in the past few weeks from fellow Canuck buyers that suggested that items contained lithium-ion batteries were dead-ending at the eIS shipping hub in Illinois, likely victims of a carrier restriction or a misinterpretation of information from Canadian carriers.  It appears that this issue hasn't been resolved and Canada is now starting to pop up on the shipping exclusion list for eIS listings in categories where lithium-ion batteries are known to be shipped with the item in the listing.

If this is what's happening with @hanknchuck13's auctions, then messaging the seller isn't going to resolve the situation as the seller's permission won't change anything.  For what it's worth, I tried going through Checkout with an item listed with eBay International Shipping where it stated the seller "may" ship to Canada and was blocked from purchasing the item at Checkout.