Australia Post has underhandedly announced its biggest parcel cost increases in its history under the guise of reducing the 15 Kg weight limit on B1, B2 and B4 parcels that it previously accepted as Click and Send flat rate products.
On the 17th April 2014 Australia Post originally stated that B4 boxes would have a revised 5 Kg limit. This today has been further revised and B4 boxes will be no longer eligible for any flat rate.
In turn eBay's new "policy" in charging commissions on all P&H from May 6th 2014 closely coincides with Australia Post's announcement about its revisions to its flat rate box weight limits for those using their C&S system.
The 2 lots of announcements are not independent of each other.
Users of the Australia Post Click and Send system will now be paying from 80% to 700% more in postage costs on all parcels (B1, B2) that will have had their 15 kg maximum limits reduced to 1 kg and 3 kgs respectively from May 13th 2014.
In other words, nearly double to up to 7 times what we've being paying when these new weight limits start.
Yes, you read correctly, up to a 700% price rise. Not just a CPI increase or some little price tweak, up to 700% in the worse case scenario. If anyone doesn't believe me, just look up the Australia Post's Regular Parcel Charges table for a 14 to 15 Kg parcel going from 3711 to any postcode in W3 (6700 - 6799) and we send a hell of a lot of parcels to that region.
And guess what, eBay now gets to add to its bottom line with their revised FVF calculation that will include all P&H costs one week earlier. Talk about being prepared.
Forget about eBay wanting sellers to change their listings to "FREE P&H" as that's almost insignificant compared with the money they'll rake off because of the new postal charges and because they will now charge on all P&H, regardless if it's itemized separately.
If nothing gets done about this very urgently, all C&S users are going to suffer the consequences with both Australia Post and eBay rorting us and our buyers.
In comparison to that, the Australia Post’s weight reductions and the subsequent price rises by stealth are the real issue and will certainly affect both buyers and sellers the most financially.
News Flash!
According to an Australia Post representative today, these changes to the weights were requested by eBay to Australia Post and are NOT an Australia Post initiative. This postal charges change has been driven by eBay Australia to bolster their own profits, ignorantly agreed to by Australia Post and approved by the Australian Federal Government.
This is blatant profiteering by both organizations and is a rip-off.
Most sellers and ultimately buyers will find an enormous cost burden dumped on them with these weight changes as they are truly significant. The end result is that this will lead to serious cost increases to buyers, cause hardship to many sellers and inadvertently provide an added bonus to overseas sellers whose parcel costs stay the same because Australia Post have to deliver their parcels regardless for far less.
Many, if not most items that users could up until now post via C&S that used to be accepted in a B1 box will now end up having to go in a far higher priced B2 size box. A 1Kg maximum actually translates to approximately an 800 gram item because the empty B1 box itself weighs 100 grams and most people need to protect the contents with some form of padding/packing material. Just that alone is going to have a huge impact on pricing that eBay sellers have to cover somehow.
Then the withdrawal of the B4 boxes from flat rate processing will mean all items greater than 3 Kg will now have to go out via standard Australia Post variable rates which can mean up to a 700% price hike if sending from Vic to northern WA.
As a quick example, a 14 Kg packaged parcel that we often used to send in a B4 box for $15.05 via C&S to anywhere in Australia is now $100.20 to send to Nth WA (W3). There's a 700% unwarranted increase! That's the worse case, but even if we take an averaged out cost to post a 14 Kg item, we're now going to be paying $50 or more for what cost us $15.05 previously.
At least when we knew the cost of the P&H was flat rate and wasn't destination driven, we could list with the false "FREE P&H" way of listing, but when we have no idea where it's going to end up going to, then it's simply impossible. Unless something changes quick smart, we will have to revise virtually all of our listings to "calculated postage" and pass on these ludicrous postage price increases to our customers.
So eBay, you want us to list with “FREE P&H”? Yeah, right!
And as far as Australia Post goes, there's only 1 week left to get this debacle sorted, so it has to be escalated to the highest levels in government, the ACCC, the Postal Ombudsman, A Current Affair, anywhere that this can get enough publicity to force a reversal of their decision that’s been orchestrated hand-in-hand with eBay.
