Has anyone else purchased something on ebay and pay like 300% in shipping costs?  i bought a barely used speedo for $20 and paid $12 in shipping and when I got it I saw that it only cost $5 to ship.  WTF???!!! 

Do an online quote using the item location on ebay and the shipping address- then if the shipping is way off ask the seller for a discount. Double shipping is ridiculous, i think they were just trying to make an extra 6 bucks off the item. 

A lot of sellers do that cos shipping isn't subject to ebay's commission.
I have had to fight with one dude after I saw that he said he'll combine shipping, and he did, only to have me pay the full price as listed in his shipping thing. It didn't combine shipping at order time. However that guy being less of a dickhead than the average, refunded me ~40% of the amount I paid. Prolly cost him 1/2 of what I paid to ship it, and OK fine it took some effort packing 3 things into 1 box no larger than what will have been needed for just 1.
BTW, there is a saying in tamil which applies to ebay IMHO.
The loose english version is this ...
"This cow needs to be sold out of town" meaning, everyone in this town knows what a POS this cow is, and will never buy it, but it looks so good, someone out of town that don't know will pay top $$$ for it ...
Which may be why my neighbor used to only date chicks with out of state plates. They dont know about him yet.
Cool.
Srinath.

They also inflate shipping to cover the fees of ebay and paypal. It is your responsibility to know the shipping & handling charges before bidding. If you do not like it, do not bid. If shipping is not listed, I will ask and if I do not get a reply then I do not bid. Complaining about it later is not the sellers problem.

Quote from: dgyver on October 20, 2007, 05:14:24 PM
They also inflate shipping to cover the fees of ebay and paypal. It is your responsibility to know the shipping & handling charges before bidding. If you do not like it, do not bid. If shipping is not listed, I will ask and if I do not get a reply then I do not bid. Complaining about it later is not the sellers problem.

+1

Also, sometimes I find that the shipping cost also dictates the selling price of the item. All in all you should consider both in the final price you pay to get the item to you 

Quote from: seshadri_srinath on October 20, 2007, 01:33:33 PM
"This cow needs to be sold out of town" meaning, everyone in this town knows what a POS this cow is, and will never buy it, but it looks so good, someone out of town that don't know will pay top $$$ for it ...

Can I borrow that from you?  That's a great saying.

I'm also in the habit of doing the item + shipping = true cost method of shopping on eBay.

That's BS though.  If they want to charge $30 and split it up then they should just set a $30 reserve and charge the actual amount for shipping.  It's just shady business if you ask me.

its a known fact throughout ebay....


and that is, they always overcharge for shipping..

Hello....welcome to ebay. enjoy your stay.

i guess i got lucky, the only time i bought off ebay i under-payed by a few dimes  . then again the box did arrive all dented up and had a bunch of random riped up ebay  invoices- maybe i wasn't soo lucky after all 

if an ipod sells for $150 on ebay, an a guy has 1 for $1 plus $149 shipping, isn't it the same deal?    if you don't wanna pay the shipping, its simple, don't bid

Quote from: tripleb on October 20, 2007, 07:03:56 PM
That's BS though.  If they want to charge $30 and split it up then they should just set a $30 reserve and charge the actual amount for shipping.  It's just shady business if you ask me.

Have you ever order anything else mail order and paid a handling charge? There is no difference. 

Whenever I sell on eBay, I include the eBay and PayPal fees in the handling cost.  That way, when I sell something for $20, I freakin get $20.  The buyer puts their zip code into the shipping calculator and sees the exact amount they will pay if they buy from me, and if they don't like it, then they should buy from someone else.

I suppose it's not earth shattering advice to look at how much you'll pay before buying something...