Postage Issue
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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 2:22 am 
 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... %3AIT&rd=1



   I want advice about the auction listed above.     :?



   I won...and at a pretty good price.   :D



   The item is exactly what I have been looking for since around 1984.  :D



   The seller is a noted game personality and I really do want his signature on it.   :?



   The thing is, the seller has sent me an invoice for this item with an extra $4 tacked on as a "handling fee."   8O



   So far as I can tell, this additional charge is mentioned nowhere in the auction post.   :?



    Have I missed something?  (Read it and tell me if I have.)   :?



    Has anyone here ever enountered this phenomenon before?   :?



    I wanted to get someone else's opinion.



    Does anyone else have any thoughts on this topic?   :?



Mark   8)


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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 2:33 am 
 

Mark,

Personally, I'd just ask Greg to sign it as a Chaosium file copy (as you note) and swallow the $4. ;)

  


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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 2:43 am 
 

I calculated my shipping and it came out to $6.07 for media and $8.20 for Priority, so there is clearly a ridiculous handling charge involved. And that's from Berkeley to Reno, which are practically next-door neighbors. Those are patently absurd rates, gaming "personality" or no.

However, ludicrous though those figures are, the seller can reasonably claim that any prospective buyer should have used the shipping calculator before placing a bid. It's pretty convenient to not mention anything about such horrid charges in the actual listing, though. :roll:

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Sidebar: The ATWM books are fun items, though. I've got all three; they were among my first eBay scores when I really started getting into it.

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 2:51 am 
 

Xaxaxe wrote:It's pretty convenient to not mention anything about such horrid charges in the actual listing, though. :roll:

... Ah! The pleasures of living in the US, oblivious to the amount that sellers regularly try to rip-off from non-US customers; except they don't call it a handling charge... Just get quoted a figure and the buyer has to take that on trust.

=
If that's $4 over the raw postage charge, that's non-fatal, IMHO.
And, since it had already been mentioned here that Greg was charging for 'handling' you'll find there are possibly fewer bidders on low-mid value items than you might've been up against otherwise.
Do feel free to ask Greg whether he'll waive that though.

Best not to let that spoil the win, however. Congrats. :)

  

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 2:52 am 
 

I have no argument with the state shipping charges.  None at all.  I would not even have an argument with the "handling fee" if it had been listed in the auction previously.

I am almost certainly going to take David's advice and just eat the $4.

Mark   8)


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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 2:59 am 
 

Just to cheer you up, Mark.



Hex sheets that arrived today ( http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 7608759877 );



Seller quoted $17.50 for p&p; "For shipping via Global Priority Mail (4-10 days predicted) your total will be as shown. The only cheaper method is "economy surface mail" which takes a predicted 4-6 weeks, but would save you USD$6.25".



Actual shipping on the tube; $10.50.



Pretty much par for the course, I'm afraid to say: but happier for the win than to fret over that.

  


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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 3:04 am 
 

I agree: it's a good win on a fun item. I'm not looking to spoil Mark's fun, but he did ask for opinions.

I'll also grant you that $4 is not necessarily a deal-breaker. But something tells me we're cutting a break for an "industry figure" here ... we've ripped into quite a few everyday sellers on quite a few threads here for doing the exact same thing.

But, as mentioned, it's still a good win. It's also given me the urge to dig up my copies of ATWM and see if some of the entries are truly as goofy as I remember them being. :)

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 3:09 am 
 

This will complete the set for me.

   I bought I and III in a University District bookstore (Magus Books) in roughly 1984....for $5 each.  

  This was so long before Ebay that I held out little hope of ever acquiring ATWM II.  

  I especially wanted II because the index in III says that "Doomguard" is listed in II.  I have long wanted to read that description...but too stubborn to simply pay $4.95 on DriveThruRPG for a .pdf.

   I am going to just pay and count it all joy.

Mark   8)


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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 3:10 am 
 

The "air shark" was my favorite ... a beastie that was legendary for its goofiness even in the pre-internet and pre-message board days.

Not to be confused with Saturday Night Live's "land shark," of course.

