Wildly disparate postage estimates US to AU

[petravk]

I'm wondering why there are such wildly disparate postage charges to send a book to AU from US. One has quoted US$40.16. It appears to be very high in comparison with other postage estimates for other (similar) copies of the book on eBay that would ship to AU.

Others with similar copies (dimensions, weight et cetera) are quoting US$15 - US$25 for ostensibly the same postage method (eBay International Shipping) even though some are having to travel a greater distance such as from E coast v W Coast USA. The particular copy I'm interested in is on W coast, so shorter distance to AU, yes, I'm aware that *some* shipping companies have extremely convoluted & weird routes to AU, but those are mainly from EU/UK.

I enquired from the vendor & their response was "eBay sets the postage price." The vendor appears to have only sold a few items & appears to be relatively new (2023) to eBay.

Is this something that has changed over the past couple of years? Any views?

[davewil1964]

Anecdotally, if the seller doesn't bother to include dimensions the postage is ramped up.

The vendor gets paid to post to the shipping hub, which can be a low cost within the USA. Everything on top of that is up to EIS. $15-25 seems to be possible - but eBay have to pay 10% GST within that shipping cost for starters. Are you sure these sellers aren't using USPS?

Must be a very rare book that's only available from the USA. In which case, pay what it is worth to you.

[petravk]

Hi, thanks for that information. It seems that they are all using eBay International Shipping (at least that is what it says on their listings) and I didn't see mention of USPS. USPS is what I've been used to when receiving things from the US in the past (about 3-4 years since I last bought from the US which is the reason I ask if anything has changed in that time).

The book isn't particularly rare, just that I saw it for a reasonable price, but was confused by the (what I felt to be) the very high postage price in comparison to other vendors.

As it's a German book, I'll just get it from CH/EU/UK instead when the particular edition I'm after turns up (postage from there does not appear to be as high/random as from the US).