Watch the postage before bidding for gear on ebay!

Thecageyone

I almost clicked to buy this on ebay today,


http://cgi.ebay.ie/New-Battery-Charger-Nikon-EN-EL3e-EL3a-D80-D90-D200-/120598439132?cmd=ViewItem&pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item1c143a24dc#ht_4010wt_1137


a cheap charger for the D200, under €6, nice.

Then spotted the postage! :eek:

£80!?

I wonder how many actually go ahead and order without checking? Scary.

Hogzy

Thecageyone wrote: »

I wonder how many actually go ahead and order without checking? Scary.

People who dont check the postage charges deserve to be taken for a ride. Price of postage is just as important as the price of the camera. Its very snaky because if you need a refund they will only refund the price of the item and not the postage.

charybdis

eBay take a percentage of an item's sale price but not its shipping cost, so by "selling" items at a very low price and making most of their money from inflated shipping costs the seller can keep more of money from the transaction than they would if they conducted it correctly.

That said, telling people to pay attention to the shipping cost is like saying "pay attention to the price".

panorton

If you check the postage to the UK it's free, so if you have a contact over there have it sent to them. I assume the seller wants to discourage oversea sales.

Thecageyone

Aye but not everyone is used to ebay or online shopping, it'd be a little ignorant to suggest people are stupid to not notice. I always check postage, and I'm new to buying online, yet I still almost clicked ... it would of course have been a silly mistake, but not entirely my own fault. Nobody expects postage on something so cheap to be £80! And would be forgiven for assuming it'll be the usual £5 or whatever.

eas

Good advice, but my guess is that's a typo..?

Probably meant to be 8.00

Kintarō Hattori

Unless an online shop includes free delivery you're always going to have to pay for that- so it is up the buyer to take into account all the costs. If someone doesn't look at how much it costs, then I can't say I would have too much sympathy for them- there's an element of personal responsibility to any online transaction.

As has been pointed out already, there is a high likelyhood that it is a mistake and should in actual fact be €8.

Thecageyone

Well I thought it might be nice to let n00b ebayers [like myself] know to watch out for it.

Cameraman

Covered here :

http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/pay/shipping-for-buyers.html

+ It's against ebay's Selling Practices Policy to charge excessive postage.

It used to be quite common to use inflated P&P to minimise selling charges etc. - but that doesn't happen much any more.