Ebay seller asking for more $ after I paid

[Moby]

Personally I wouldn't volunteer to pay the extra shipping after the deal was made. You both agreed on the item price and shipping costs beforehand. This seller has over 500 feedbacks. They are not new to Ebay and shipping costs. I have on occasion underestimated shipping costs when selling on Ebay. My mistake, my loss although the loss was actually just a reduction of my profit on the item, not an actual loss of money. That may also be the case here.

I looked at the sellers feedback. They have a fairly low rating on shipping costs, 4.4 on a scale of 5.0, so others have been unhappy about the shipping costs with this seller.

If this teapot is not something really special to you, you can just ask for a full refund and forget the teapot and this dealer.

 

[scotrace]

It's easy to see that the seller figured $15 or so would cover shipping a simple teapot. So the "shocked" at $20 is believable. Shocked enough that their immediate reaction was to ask you to cover it. If it was a $5 teapot, the seller lost money on the sale, and lost money on shipping. I've certainly done that myself, and it's annoying.

I would say send the additional $5 in good faith and for the sake of karma if it arrives unbroken. If it arrives broken, then gosh, the seller not only lost money, but paid for a lot of bad packing. Lesson learned.

If it was shipped insured for say, $25, then you can send her the five when you collect, right?

 

[millbrookmusic]

What the seller is doing is against Ebay's rules.
What you can do (especially if it's already shipped) is pay what the item was listed for and not a cent more. If they try to come after you, you'll have a receipt that says you paid the amount the contract stated/auction stated.

A similar thing happened to me a few months back. The seller tried to give me a non-paying buyer strike but as soon as Ebay saw that I had a receipt from Paypal (though the seller never accepted the payment) they removed the strike. In the end the seller was stuck with a negative comment and though I didn't get the item (i let the seller have it as it was only 99cents) all was well on my end.

Daniel

 

[Baron Kurtz]

It's really not very difficult to find out what actual shipping costs will be. Weigh the thing and check the www of their shipping company. If a seller is incapable of even this small task they should suck up the cost of their inability or forget about selling on eBay.

bk

 

[dr greg]

why all the fuss

If I sell on Ebay, I clearly state that shipping costs are determined after sale, I then pack and weigh the thing at the post office and tell them what the charge is....so simple.
Never had an issue with it.

 

[ShoreRoadLady]

If shipping costs were stated in advance, you aren't legally liable for any extra fees. I understand a newbie seller not calculating correctly, and I *might* be inclined in that case to pay the extra - as long as it wasn't a significant difference. I think I'd wait until it arrived (safely) though, instead of just taking their word for it. After all, it's not like the post office hiked their prices in the interim between buying & shipping.

As a seller, I think I'd just eat the cost and be smarter next time instead of trying to change the deal on my customer. It's rude to ask someone else to cover for your lack of attention.

 

[CherryRed]

I had this exact thing happen to me last year only the seller wanted an extra $20. They also gave me a big sob story about being disabled etc. I'm sorry but I don't fall for that nonsense. I never paid them nor left them feedback as then they could still retaliate.
As a seller I have ate my own shipping mistakes. It's no fun but it makes you more careful the next time.
I have also refunded excessive over payments and had it done to me.
An auction is a contract and the price and shipping charges as stated are all that is needed to pay.

 

[Warbaby]

Olive that's probably the best answer, lol!

As a seller I would never ask for more~

It's a teapot coming from Canada. And no, I probably would not have bid if the shipping had been higher.

I'm thinking of telling her that if it arrives in one piece, I'll pay the extra, but not before then. Do you think that's fair?
Nikki

I've been selling on eBay for 10 years and the occasional times I've mis-estimated the postage I chalk it up to my error and eat the loss.

OTOH, you mention that it's coming from Canada...

Canada Post has the most capricious and confusing rate schedules I've ever seen. In the two years that I've been here, I've never been able to figure it out (and I consider myself a fairly smart monkey). Even if you take the package to get it pre-weighed, the price could be different when you return to actually mail it. Sometimes taking a package to two different post offices will result in two different price estimates. In any event, ten bucks seems like a bargain to send a teapot to the states. I took a small box weighing about 400 grams (under a pound) to send to a friend within Canada and the quoted postage via surface mail was $14.60 and $24.00 via airmail! I'll take it to another PO next week and probably get a better price.

In this case, I'd take pity on the seller and send her the additional fiver.

 

[olive bleu]

Actually, WARBABY makes a very good point.Canada Post rates are out of this world.I will buy on ebay from the U.S, before i will from Canada for that reason.It is usually cheaper for me to have things shipped accross the border than it is to have it shipped accross my own country. You can imagine what i go through at Christmas

 

[ScionPI2005]

I have made the same mistake as a few others here. I've only sold a handful of items on Ebay over the years, but on the first one or two items, I underestimated shipping costs. I just ate the costs myself and told myself to be more careful next time.

 

[Foofoogal]

I have sold 100s if not 1000s in various venues.
With such variable sizes and items it is hard to determine shipping.
What has happened since I started selling online are 2 distinct things IMHO that has changed.
Once upon a time people would order. You would find a box and weigh and then send them an updated invoice.
Now since Ebay changed it to where you have to charge shipping upfront. Near impossible to know. Shipping out West is much higher than shipping East or overseas.
Then USPS came out with the flat rate shipping boxes.
Recently I had not one but two orders I had miscalculated.
I always refund on over shipping.
I went ahead and told the people I had undercharged for shipping but it was my mistake. I left it up to them to refund if they wanted.
It was interesting really. I didn't not expect them to do it but one did refund the extra via PayPal.
I then offered a 50% off of next order for my mistake and sent them a nice note about kindness.
I believe in golden rule or karma or whatever you want to call it.
I wish people would understand most dealers cannot help what the postal service charges are.
If I can wait 10 days for checks to clear I do not understand why anyone cannot wait 24 hours for a dealer to properly weigh an item to get correct shipping cost. I do understand that some ebay dealers in pass gouged customers on shipping. It happened to me when I first came to ebay. I didn't read fine print.