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Cheapest Shipping for Ebay items?

by bigfoot12
6 replies
This was my first sale ever, and I sold a lot of 4 binders for 8.00 and yet had to pay $15.00 to ship in USPS. So yet, it was a loss of about 8 bucks.


What can I do to make my shipping easier? How do you make the eBay buyer pay for the shipping?

If the buyer pays for shipping, do I still have to pay? Is UPS any cheaper than USPS?
#cheapest #ebay #items #shipping
  • Profile picture of the author UnkwnUsr
    USPS is still the cheapest, remember to set your shipping to calculated by weight if you want them to pay the exact amount. You can also add a handling fee to make up for your cost of shipping materials. Sometimes it can be cheaper to ship using USPS flat rate boxes. Also, if your selling books or other media be sure to send it "Media Mail".
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    • Profile picture of the author bigfoot12
      When I shipped my binders, I had to choose a large flat rate box - and those cost $17.44 no matter what weight.


      So, you are saying that if I do a handling fee, I could lower the cost?


      What do you do if your item is too big? How do you ship if you wanted to sell a vacuum cleaner?
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  • Profile picture of the author bigfoot12
    How do I do a handling fee?

    Is that the same thing as switching the handling time (in your listing)?
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    • Profile picture of the author deprhino
      I just sold 11 items on ebay in about 2 weeks. Learn by making mistakes. I shipped a car repair book via ups and didn't even bring a box into UPS. Paid like 23 bucks. Would have been half that if I would have gotten my own box and shipped it "media mail" at the post office. Google USPS shipping calculator and you will get their website. Only thing to get the cheapest you must click on "other options." They really push priority mail and the expensive flate rate boxes. You have to ship "Standard Mail" to ge the cheapest rate. Also anything under 13 ounces is "first class mail" which is cheaper than priority mail. Standard Mail used to be "parcel post mail". They just changed the name and don't really push it. Do your homework. I also have a food scale at home which weighs up to 11lbs. Just put the package on it to get the weight. use a tape measure to get the sizes and look it up at the USPS site. That's the best way to know the cheapest rate. It is a game changer for me instead of guessing. Any real big heavy item should go ups ground. 2 weeks ago I didn't know crap. Now I am educated. Plus remember ebay will deduct 10 percent fees later on. Plus paypal takes their cut and when you mess up on shipping that cuts deep into your profit.
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  • Profile picture of the author UnkwnUsr
    The handling fee will be added to the calculated shipping charge to pay for things like boxes , bubble wrap, paper and printing materials. These options are all there on the Sell Your Item form under the shipping section. It should be near the handling time option.

    For shipping large items there is not much you can do to reduce cost even the cheapest shipping will be quite high for a vacuum cleaner. I'm not sure is USPS is the cheapest for that size item never really sold anything that big.
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  • Profile picture of the author dean20653
    From my experience Anything big and over 12 pounds is generally cheaper with UPS and not USPS

    As far as figuring out the shipping cost, The way I do it is, I take photos of the item and box it up like it's ready to ship, I put it on a USPS letter scale to see how much it weighs. then either enter all this info into ebay (weight, size of box, and shipping service) and let ebay calcualte the cost depending on how far away the buyer is.

    Or Since I am in baltimore, I will do the same exact steps but get a quote from usps or ups website going to california (90211) and charge that for shipping.

    On you listing you can add a handling charge (Usually 2-3.00)

    You can calculate the cost of shipping into the selling price to help your listing, I want 5.00 for my binders, shipping is 15.00 so I will list at 20.00 (works better on somethings, other not so much)

    You can loose so much money in shipping and supplies if you are not careful.
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