REQUEST A REFUND

[rainbow*rob]

Get a email this morning  '' request a refund ''  buyer did not receive package 

thru E bay of course , just wondering how many items thru e bay get lost in the mail every year

that is something I sure would like to know.

[rosscd57]

Yr. asking the wrong people. 

[femmefan1946 · Accepted solution]

Pretty rare.

And I don't even track most of my shipments because it would be cheaper to lose a few than to pay for tracking on them all.

And that doesn't include lost sales, which are impossible to know, due to unacceptably high shipping costs.

Can I tell you the Good News about Cookie Jar Insurance?

Basically, this means that the seller adds a few pennies to every asking price (rarely more than a dime) and puts those virtual pennies in a virtual Cookie Jar.

And that is a self-insurance fund against Disputes and Claims.

When a Buyer asks for a refund, the return postage and eventually the refund come out of the Cookie Jar.

Cookie Jar Insurance not only covers delivery problems and damage in transit problems, some of which are covered by tracking and postal insurance, but also Buyer Remorse refunds and seller errors, like shipping a red sweater when a blue one was ordered.

In the long run, CJI makes money for the seller.

WalMart has said that they lose about 1% of their profit to shoptheft and shrinkage.

https://www.thestar.com/business/2007/06/13/theft_costing_walmart_3b_a_year.html

Rates of  claims will vary within categories. If your offerings appeal to young (15-34) men you will have more Claims than I will with a demographic that runs older and very rules concious. (philatelists and readers and seamstresses).

[esclyons]

Yes it all depends one what you sell, and how you ship it..  There are 3 reasons for an item not received case..

Although  1 and 2 are similar, # 3 happens way more often than 1 and 2..

1.  Lost in the mail

2. delivered  mail to the wrong address

3. dishonest buyers

[momcqueen]

A rep with Canada Post told me four per cent of items are 'lost' or claimed undelivered. 

[reallynicestamps]

That's a lot higher than I would have expected.

Did she give you any details on where the numbers came from?

I assume that's all Canada Post shipping.

All with tracking?

International coming and/or going?

Parcels or parcels and letterpost?

[weaversofspeech]

I have been on ebay for 17 1/2 years selling 

just over 16 years with this ID and 17 1/2 yrs  with the other

During that time I have only had one item lost in the mail.  A small but expensive tin it was sent to England.  

Have had a handful of items take their time getting to the right place

Longest was about 4 1/2 to 5 weeks.  A Old Postcard It was only going about 120  Km's from Peterborough  to Toronto.  Should have taken 3 days tops.

When the customer received it he sent me a scan of the envelope.  Had 5 post marks on it  Peterborough and Toronto plus 3 others of the places it went to before arriving in Toronto.  It overshot Toronto and went to a town near Windsor Ontario then another town about 100 km from there and then to the Guelph area.

weavers

[momcqueen]

I don’t know, I didn’t challenge him for more details at that point but I did tell him that since I switched to parcels with tracking for 85 per cent or more of my orders, that my losses were far less. This conversation was a year ago. My lost parcels were four+ percent when I shipped without tracking everywhere except Canada. In the days before Canada Post invented Tracked Packet. Back in 2012 when I began to sell.

[Anonymous]

That is NOT a good news.  It may be a good news if items are under $20.00 but not for expensive items which some of you don't use tracking number last December and lost 4 of them.  Those sellers had to refund and lost items at the same time and the Cookie Jar Insurance won't help!  Don't encourage people not to use tracking number!

[reallynicestamps]

Most small and inexpensive items can't be Delivery Confirmed in any case.

If your item is under 500 grams/ under 2cm your choices for the USA are $14.04 for Tracked Packet or $5.15 for untrackable* LetterPost.

And, if you are doing it right, your price on the item is marked up at least 100% from your cost (including procurement, labour, fees, and packaging).

Cookie Jar Insurance is coming out of that markup.

Again, it doesn't work well for high value items, which should be shipped with tracking.

It should also be used cautiously in certain categories, including coins and sportscards, which have high scam rates.

But it can be a useful tool in attracting customers (because you can use Free Shipping) and in covering costs that are not covered by postal insurance (damage in shipping, and paying for return shipping.

*$18 internationally, $9domestic, not available for USA at all. And International registration stops tracking at the border.

[femmefan1946]

There are 3 reasons for an item not received case..

I believe there are four reasons.

The one you don't mention is probably even more common--

Delayed in mail.

Not only are eBay and the international postal system optimistic about their delivery time, but as we all have heard by now, untracked items from China have been held by CBSA (fentanyl) and Canada Post (UPU dispute) for months, a situation that has been going on for a few years now.

[kawartha-ephemera]

Femmefan's approach has worked very well for me over the years. The last shipment I had go "not received " was several years ago and that one was tracked packet to California. The tracking showed confirmed delivery but the buyer stated she'd been away when it was supposed to have been delivered and it was no where to be found. Anyway, we communicated back and forth for awhile, she checked with her neighbours and the post office but she wasn't able to find the package anywhere. She had been polite and seemed believable so I refunded her including the shipping and filed a claim with Canada Post. To my surprise CP reimbursed everything including the shipping, I was very surprised. Very rare to lose one in the mail here.