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 3:15 am 
 

MShipley88 wrote:I have no argument with the state shipping charges.  None at all.  I would not even have an argument with the "handling fee" if it had been listed in the auction previously.

I am almost certainly going to take David's advice and just eat the $4.

Mark   8)


Mark

I feel for you.  As David rightly pointed out any of us who live outside the US have had to regularly deal with sellers who overcharge.  I am sure I have spent 100s of dollars extra in shipping during the time I have been collecting.

Can I suggest that apart from wearing the cost of shipping you might like to send a NICE email to the seller just letting him know that you will be paying the fees but could he in future please clarify in his auctions that there is a handling fee. Be polite and tactful as I am sure you still want the signature .....

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 3:16 am 
 

I noticed an air shark miniature on Ebay just recently.   8)

Just the sort of goofy stuff Arduin was great for.

Mark


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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 3:25 am 
 

Does the Air Shark look like this ....



http://cgi.ebay.com/SHARK-AIR-SHREDDER- ... dZViewItem 8O

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 3:26 am 
 

Classic. :D

That's pretty much how I remember it ...

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 9:05 am 
 

Wait a minute. It's okay for an "industry figure" to pork someone on handling charges, but not the average joe? Did I miss something?


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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 9:15 am 
 

Mark

Can you clarify.  Is the handling cost in addition to the cost generated by the shipping calculator or is your total cost the same as the shipping calculator?

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 10:21 am 
 

Deadlord39 wrote:Wait a minute. It's okay for an "industry figure" to pork someone on handling charges, but not the average joe? Did I miss something?


    I don't think it's ok.  But MS mentioned he'd been looking for the item for over 20 years, and he has a chance to get a copy with provenance. Personally I'd also eat the charges but never do business with the seller again...I'd also withhold feedback. It's not like the guy is a Jonb type who was a proven criminal yet kept getting business from members here...maybe he is just clueless about the subject.  There is a certain etiquette about being upfront about such fees so buyers can either do business with you or not depending on what you charge. Indeed the charges should be stated in the item description or elsewhere.
   Sometimes you accept getting molested when it's an item you really want.  Years ago I was in Adventures in Crime and Space bookstore in Austin (very well stocked mystery/SF/Fantasy bookstore downtown).  I managed to find a Joseph Payne Brennan paperback I have been looking for since I was in high school and lent my copy (which never made it back) toa friend, almost 20 years earlier.  It was only $10 which was reasonable.  However, I made the fatal mistake when checking out of mentioning that I was glad they had the book because I had been looking for it 20 years.  The owner immediately did a double take and told me the item was priced wrong, that is was $15 not $10.  Of course I should have just walked out, but I really had been looking for the book amost 20 years with no luck, so I swallowed my angry comments and paid the extra $5 bucks.  However, I never went back in the store and they lost hundreds if not thousands of dollars of my business as a result (I would typically drop $100 or so per visit, sometimes more).  I was happy to see they closed down a couple of years later due to slow business, although they do operate a website now....
   I guess the moral of the story is you don't give these guys free passes, but if you have to have the item you hold your nose and do the transaction resolving to avoid them in the future.  BTW, if it wasn't an item that MS had been trying to find for so long, I'd say just not pay the handling charge and tell them why, with such low feedback they can ill afford a neg if you are forced to leave one.

Mike B.

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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 11:38 am 
 

improvstone wrote:Mark

Can you clarify.  Is the handling cost in addition to the cost generated by the shipping calculator or is your total cost the same as the shipping calculator?


    Yes....or rather, No:  There is no mention of a "handling fee" in the text of the auction or in the postage calculator.  It was attached entirely after the fact.

Mark   8)


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Post Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 11:38 am 
 

improvstone wrote:Mark

Can you clarify.  Is the handling cost in addition to the cost generated by the shipping calculator or is your total cost the same as the shipping calculator?


    Yes....or rather, No:  There is no mention of a "handling fee" in the text of the auction or in the postage calculator.  It was attached entirely after the fact.

Mark   8)


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