Counteroffer with negotiation of shipping charge
I sent a seller this message in reply to a special offer from a seller, "but a) I don't know if this is ok within Ebay rules, and b) how to effect the transaction if it is. "Would you consider splitting the shipping charge? So that would be $XX (taking the 15% special discount offer), plus $YY for half the quoted shipping amount of approx. $100, for a total of $XXY. Please let me know if interested."
10 comments
springhollowfarm
OP1 year agoThanks to everyone who chimed in. I completely agree with the comments about the justification for shipping and other charges, as a seller I understand this well. But the answer proved to be almost too simple: keep the shipping charges as they are and negotiate the price. Duh. Done deal.
albertabrightalberta
·1 year agoI'd block a buyer who made such a request. Many buyers have no clue on how much it costs to ship, what other handling expenses sellers incur and often tend to be problems after the sale.
cardsforauction
·1 year agoYou're right. Shipping is expensive and has gotten quite expensive in recent years. I don't know why a potential buyer can't ask for a better item price and not a better shipping price. Silly potential buyer who thinks things are free in this world. Maybe they asked for a better item price and shipping price? Ridiculous if they did.
house*of*paws
·1 year ago@cardsforauction
English is my first language. I’ve read your post several times and simply cannot grasp your point. 😕
cardsforauction
·1 year agoRead and you will learn. Not sure what you are talking about with your silly comment.
Shipping is expensive and asking for a big discount when it's posted in the item listing does not make sense. The buyer can negotiate a lower item price, but not shipping. Who negotiates shipping prices with potential buyers?
house*of*paws
·1 year ago@cardsforauction
Then please reread your prior post and tell me that there isn’t at least one typo in it that obscures the point you were trying to make.
“I don’t know why a potential buyer can’t ask for a better item price and not a better shipping price.â€
I respectfully request a translation of the above. I honestly couldn’t tell which side you were supporting. 🙂
cardsforauction
·1 year agoIf the potential buyer wants to make an offer or negotiate a price, it would be on the item price side. I would not ever consider negotiating a shipping price with a potential buyer. For me, it does not matter since most of my items have free shipping.
I was just thinking that it would be wild if the potential buyer wanted to negotiate both the item price and shipping price, because I'm sure there may be some people who feel they can get both, and a super low price.
ryry-jj
·1 year agoIt's ok to ask...most likely that type of deal gets cleaned up with a partial refund after you have paid the "offer accepted" price and the full shipping.
However, when making an offer like this, do expect you might get an wordy "no". You are asking a seller to devalue his item and take back costs. No seller likes to eat costs. But you can still ask...
redmodelt
·1 year agoShipping is not part of the Best Offer. You would have to make a lower offer on the item itself. If they made a counteroffer, then more than likely they would not consider lowering the shipping cost as part of the deal. Could be that counteroffer is just above or at their breakeven point after fees, item cost and time.
Sellers are paying fees on item, shipping and any sales tax and own item for X amount. The shipping discount sellers gets, "might" cover time and packaging materials to ship the item.
kensgiftshop
·1 year agoOffers are for the item price only and you pay the shipping shown in the listing.
You can ask, but they can't change the shipping with an offer.