eBay

1049susanm · ‎03-14-2017

what is the rule about getting items sold via global shipping if they are all bought on the same day and bought together?

Thans!

afantiques · ‎03-14-2017

If they were sold as individulal lots they must be sent as individual lots. Unless the buyer used the shopping cart feature, and I don't know what that looks like to the seller.

What you will probably find is that although all addresses you have are the same Erlanger depot address, the individual routing number that must be included in the address will be different for each item. If this is the case, they MUST be sent as individual packages each with their own number.

The buyer will be paying such a large shipping total they may just not pay you.

PS I see you are probably a buyer. There is no shipping discount for GSP items in general. It would be a good idea to ask the seller to sort out some more economically sensible way of shipping, before you buy. After is too late.

momcqueen · ‎03-14-2017

The Global Shipping Program cannot be used to combine shipping.

If you place three bids with a seller who uses the GSP and win all three, they must be shipped to you in different boxes as part of different orders. It's how the program is established to process orders. One item listing equals one shipment. The only way a buyer or seller can 'combine' shipping is if they have three of an identical item and you buy two, they can ship together, or the item you purchase is a lot or bundle of many similar items.

femmefan1946 · ‎03-14-2017

So we go to a workaround.

If the seller agrees (which generally means if the value is high enough) he can cancel the three sales as "Buyer Request". You agree.

Then he sets up a new listing for all three items, using your name as the title. (Because that's easy for you to find but no one else).

The price and shipping cost BY USPS!!! is agreed beforehand.

You buy and pay promptly.

He ships the three items together BY USPS FIRST CLASS PARCEL INTERNATIONAL.

https://ircalc.usps.com/

Note that this service includes Confirmation of Delivery to Canada.

You pay applicable duty, sales tax and a $9.95 service fee to the Canada Post carrier on your doorstep. (Or more likely to the clerk at the PO).

The seller is not required to agree to this.

Many sellers enrolled in the GSP to avoid perceived problems with international sellers.

And many are nervous, new, and/or xenophobic.

pjcdn2005 · ‎03-15-2017

Contrary to what others are saying global shipping DOES have a shipping discount if you purchase multiple items from the same seller. You must put them in a cart and purchase them all at the same time. If you purchase them separately, the shipping will not be discounted.

momcqueen · ‎03-15-2017

When did this change?

femmefan1946 · ‎03-15-2017

It's been around for a while, but I have, perhaps sloppily, been taking it for granted that if the buyer is complaining about not getting a shipping discount on multiple purchases, that no shopping cart was used.

I suppose that the 'shopping cart discount' is not retroactively applicable.

i'm also guessing here that the 'shopping cart discount' is automatic.

I'd be happy to be corrected.

momcqueen · ‎03-15-2017

I tried to combine shipping with items in the cart (from a large seller that used GSP) last in summer of 2015. It did not work, and I never tried again. I'll do so at my desk later today and report back with my findings.

momcqueen · ‎03-15-2017

I stand corrected: it is now possible to combine shipping on multiple items from the same seller if you use the Shopping Cart.

maggiebvintage2010 · ‎03-15-2017

Good to know, but I don't see a shipping discount such as pj mentioned - and the "import charges" are not changed either, so what is the advantage to the buyer, other than they all arrive in the same package?

momcqueen · ‎03-15-2017

It looks to me like the shipping cost is split across the items while the import fees accumulate as the value of the total order rises. Therefore, a modest combined shipping savings. Assuming it's calculated the same by eBay for sellers who use both Calculated and Flat Rate postage calculations.

momcqueen · ‎03-15-2017

It might make better sense in some cases NOT to combine items into one order. You'll notice the top one in my screenshot example is under the de minimus threshold and should therefore be duty-free on its own.

A buyer would have to experiment to find the best value.

marnotom! · ‎03-15-2017

@maggiebvintage2010 wrote:

Good to know, but I don't see a shipping discount such as pj mentioned - and the "import charges" are not changed either, so what is the advantage to the buyer, other than they all arrive in the same package?

The shipping and import charges on the first two items are considerably lower than those for the third item. I've never encountered those sorts of charges on listings for single items listed with the GSP. I think those are the ones that have been discounted, while the charges for the third item are the ones found on the listing page.

pocomocomputing · ‎03-15-2017

@maggiebvintage2010 wrote:
Good to know, but I don't see a shipping discount such as pj mentioned - and the "import charges" are not changed either, so what is the advantage to the buyer, other than they all arrive in the same package?

The discount is not visible above since the items are combined. You would have to buy each item separately and the total of the three separate purchases would be less than the combined shipping shown above.

As I understand it, the difference is very small. Which makes sense because the main component of the import charges is the sales taxes due. The combined invoice has lower charges on the shipping cost portion since it is one package and perhaps only one Pitney Bowes processing charge instead of three.

The difference above most likely is small like $10 US or so for the three items above.

pjcdn2005 · ‎03-15-2017

@femmefan1946 wrote:
It's been around for a while, but I have, perhaps sloppily, been taking it for granted that if the buyer is complaining about not getting a shipping discount on multiple purchases, that no shopping cart was used.

I suppose that the 'shopping cart discount' is not retroactively applicable.

i'm also guessing here that the 'shopping cart discount' is automatic.

I'd be happy to be corrected.

I believe they started it at least 2 years ago, perhaps even longer than that. I've posted about it a number of times here and on the .com boards but many are still not aware of it. I think that some people who use the gsp may not realize that there is a discount even if they've used the cart because of the way that it is distributed throughout all of the items and there is no 'discount' mentioned. In some cases they probably don't even check because they were told that there wasn't one so they assume that's true.

pjcdn2005 · ‎03-15-2017

@marnotom! wrote:
@maggiebvintage2010 wrote:

Good to know, but I don't see a shipping discount such as pj mentioned - and the "import charges" are not changed either, so what is the advantage to the buyer, other than they all arrive in the same package?

The shipping and import charges on the first two items are considerably lower than those for the third item. I've never encountered those sorts of charges on listings for single items listed with the GSP. I think those are the ones that have been discounted, while the charges for the third item are the ones found on the listing page.

I suppose that's possible but whenever I have experimented, the shipping for all items were discounted in some way. The import charges are often less too because there is only 1 handling charge rather than 2+ handling charges.

momcqueen · ‎03-15-2017

Maybe my problem with no available combined shipping in the summer of 2015 was particular to the seller, and not the program.

momcqueen · ‎03-15-2017

Thank you for clarifying this. I'd been laboring under the wrong information for awhile.

marnotom! · ‎03-15-2017

@marnotom! wrote:

The shipping and import charges on the first two items are considerably lower than those for the third item. I've never encountered those sorts of charges on listings for single items listed with the GSP. I think those are the ones that have been discounted, while the charges for the third item are the ones found on the listing page.

@pjcdn2005 wrote:

I suppose that's possible but whenever I have experimented, the shipping for all items were discounted in some way. The import charges are often less too because there is only 1 handling charge rather than 2+ handling charges.

Fair enough. Without knowing more about the items in the screenshot, it just appeared that the import and shipping charges for the third item are pretty typical for a GSP item, whereas the first two have charges that are considerably lower. Doing the number crunching, though, I can see that you're probably right about the discount being spread between all three items.

momcqueen · ‎03-15-2017

I really cannot tell you what items they were, as they were grabbed at random from a random seller. I could try to re-create it tomorrow but I can't promise success.

I do think it's probably a test anyone could run with any GSP seller out there to see where sayings lay on shipping and whether it also applies to import fees in more cases than not.