I hate to be a naysayer, but, even if his auctions are shut down, I hink he is far less "shady" than those who do the very same thing without mentioning it. We're actually going after this guy for being honest in this case.

He doesn't exactly say he includes Ebay fees in his shipping, he says:
"My shipping costs consider EBay listing fees, PayPal fees, shipping material costs and postage."

Clearly it is a mere semantics issue, but he may even be able to keep the auctions up.

I agree with the poster above that a "friendly" email regarding Ebay rules would have been a better way to start with this guy.

The witch has been burned by the righteous. Next!

megnelwil wrote:The witch has been burned by the righteous. Next!

Hey I guess if megnewil is okay with getting completely porked on shipping and handling costs then we all should, huh?  Considering that its your old pal Dave's whole business model for selling, I guess your responses in this thread aren't much of a surprise.

bclarkie wrote:
He's being honest about screwing you though.    Thats like saying its not as bad robbing a bank  if you go in saying "may I please have the money" instead of "give me the f**king money!".  In the end you are still robbing the bank.

The only real difference about this guy and every other shipping screwer is he is implicit in what he is doing, but in the end its all the same. He's charging 4 times what it costs to actually ship the items out.  Up front or not, thats freaking shady.

In the end a buyer needs to look at the total they are paying for an item and decide if it is worth it. I personally feel ebay should let sellers charge whatever they want for shipping, but they want their slice of the pie. Ebay has no concern about buyers being over charged, just about fee-avoidance.

The first thing listed should be the total cost of the item with current bid and shipping, then just the current bid. Sellers that charged high prices for shipping would lose business.

I think that when you run an auction you should simply start with the minimum price you want for an item and take the cost of shipping from the bid. I think percentage of sales was dramatically higher this summer because I don't have a shipping charge.

But shipping does cost money, more than is being estimated here if the charge is $7.00 it costs a lot more than $1.75 to ship a module safely, with tracking.

I don't think it is silly to bring this up, the real cost of shipping, when a seller is being tagged as shady because of it. I just bought 2 modules from someone here and the shipping (priority box with the paypal fees added) was over $7.00

It wasn't shady, just the cost of shipping.

And then, there are the ones who refuse to allow other shipping methods, which I find to be total BS, outright. For example, maybe I don't want my item in 2-3 days (priority) when I can get it in 3-5 (flat rate) for half. I think I'm going to stop bidding on all auctions that don't let me pick my shipping method. After all, once I pay for it, its no longer the seller's item... its mine; they have my money and my item; why should they be the ones to dictate how I get my own stuff? I can have it sent to me however the hell I want, and if it gets lost or screwed up, it should be my fault because I didn't request it be sent in a better manner.

Needless, this little thing with eBay pisses me off to no end.

serleran wrote:And then, there are the ones who refuse to allow other shipping methods, which I find to be total BS, outright. For example, maybe I don't want my item in 2-3 days (priority) when I can get it in 3-5 (flat rate) for half. I think I'm going to stop bidding on all auctions that don't let me pick my shipping method. After all, once I pay for it, its no longer the seller's item... its mine; they have my money and my item; why should they be the ones to dictate how I get my own stuff? I can have it sent to me however the hell I want, and if it gets lost or screwed up, it should be my fault because I didn't request it be sent in a better manner.

Needless, this little thing with eBay pisses me off to no end.

eBay could help by making it more straightforward to assign shipping prices. Like allowing you to input an item weight and auto-fetching the various costs for services by country. This is what Web 2.0 is all about. They could also allow packaging material costs to be itemised and stored so that the whole P&P (S&H) thing could be automated, including for multiple wins. Don't know if it's practical for every country but it would be easy to do for the UK at least.

oh fecks sake guys, lets stop bickering between one another eh? everyone is entitled to their own opinion, whether its right or wrong. do we have to constantly shoot each other down all the time?

my only issue with the auction is that he has stated that fees are part of the handling. simple as that. the actually shipping is what he wants to charge. you see what he charges - you either still buy it, question it, or ignore it.

these things happen all the time.

serl: i offer few ways to mail from the UK abroad. its airmail or er airmail.

i like the item to get there quick and i like to have the option to track or insure. most other methods dont allow that or take way too long.

c'mon guys lets at least get on for a lil while eh?

Al

Bclarkie: Thank you for engaging in the conversation/debate on this, really . I understand your point. Yet I wonder if we have done anything more than make ourselves feel good. Seems like we could have been more constructive. I was also shocked to see others acting as "thread-Nazis" who were unwilling to even discuss the issue.

I think it is fair to say that we ALL think the guy overcharges...because he does.

I also think it is fair to say that we know why he overcharges...because he said so (taking all those costs into account, etc...).

My only beef is that this hardly seems "shady." Quite the opposite, it seems he is practicing in open daylight by telling people his reasoning. So, I still agree with the poster who questions the value of reporting the poster.

I don't think it helps Acaeum members or collectors at large (assuming they can read). The only entity potentially benefitted is Ebay. Now, and please read carefully, I have no beef with Ebay whatsoever and do think they should get their payday too. On the other hand, who are we supposed to be looking out for? We could have even benefitted the seller by schooling him on Ebay rules  as well as our views of ridiculously high shipping charges. Give him a chance to come in line. If he does, then everyone gets their due. As it stands, all I think we've done is the old tattle..."neener neener" thing.



Finally, I historically avoid threads such as this because of the general lynch mob flair that can sometimes creep in. While I, too, get angry about scheems and outright thieves on Ebay I just think that we are sometimes guilty of the "if it walks like a shady dealer and charges like a shady dealer," then we need not check...just run 'em through!!!!

Aren't we better than that?

bclarkie wrote:
Strawman argument?  You obviously don't know the definition of what a straw man argument is.  You also obviously seem to think that these types of practices are okay (i.e your posts here in this thread and your defense of DM Dave's practices in the past) and you are very much in the minority. Just because I am right and you have no comeback for it doesn't make it a strawman argument, sorry.

Yeah sure I know what a straw man is BC. Though your particular model is built from 'facts' you plucked out of your rear end, such as me wanting to see people get 'porked' on postage, and the defence of my 'Pal' Dave. Heard you had a reputation for doing your homework, guess I heard wrong. So you knocking down your own pack of 'shady' accusations doesn't remove the original argument, does it? Wasn't me who dropped the argument and changed the subject, was it? But you go ahead and take the last shot because I've said what I wanted to say and a pointless slanging match would be a waste of time now that the actual point has been made. Wouldn't be much of a challenge either if your performance so far is an indicator. That said, I should have bottled the original sarcasm, that was counter-productive and provocative and I apologise for it.

Poster below [edit: above] gets it dead right on shipping.  All that's required is for people to take a look at the costs and either bid or move along.