ebay help please!
 

I sold a DVD on ebay recently, mailed it out as soon as I got payment, and now 3 weeks later, the buyer says he hasnt gotten it yet. He has good ratings so there isnt really much concern he is scamming me. I am going to check with the post office (though it wasnt confirmed delivery or anything like that). I wanted to know what other people do in this situation?!? Its not either of our faults that the USPS is either taking forever or possibly lost the package. Any advice would be appreciated! Thanks.

Well first did you offer the person insurance on the item? Secondly did you state in your item description that you were not responsible for lost items if they were not insured? If you did this then the person knows before he bids that you are not responsible. BUT, I personally sold several thousand items on Ebay and even if the person didn't have insurance on the item I still gave him a refund. This gives you a good reputation. $10 or $20 dollars is not worth getting a negative feedback. Especially if you do alot of selling on Ebay. But it is still your call.

In the future you can give yourself a little more protection by adding delivery confirmation. Of course it's a ripoff at 55 cents, but if you do it over the internet it is free for Priority Mail and only 13 cents for First Class and Media Mail. Stamps.com and Endicia will both do discounted DC automatically, or you can download the USPS shipping assistant for free and it will also give you the discounted DC. If you use the USPS shipping assistant, it doesn't cost anything to use (no monthly fee) and you just use it to print up the shipping labels and affix your own postage.

Personally, I use stamps.com (I think it's $5/ month or something) and I ship out most of my DVDs via First Class with DC and it's usually only about $1.80 for a regular DVD in a padded envelope.

I always take a picture of the package with my digital camera before I mail it. Also email said picture to the recipient. I know it isn't proof, but it's better then nothing and the recipients seem to like it.

How did you ship it? If you sent it Media Mail, than you shouldn't worry about it until a month or more has passed - especially if he lives on the other side of the country.

If insurance was an option and he did not pay for it then he is out of luck. I always keep my receipts which show the city and zip code in case I need to email someone a copy of the receipt to prove it was mailed. My auctions state that I am not responsible for lost mail....if insurance is not purchased by the buyer then they are out of luck should the package not make it to their address.

No offense but sellers who say they aren't responsible for lost or stolen merchandise if insurance wasn't purchased are basically trying to bully a potential customer into buying insurance. Now some items it makes sense to insure and some it doesn't.

But as sellers we are responsible for getting the product into the hands of the seller. If you don't believe me call up the post office do some searches on the net. The protection is for the buyers and not the sellers. Unfortunately some scrupulous buyers claim they haven't received an item when they did.

How much was the DVD? How was it mailed (media mail, first class, "Priority" mail? How high is the buyers feedback, and is there anything in it about now him saying he didn't receive the item (read all of the positives as well as negatives / neutrals)? How much did you charge for shipping and how much did shipping actually cost?

The buyer paid $44 for the DVD. I mailed it in a padded envelope, first class mail. The buyer has good feedback, no negatives. I charged $3.00 for shipping & "handling" which covered the cost of a $1.50 padded envelope & then $1.50 (or so) in postage...

I am putting out a trace, calling the post office, etc... The buyer did not choose the additional insurance I offered. I am going to ask him to contact his post office, etc, and give this a little time before taking the next step....

I don't agree. If the buyer wants me to be responsible for the safe arrival of the package, they have to pay for it. I charge actual cost shipping, and actual cost for insurance.

It's easy enough to say that sellers should be responsible for lost packages, when they charge ripoff shipping. I'm just giving the buyer the option of saving money on shipping (paying about $2) or paying for shipping that approaches ripoff levels ($3.30 with insurance).

Agreed.

Just look at it as part of the cost for doing business. I always
cringe at sellers who say they are not responsible when the item leaves
their location..... (a.k.a. I am happy to have you as a customer until I
have your money in hand, but I'm not responsible after the fact.

If it is a higher cost item, I will purchase insurance myself just to be safe.
If you do a lot of business, you can insure through U-pic.com at rates which are
much lower than the post office.
It's never fun to eat a loss, but if you sell on ebay enough it will happen.
Either,

A) An item ends with a low bid.
or
B) the item is lost in transit

I once sent a package to a buyer in Norway that went lost. It was
around $45. I cheerfully refunded his money and went on with life.

If businesses took the same "We are not responsible after shipping"
approach, they wouldn't last.

Last year, I had an package from proxis.nl
(Netherlands DVD e-tailer) arrive open. All that was left was the empty box with a note from the PO. It was easily over $100.

After e-mailing them about the problem, they replaced the entire
order at no charge. You can bet I will look at them again if I decide to order
a DVD from that region.

2 Days ago, I received one of my $24.95 5 DVD enrollment packages from Columbia House. The box was opened and the DVDs were gone.
I made one phone call and the CSR told me that she would have the order
reshipped using expedited UPS ground.

High positive feedback may or may not paint an accurate portrait of a seller.
It's always a good idea to look for those transactions where problems may have occurred so you can see how the seller dealt with them.

Sometimes a problem can actually work out to be a blessing in disguise.
Once about a year or two ago, I had a Silence of the Lambs Criterion DVD
on Ebay. It closed at around $30 and it was received by the buyer
several days later.

A couple days after that, he e-mailed me to say that the disc was defective
during a certain chapter and wouldn't play. His feedback was great so I
knew he was being truthful. He returned the DVD to me and I refunded his
money + return shipping.

I then sent the disc back to the e-tailer that I had purchased from and
received a replacement.

When I listed the replacement, it sold for around $60!!

One final point, many ebayers (and DVDTalkers??? :) ) have a
set price that they will pay for an item. Let's say the buyer's limit
including shipping, handling, insurance etc. is $20.

Seller A and B both have good feedback.

Seller A quotes shipping @ $2.50

Seller B quotes shipping @ $2.25 but adds that he/she is not responsible
unless insurance is purchased for $1.25.

Seller A's auction ends at $17.50
Seller B's auction ends at $16.50

Seller A might have to send a replacement DVD once every 50 times
, but even if that is the case Seller A can afford to do it and will probably come out ahead in the long run.

Seller B might also have to send a replacement once every 50 times, or haggle with the PO and attempt to collect on insurance. Who comes out ahead-----USPS. $50 * 1.25 = $62.50. Even if 2 packages were lost at $20 a
pop, the USPS is still ahead.

BTW, as others have stated, USPS Shipping Assistant is Free and offers
substantailly cheaper DC. While DC is not insurance, it is better than nothing
at all and can now be used on ALL classes of Mail (First, Media, Priority).



Seller B