Anyone else lose sleep last night from the Tariff News?

[sin-n-dex]

I stayed up late last night because I was restless and the forum was giving me comfort (because I know I'm not alone in this situation), and finally fell asleep after midnight. At 4am I was awake again and unable to get back to sleep.

My brain is on a hamster wheel going around in circles of different scenarios of the tariff problem, and every time I think of a solution, I think of another problem it will cause.

The two solutions (if I have a choice) are to either ship from Canada, or ship from the US. Each one has it's benefits, but each one has a problem. Ship from Canada, the buyer might have to pay tariffs and wait a long time for their package (which will result in a lot of INRs), ship from the US with a cross border shipper (if that's even an option, I'm thinking they're going to be collecting tariffs) and then for sure I will have to pay tariffs and give up 75% of my profit to the US government.

It's a problem where every solution stinks. I thought about changing the inventory in my store, but what do I do with the rest of the inventory? I got my Canadian eBay account back up and running (with no listings yet, this is an account on the .ca site), but that's not a perfect solution for many reasons. No matter how I look at it, there's lots of work to be done, updating listings for one. I have software which will do that fairly quickly, but on 12K listings it will still take a few full days of babysitting the computer.

My plan for now is to wait a few days and see what happens. I don't think they thought this through, and I don't want my packages to be lost at Customs as they try to figure out how to tariff every single one. There has to be some changes for the better down the pipeline, but it might be a long wait to get there.

Anyway these are just my random thoughts. I haven't been feeling so great this weekend and this forum has been helpful to stay connected to other Canadian sellers faced with the same plight.

C.

[chicweb]

Us, sellers, have difficult time since a few months. Canada Post strike, now this... 

But we have to stay logical and think of solutions. Each sellers have different situations. So it's not a one size fits all.

You have to consider the good and the bad for each one and choose what solution will be best for you. Maybe the peace of mind is better than the sales? Maybe the sales and hassle is worth it? I don't know. It all depends. Maybe just wait and see?

We are all together in this. Of course, we are limited by the tools offered to us on eBay, but the community is what makes it easier.

Stay strong and positive. Let's take it as opportunities to change our ways.

[ricarmic]

It is certainly bugging me, and I'm not as dependant on eBay as many others are.

I did hear back from one of the 2 US folks I sent my "warning" message to, they're AOK taking the risk, they were polite and avoided any political comments around the situation, I had a great "stamp conversation" with them.

It is very hard to know what will actually physically happen. Traditionally here on the boards things tend to be fired up as being more catastrophic in advance than they end up being in reality, however this particular situation is relatively unique. 

If I don't hear from the other US buyer I sent the warning message to, I am going to go ahead and ship to them on Monday and see what happens.

If this problem persists for a long time, I will begin to try to assess the best way to "un US" my stuff, but that is going to be a very big job because of the way things have evolved with my listings (although my problems are not as great as yours!!!). In the meantime, I'm doing to do the same thing I did during the postal strike, I'm going to put more effort into the "other ways" I found to move my stuff that are coincidentally naturally "un-US".

I think the plan of waiting a few days is probably very smart to see what happens. The only reason I've shut right down is because I am not as dependant on the income stream here as I was before as I'm trying to find a way to "semi retirement" (whatever that might be for me) and it's not worth all the worry and hassle I anticipate might ensue.

I 100% feel for all those caught directly in the crossfire of this. I do think despite the general more negative slant the boards tend to present (usually problems, issues, worries are naturally presented instead of the good times so to speak), the sense of community is very important to us all!!!

[brettjet38]

@sin-n-dex "Anyone else lose sleep last night from the Tariff News?"

Just like when all the Canada Post Strikes happened during the past 25 years, and the same thing when the eBay Boycotts happened decades ago, and when the 2007 economic crisis arrived, nor when the housing market crashed, been on here through it all, so NO I have not lost a wink of sleep over this, nor did I for any of the above.

I am going to simply take advantage of all the distractions as I have done for the last 20-plus years on eBay to "Keep Calm and Continue On" and find things to do and continue selling on here...

[fergua3]

i'm sorry that you, like so many others, find yourself in this situation.

My best advice is to do nothing until we get the detailed details, hopefully on Tuesday.  All information has been a bit vague up til now, especially regarding the deminimus change, which is the main problem for Ebay sellers.  If it just drops to $200 then for many sellers the tariff situation won't be nearly as large a problem.  If it drops to 0 then it's a problem for all.  But we don't know yet.   Plan for various scenarios but do nothing until the legal documents are released from the Whitehouse.......that will be the information that we need.

You can take some comfort perhaps in the fact that  many Americans are speaking out against the tariffs, because of the harm it will do to their business, or state's economy.  Whether that will have any impact on the situation, who knows.    Trump really seems to have lost his marbles a bit.......i even wonder if he's still the one pulling the strings or if somebody behind the scenes is pulling his.

One thing is for certain:  No matter what the outcome of this situation.....even if Trump were to say tomorrow  "just kidding guys.....no tariffs", the relationship between Canada and the US will never be the same.