Cost of package material

[charlotteonline]

Hi, I am new to Ebay and have a question on how you recover the cost of packaging materials such as boxes and padded bags. It seems the postage calculater could do with a little feature to add in a few dollars to cover the cost of packaging material. I would prefer not to use fixed postage as this means I have to charge at the highest rate. At the same time, I use calculated costs, I could end up paying more for packaging material than I get for a low cost item. 

How do you all deal with this issue?  Am I missing a setting?

Thanks for any assistance on this.

[digital*ghost]

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@charlotteonline wrote:

How do you all deal with this issue?  Am I missing a setting?

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Actually...yes, but that's more eBay's fault and the way they designed the listing form (many useful extra options are essentially "hidden").

When you use calculated postage, there is an option to add in an amount as a handling fee (the total shown to prospective buyers = calculated postage + handling amount specified). By default, the handling charge is set to $0 and probably not shown as an extra option, so if you click "Add or remove options" in the postage details section, then make sure "Show handling cost and Get It Fast" is ticked, then save, it should be made available. Then click "change" (under the "Additional options" displayed at the end of the postage section) to open up the option to add in a handling charge.

[charlotteonline]

Thanks heaps for your reply.

That sounds like just the solution I need. But I can't seem to find the option you mention.  The postage section you refer to, is that when you are listing an item to sell or within my account settings? I have looked at both these and can't find it.  Would you be able to guide me a little more, please.

[digital*ghost · Accepted solution]

No problem. 🙂

It's done while you are creating the listing - as mentioned, the selling form will be broken into sections, i.e Title, Item Specifics, Description, postage section and so on. Some people will have access to the standard listing form, and some people will have "business policies", but if you have business policies, the option to add in a handling charge is there by default, so I presume you have the standard listing form, so here's a step by step guide...

First step, make sure calculated postage is selected as the postage option you want to use, and then click the add or remove options in the postage section.

Once you've clicked that, this window will pop up, and you need to make sure the right option is ticked.

Click save, and this option will be added to the postage details section:

To add a handling fee to your postage charge, click the "Change" link, this window will pop up and you can enter the amount you want to charge as shown.

Once you've changed that amount to whatever you want to add on top of the postage charge, click the save button, and it should be all done. 

[charlotteonline]

Thank you again heaps. Your reply is gold and I really appreciate you taking the time.  Unfortunately, I still don't see it.  My screen looks like this (please see attached as I cannot dump the screen print in the message due to size limit). 

 I am starting to think there is more than one layout in Ebay??? 

[digital*ghost]

Ok, I haven't seen that before... 😄

Are you using a PC? There was some updates to the selling form recently which gave some users a simplified listing form, which I've not personally come across as yet so I don't know too much about how to navigate it or whether you can bring up all available options, but I can see at the top of your screen the option to "Switch to Advanced tool" - if you click that, you should get the traditional selling form with all the options shown above. 

[charlotteonline]

  Again you are spot on and i am slightly off target. 

I switched to the advanced tool and my screen now look much more like yours, except..... I don't have an option button.   Seem my postage is controlled by policies.  This was somehow saved from a listing I completed earlier today.  I can't find anywhere to switch it to 'Domestic Postage'. Within the policy, I can't find anywhere to specify an additional cost. I have attached a screen print of what I see.

I hope I haven't outstayed my welcome as your help has been invaluable.

[davewil1964]

You will need to create a new policy or edit the existing one.

Both options are just above the package details section.

[charlotteonline]

I just had a bit more a look around. If I access the postage policies through my account, I can add a handling fee. It doesn't allow me to delete my policies as they are in use or a default.  I am not sure how you get your option for domestic postage, but at least I managed to locate the adding of additional cost. I can specify it on the policy if I edit it through my account/policies instead of while listing the item. This means I may end up with multiple policies just to cater for different packaging. Convoluted but workable 🙂

Thank you for all your help. I really appreciate you taking the time out to assist with so much detail.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.

[digital*ghost · Accepted solution]

Glad it's all worked out. 🙂  The screenshots above are from the listing form for accounts using the advanced tools but without the business policies function (you can opt out of them if you'd rather create each listing step by step, though, there'll be a small link on the top-right of the Business Policies page if you decide to in the future).