Import Charges reporting/calculating differently between listing and Bid

[winnipeggal74]

Is this a bug?

I'm attempting to submit an offer on a "buy it now or best offer" listing. 
I'm logged into ebay.ca. I've recorded my geographical information in my account detail.

I'm submitting an offer that is LOWER than the buy it now price.  However, the import charges associated with my bid are double what is reported in the listing. 
This makes no sense, even if you were to add a processing fee to the import fees, or account for geographical differences.

Buy it now: 150.00 USD
Import Charges: 12.45 USD

Bid: 125.00 USD
Import Charges:  24.75 USD

This is a huge problem for me as a buyer. 
For this specific listing, once I saw the Import Charges, I had to cancel and recalculate my bid with the current exchange factoring in the different Import Charges - and in that time someone else bought the item. 

The maximum Import Charges for the buy it now and whatever geographical fee differences should be what I see in the listing - not when I'm bidding or making an offer. 
 
As far as I'm concerned this is a calculation bug that ebay needs to fix. 

ebay.jpg ‏115 KB

[marnotom!]

I think @reallynicestamps is on the right track here.

Based on what other posters have been saying about their experiences with "best offer", what's probably happening is that while the import charges associated with the listing are based on the location you set up in browsing mode, the import charges on the offer (or in your case, high bid) are based on a worst case scenario of duties, 15% HST, and Pitney Bowes' processing fees.

The official word from eBay is that import charges should be considered estimates until Checkout, when the bots will calculate them properly based on your shipping location.

Annoying, yes. Glitch? Jury's still out.

[pjcdn2005]

As the other poster mentioned, there have been other reports of this so something very odd is going on. I'll tag one of the ebay reps so that they can also pass on your example to the tech department. 

When you were just looking at the listing before you made the offer, were you signed in?

tyler@ebay 

[reallynicestamps]

There are a couple of other posts about this glitch but one possiblility is that the bots are using a generic sales tax percentage when they show the BIN, but when you enter an actual offer they are calculating based on your provincial tax.