How do you ship Globally?

[mugsisme]

I sold a watch for $449 with free shipping. The woman lives in Germany. She was unable to pay via the invoice. Ebay in Germany told her to ask me to invoice her. I did. Now the money has come through, and Ebay won't let me print a label because they don't have it marked as paid. I have two choices. Refund her and have her pay the invoice (which she can't do because there are problems on her side), or ship it myself. I will have to ask her for money for shipping and customs and all that. How in the world do I do this? How do I even start? I am so mad at Ebay. I never, ever, ever would have dealt with this if they hadn't pushed the stupid program. Debating about opting out now.

 

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[Joe777Cool]

Can't you manually mark the item as paid?

 

[mugsisme]

Nope. It won't let me. It won't let me invoice her either. I wrote to her privately and asked if I should use Fed-Ex. I don't want to get hit with import fees and stuff like that.

 

[GibH]

Easiest solution: call ebay.

You don't have to pay import duties, the recipient does.

 

[Paleo_joe]

I ship internationally all the time. If not ebay, you can do it all online through the post office's website, I think. If not, just put it in a box, go to the PO, and send it priority mail. The form looks bad but it's easy.

I just looked at the USPS site and shipping to Germany is $25 or so with a priority mail small flat rate box or about $35 for a 1 lb regular priority mail package. The value limit for the flat rate is $400, though.

 

[diggummup]

I recently went back to using the global shipping program only for all international sales. This way if an international customer wants to bid they still can. It may cost them more but it makes it easy for me not to have to figure out international shipping for this country and that, and I can still offer free shipping, at least to the Global shipping center in Ky.

 

[stonehenge]

I'm about to drop global shipping. I've had five deals get cancelled after cases for nonpayment.

Every one of them was global buyer. Not big money - between $12 and $50, but it is a pain in the ass to deal with.

 

[mugsisme]

I'm waiting to hear from they buyer. Ebay was worthless. The buyer paid for the watch. I had free shipping ... to Kentucky, not Germany. I went through Fed-Ex, and got a price of $110. I'm not paying it. I told her to either pay Ebay, or send me money to cover the shipping. Meanwhile, I have her money and I haven't heard back from her.

 

[diggummup]

I'm about to drop global shipping. I've had five deals get cancelled after cases for nonpayment.

Every one of them was global buyer. Not big money - between $12 and $50, but it is a pain in the ass to deal with.

I have that problem with the US buyers lately myself. 3 cases in the last week.

mugisme- when you say "ebay was worthless" do you mean you called them and explained the situation? If she paid using paypal there is no reason the payment would not show up as paid once cleared.

 

[2ndisbest]

I sold my first item going to Hawaii, brand new ebay account. I got lucky cause the item fit in a flat rate priority box. And even to Hawaii a flat rate box rate is good. So far I haven't had any problems with international buyers expecting free shipping. They will message me for a quote before bidding/purchasing. I dropped out of the global shipping program but I will still ship international. I figured I would pick up more business dropping out because the buyer doesn't have to pay so much extra. So far about the same amount of orders going international. Actually most of my international customers have US addresses. I think people who buy off ebay alot in other countries set up with importers.

 

[mugsisme]

I have that problem with the US buyers lately myself. 3 cases in the last week.

mugisme- when you say "ebay was worthless" do you mean you called them and explained the situation? If she paid using paypal there is no reason the payment would not show up as paid once cleared.

Yeah, I called Ebay. They had no idea how to mark it paid, or how to help me. They told me to refund the money and tell her to pay again using the invoice they sent.

MAN! You guys were SOOO RIGHT! Ebay was going to charge her $130 to ship this package. USPS cost -- $30. I printed the label and will be going to the PO tomorrow to send this baby off! (She sent me more money this afternoon, so I had the money to pay for her postage.)

 

[Koffee]

I betting that is not all shipping. I am not sure about Germany but duty fees can be around 40 percent of the items value.

I like the GSP as I do not lose items anymore from customers who refuse to pickup their items because of their countries fees

Cheers - Koffee