Can a seller charge petrol, time, fees & other misc costs as part of postage ?????

[jbeach1971]

I have a seller who wants to charge me $29 for postage of a pair of shoes from Vic to Perth WA

I questioned her postage charge and i got back the following

"Yes, the postage is correct. These shoes are pretty heavy, especially with the packaging, and will weigh much more then the standard 500 g to ship. The price is a little higher than the actual postage cost to help cover eBay seller and postage fees, PayPal fees, etc. These shoes are in fantastic condition and cost about $140 when I bought them and I only wore them once or twice."

I only paid $9.99 for them - that was the starting bid and i was the only bidder

I also have another woman who wants to charge me $30 postage for 3 items from Chatswood NSW to Perth and her reponse was

"Yes, the combined postage of all 3 items to Perth will be $30. This includes the increased weight, bigger mailing box, petrol, ebay/paypal fees and time."

Is this correct ??????????????

[k1ooo-slr-sales]

Was the $29 charge shown on the listing?  The time to question it is before bidding.  What do you consider to be a reasonable postage charge?

Your sellers are probably just telling you what many sellers do not, i.e. they are giving you a breakdown of what they use the Postage & Handling charge for.  However, sellers are not obliged to give a breakdown if a buyer asks for one, and they are only allowed to charge what was included in the P&H section of the listing i.e. they can not add extra charges after an auction ends if the final price is low.  When looking at an item, if you don't like the P&H charges then don't bid/buy OR factor the charges into your total spend amount.

In your shoe case, your total spend amount is $9.99 + $29 = $38.99.  If the seller had had $15 postage and the item attracted more bidders and the price got to $24 then the total spend would have been $39.  What you have to ask yourself is "Is $38.99 a good price for these shoes?".  If the answer is yes, then consider paying the asking price for P&H, if your answer is no then ask the seller for a cancellation as you no longer want them.  If you ask for cancellation the seller is likely to put you on their Blocked Bidder List and relist the item.  if the relist has lower postage you will find yourself unable to bid, or, if not blocked your total spend may end up more than $38.99.

eBay allow sellers to apply a reasonable handling charge, but also tell sellers they can't add eBay and PayPal fees to their listing price.  When they introduced final-value-fees on postage they encouraged sellers to use "free postage" and to incorporate the increased fee into their pricing structure.

This eBay help page might give you more information http://pages.ebay.com.au/help/policies/selling-practices.html#other

Here is a screen capture from that page