I've had it with international shipping!!!

[musicyouneed]

So far in the last 6 months, 4 parcels sent to Australia at different times took 3 months to arrive when I shipped them airmail.  

One parcel to Spain, One to Germany and now today one to the Netherlands did not arrive.  For the last 3 I lost $30 alone just in shipping.  I can't afford to send international anymore.  

I don't have that many anyways but 1 out of 4 go missing, I just can't afford it when I only make a couple of dollars on a CD.  This last one was $6.99 plus $10 for shipping total 16.99.  I paid $10.10 for shipping, 2.89 in fees, .75 for the envelope total $13.74 and then add in the cost of the CD, say $2.00. My profit was a whopping $1.25.   I will have to sell over 10 CD's to make up for my loss just for the shipping.  Now I realize I will get my fees back less 30 cents.  but jeeze. 

So sad but I can't afford the losses.

[pjcdn2005]

I have my moments. lol

[15westcoast]

I only ship to the USA or UK or here in Canada.  I have shipped to Australia and New Zealand in the past and the

parcel did arrive, but took far to long, which makes you nervous.  My most recent country that I

will no longer ship to is Mexico.  The parcel did arrive but the buyer was already complaining as

it took a long time to arrive.  Tracking is not an option to Mexico from Canada as it costs too much,

so I no longer will post to that country.

[triber]

I mail letter mail quite often to Australia. Rarely get feedback, so I presume they have arrived. I do warn the buyers that mail to Australia can be very slow. I haven't had a complaint-not yet anyway.

[femmefan1946]

not an option to Mexico from Canada as it costs too much,

It doesn't cost the seller a penny.

The buyer pays for shipping and tracking and insurance and packaging.

Even with Free Shipping, those selling costs are included in the asking price for the item.

If a Mexican ( or Australian or Zimbabwean) customer finds the price too high, he will not buy.

If he finds the total cost acceptable, the seller has a sale.

This is why listing on dotCA is a benefit.

We can use Calculated Shipping and our potential buyers can see the cost of the item to their doorstep.

Then decide if it is a good buy or not.

[momcqueen]

This is also my point. Offer Tracked shipping instead of blocking those international destinations and let the buyer decide whether or not it's worth it.

[dutchman48]

And then if they file a SNAD???

You lose even more!

[momcqueen]

You can't protect yourself from all forms of fraud, can you? SNADs can be avoided by giving buyers nothing to complain about.

[dutchman48]

The point I am making, International shipping has many pitfalls. If you are going to be paranoid, tracking will not fix that.

[rose-dee]

---

@mjwl2006 wrote:
You can't protect yourself from all forms of fraud, can you? SNADs can be avoided by giving buyers nothing to complain about.

---

Unfortunately, no matter what a seller does, a buyer who believes (a revelation after the fact!) that they've paid far too much to get what they want may be more likely to find other things to complain about.  

I originally thought that simply letting overseas buyers decide if they wanted items badly enough to pay the exorbitant cost to ship with tracking was a good idea.  But since historically less than 10% of my buyers are overseas, I've changed my mind on that after a couple of near misses with international transactions gone wrong through no fault of my own.  I can't see the point in less than 10% of my buyers potentially creating most of my problems (and possible defects).  

I now think it's better to restrict shipping of certain items (those of higher value) to the U.S. and Canada, and when I re-stock my store for the fall I'll be doing so.  I'll still continue to ship the smaller, less expensive items via Light/Small Packet.  

The problem with international shipping of items of some value is that it isn't just the high shipping cost, but (for Europe) outrageous VAT charges, insurance coverage vagaries and restrictions, and some countries' desultory processing of parcels through customs, if not outright poor postal service.  That's a lot to go wrong, especially for a small seller without the volume to absorb losses or defects.  After all the trouble a seller takes to provide great service, the buyer may decide it wasn't worth the high cost after all.  And maybe they'll find a scratch on the item, or a dent, or a piece missing, or...

In the end, it's a trade-off game -- known and unknown risks v. potential gain.  If a seller has a traditionally substantial percentage of overseas sales, it may be worth it.  I think one also has to have some particularly desirable or rare items to offset the disadvantages of displaying a high international shipping cost (or higher price that incorporates that cost) in such listings. 

[dutchman48]

I generally only sell internationally on sites other than Ebay.

I refuse to get stuck with return shipping costs from an international sale, lose the original shipping, and give away the item. That is the risk with international sales on Ebay. Our high shipping costs on cheaper items is just asking for trouble.

Other sites, have far less issues because the buyers know they have a greater difficulty scamming sellers.

Just my opinions.

[momcqueen]

I really don't agree but I don't have the will to get into a big debate about this. Sellers can do whatever they desire without my permission.

[dutchman48]

Who are you disagreeing with?

[rose-dee]

---

@dutchman48 wrote:

I generally only sell internationally on sites other than Ebay.

