Free Shipping On Ebay: Does It Change Purchasing Behavior?

There is not such thing as a "FREE" lunch; costs are costs. Anyone offering "Free Shipping" implies the shipping charges are built into the price; the Seller is over charging -- that means the item is overpriced. Before you start shipping things across county, you better start looking at what it is going to cost you for postage, envelopes, labels, etc., or you may up spending more than you take-in and you'll be losing money.

I will not purchase for sure ...Mostly all US sellers charge me $ 2 to $ 3 to send me stamp in a regular envelope to Canada.

Why do you say the seller is overcharging if they offer free shipping? I list most items at $4.99 with free shipping. With E-bay and PayPal fees, and the $2.54 in postage, I clear about $1.50 if the item sells for the minimum. I may build the postage into the start price, but I have no control over the final price, and most lots see to go for $15-$20. Maybe you can build the cost of postage into a fixed price lot, but for items at auction, I haven't found a way. It does prevent me from listing anything that won't sell for $4.99 or more, but it doesn't mean I am overcharging.

area66, are you talking about a single stamp that can go in a normal envelope and without tracking using discount postage? Or stamps that need to go with stiffener, have tracking, and have to go as a parcel? If I only charged $3 for shipping international, I might as well just throw most of the stamps in the garbage, I would lose less money.

adcaplan - Yes I see the $5 rate increase. I rarely use First Class Package International service. Generally, stamps can be mailed in a #6 envelopes with stiffeners, but still machinable or 6 x 6 Stayflat envelopes for slides. I haven't seen enough items disappear to justify paying the huge markup for tracking. Alternatively, paying for insurance through a third party would be preferable. However, once the value reaches $400, there is may be no alternative but to use a much more expensive shipping option, ebay Global shipping or splitting the order if possible.

Clark

Here and exemple of a purchase , you have to include the cost of your lost in the selling price not in overcharging customers for shipping , they will go elsewhere.

Envelopes, labels and packing materials like chipboard can be had in bulk from business suppliers thus those costs are fairly minimal per shipment. Postage is a problem and like others it seems most of the buyers are outside of the U.S. especially when selling any non-U.S. material. With the recent increases on international rates I doubt you'll see too many free shipping offer for overseas buyers. Even with discount U.S. postage it might not be possible and it would be time consuming to place so much postage on international shipments 4oz. and heavier.

Most philatelic shipments at 3.5oz and less can be shipped at the more affordable interntional letter rates, but the international parcel/package rates went up quite a bit on the 17th. http://pe.usps.com/cpim/ftp/manuals...otice123.pdf (page 34)

I've noticed that they also lumped a lot of the weights together, i.e 1 to 8oz has the same rate, 9 to 32 oz., 33 to 48oz., and 49-64 oz.

Canada for parcels is now $9.50 for 1 to 8oz. and the rates then go to $15.50, $24.50 and $36.50 using the groupings above.

Most of Western Europe - $13.50 for 1 to 8oz, and then $22.50, $34.50 and $49.50.

The USPS has also made it a bit more difficult as they have more different rates for the different regions. Before it was lumped into just really four groups - Canada, Mexico, regions 3-5 and regions 6-9. Now there's different rates for each region of 3 through 9. The highest international parcel rate is just over $57 for a 49-64oz. parcel. Thus to mail a 5 lb album overseas will cost about $49-$57 roughly in postage. Of course that doesn't include any tracking or insurance.

Free shipping would only really be feasible on large (4oz.+) shipments on big ticket items. Not so much on cheaper items.

As a buyer on ebay, I consider the total price including shipping, but I do think about the shipping cost in relation to the value of the item. If the purchase price is under $10, a shipping cost of $2.54 would be more than 25% of the value of the item. I would rather take the chance of an occasional item being lost.

For items with a purchase price of $25 or more, paying $2.54 for tracking makes much more sense to me.

I have bought mostly from sellers within the US, but also a couple from Canada who mailed the items in envelopes with stamps. The items that came from Canada were all low-value used mixtures, so no reason for special packaging.

I am mostly selling sheets of stamps, and I use photo mailers now, as they seem to be the best option I have seen. I use tracking because it is required to get the e-bay discount (20% reduction on e-bay fees). I have been told that using the photo mailer automatically means it has to ship international as a parcel, since it is not flexible.

adcaplan: Ditch the photo mailers for international shipments and just sandwich the contents between chipboard. You should be able to use the letter rate as long as it's not too thick and a 6"x9" envelope or smaller. You might have to pay the 22 cent non-machinable surcharge, but that's small compared to parcel rates.

I have no problem with buyers factoring shipping into the price they pay, it is what I do as well As a seller, when I list the item, I have no idea what the final price would be, as the buyers control it. FOr most of my lots, international shipping ($12) is double the start price ($4.99). However, it might still be a bargain.

Battlestamps, I tried that. I had 4 customers complain they arrived bent, so I went to the photo mailers, 0 complaints on those.

Did you use two layers of chipboard? I've mailed tens of thousands of them - no damaged ones yet.

The problem in business is not the one who complain, it's the one who don't complain and never return. The one who complain you just find a solution to make them happy.

An example in my field, if a guy come to order wood and I told him $ 1000, if he told me it's $ 900 an other place, I will give him a discount + free delivery, if instead he say nothing and go elsewhere, I lost way more.

yes, when one of the buyers sent me pictures, it looks like the post office jammed it into the mail box.