$9 USA Security Charge

[brighttomato]

This has probably been asked before but I can't find any topics that answer my question..
I recently had a purchase from a US buyer (item was over 700 g) and unfortunately the $9 security charge was not added to the postage cost. The buyer paid immediately with Pay Pal and I am left with a payment which is $9 short. I called ebay to try and find out why their postage calculator is not adding the security charge and they were not helpful at all, could not give me an answer. I asked to raise a technical ticket but have no idea how long it will take them to get back to me. In the meantime I can't imagine what I should do to fix this. I have over 200 listings - do I start modifying all of them to remove US from the list? Contacting people after they purchased and asking for an additional payment is sure to tick them off - great way of getting a neg feedback.

Am I missing something? Has anyone else experienced this?

[lyndal1838]

I am not familiar with the UK postal services and cannot comment.

What I do know is that I quite often order from large as well as small UK on-line stores and delivery charges are very reasonable. Somehow they seem to manage that.

You were horrified at the cost to send something to the UK and wondered what it would cost to send it from the UK to Australia.  I looked it up for you and found that it was more expensive.

You do not need to understand anything....the Royal Mail website works just the same as the Australia Post one and the USPS website for that matter.

There is no point in complaining about Australia Post if you are not prepared to do your comparisons and see that they are just as competitive as other services the world over.

As for reasonable delivery charges from other on line stores....have you ever thought that they may be subsidising their delivery charges.  Have you ever looked at the actual postage on the packet as against what you were charged?

[brighttomato]

You were horrified at the cost to send something to the UK and wondered what it would cost to send it from the UK to Australia.  I looked it up for you and found that it was more expensive.

You do not need to understand anything....the Royal Mail website works just the same as the Australia Post one and the USPS website for that matter.

There is no point in complaining about Australia Post if you are not prepared to do your comparisons and see that they are just as competitive as other services the world over.

As for reasonable delivery charges from other on line stores....have you ever thought that they may be subsidising their delivery charges.  Have you ever looked at the actual postage on the packet as against what you were charged?

I will end my discussion with you right there as I don't like your tone. thanks for looking things up. have a great day.

[lyndal1838]

No worries....just don't complain about Australia Post without knowing the facts.  It really is easy to look it up for yourself.

[brighttomato]

Does anyone know - has this security charge been abolished by Australia Post? I am not seeing now when I use AP Calculator.

[digital*ghost]

Does anyone know - has this security charge been abolished by Australia Post? I am not seeing now when I use AP Calculator.

Yes, the surcharge has been abolished. I'm not sure as of when, but I hear some post offices have already stopped charging it, and the AP rep (Alice) has confirmed that it's been scrapped, though wasn't able to provide an official date for it to take effect.

[brighttomato]

Yes, the surcharge has been abolished. I'm not sure as of when, but I hear some post offices have already stopped charging it, and the AP rep (Alice) has confirmed that it's been scrapped, though wasn't able to provide an official date for it to take effect.

Wow! I am amazed and ecstatic all at the same time 🙂 Although, also slightly annoyed because I spent the last month adjusting my listings to remove postage calculator for US and now I have to spend another month to change them back. 🙂

thanks for confirming, digital*ghost

[phorum_junkie*]

You can bulk edit your listings, that shouldn't take a month!

What I do know is that I quite often order from large as well as small UK on-line stores and delivery charges are very reasonable. Somehow they seem to manage that.

That is because they probably post offshore on a contract or at the very least if they are a large organisation they will have a contract with Royal Mail. They are probably not posting by a method that needs Paypal seller protection which would reduce their costs considerably.

[brighttomato]

You can bulk edit your listings, that shouldn't take a month!

you can't bulk edit the option that I was changing. I consulted with ebay customer support before I started editing the items.

[centsis]

Thank goodness the charge has been abolished. Australia Post have revised prices since October 22. The 250 grams weight bracket for international postage has been removed.

[lovetadojen]

the joys of the idiotic dysfunctional ebay postage calculator.

allowing that to be your auto-pilot is a mistake for a start.

that $9 500g+ US DHS surcharge has been in place for a fair while now.