---

Yes, I'd have to agree with you on that.  You have a valid point in saying that current eBay policies are at the root of why international selling has become a minefield, especially for smaller sellers.  It's not just that the shipping costs themselves have risen.   

[momcqueen]

I disagree with anyone who says selling internationally is a 'minefield to be avoided' whether due to the cost of postage with tracking or delivery times or whatever. The ONLY thing that makes eBay different than other ecommerce sites in my opinion is that it puts buyers and sellers from across the globe in a room together.

But again, sellers may do what they like. It's not my job to convince anyone how to run their business just as it's not anyone else's job to convince another seller how to operate theirs. Good luck to those sellers who decide not to sell internationally, it makes it easier for the sellers who do.

[eurobeads]

Based strictly on my own experience, I'll take International buyers over Canadians any day. Canadians have given me more grief overall than any international buyer (US included, and my sales to Canada are few). Almost all (literally 99.%) of the refunds I've given, the scams pulled on me, the rudeness, unreasonable requests, cheap stunts & the feedback issues have been by Canadian buyers. I hate to bash on our own people, but this is how it's been for me.

I find that Internationals are much more relaxed & grateful. They pay high shipping feee and wait a long time to receive their item & still always leave positive feedback. When they do have an issue, they contact you very politely after already having waited an eternity & they don't jump to open cases. Now I won't ship everywhere (for example Mexico is a bad one with theft) but as a seller, you are doing a disservice to yourself & to good international buyers by automatically excluding them. Mind you my items are low-priced so maybe the experience is different if you're selling higher priced items.

[tobyshitzu]

Was just noting the shockingly good shipping times Im getting consistently to Europe.   In the mail Monday, fb thursday to the Netherlands last week.  That was something there are many listed by Canadians only selling for half or less, because no one else is making it available overseas

[ricarmic]

Yes I sell stamps (on .COM), one of the "safe" things to sell, and yes there are problems even with stamps (I seem to have more problems than the average stamp seller has, as you know from my self insurance statistics I publish each year).

However, my stubbornness to continue selling internationally is becoming a competitive advantage for me because it appears hard for international folks to find people selling stamps of the kind I sell internationally on .COM. My case is like tobys mentions, my prices are usually not the lowest, however they are attractive to the international folks because I'm one of the people that will ship to them. (even situations where they pay more for the shipping than the item itself cost!)

As you know from my annual self insurance report, I do have more problems with some countries, like Brazil and China, and I've taken steps to force them to use tracking. That has affected sales to those countries but it has not stopped sales to those countries, what it has done is encouraged them to make larger purchases to "justify' the elevated shipping cost. Sadly I don't have stats to prove it but I know for certain that my sales with forced tracking to China are higher now than they were when I did not force tracking.....that I strongly believe is not true for Brazil but it was generally more of a problem anyway.

For those who haven't seen it, here for reference is the link to my self insurance statistics up to 2016:

http://community.ebay.ca/t5/Seller-Central/Self-insurance-cookie-jar-RICARMICs-2016-statistics-added... 

[zee-chan-jpn-books]

$0.75 for an envelope seems expensive. I use regular oversized paper envelope and fold them smaller, cut out my own sheet of bubble wrap, and cut out my own thin cardboard backing. My paper envelopes are $2.25 for 13 so that's like about $0.20 a piece. Bubble wrap $1.68 for a big roll that lasts me a few months, in fact I haven't bought any for a while since I reuse bubble wraps from my online shopping. Cardboard free as I reuse them from my shopping too. It might take a bit more time than using a bubble mailer but it's so much cheaper.

I sell to Germany + France + UK regularly and never had lost shipments there, with regular letter post / SP air / light packet. Oh and I stamp (ink stamp) cartoon patterns on my envelopes... I don't know if that makes my shipments less prone to customs inspection but some buyers love it lol.

[femmefan1946]

But zee-chan, how many minutes (at 18cents a minute,the BC minimum wage) does it take to gather all those materials and assemble them?

Once you've done that, the 75cents per envelope may seem cheap.

Using LetterPost/LightPacket means no labels, but like ricarmic , I have an endless supply of pretty postage stamps to decorate my envelopes. Same effect as your rubber stamps.

I've been using the eBay bubble envelopes we were offered -- I think for Store owners? Or possibly TRS? -- Free is a pretty good price for these but I really don't have much use for them. Mostly I use  poly envelopes with a stiffener.

[musicyouneed]

Quick update.  The person from the Netherlands received their CD, so I am hopeful.  

With CD sales as dismal as they are I have reconsidered my decision.  What I did do was raise the international shipping cost by $1.00 to offset any loses.  So far this month,  I've even opened up to Australia, sold one on the 17th we will see how that goes.  I also sold 2 to the UK and another to Germany.  

We'll see.