Pirate Ship question
Summary: The discussion revolves around the benefits of using Pirate Ship for shipping, especially concerning competitive pricing compared to eBay, and its cost efficiency for UPS shipments as shared by ltldpr. A question about necessary access permissions for automatic tracking uploads to eBay was addressed by wastingtime101, who explained the account synchronization process between Pirate Ship and eBay to facilitate automatic order imports and tracking updates. The conversation highlights considerations of cost-effectiveness based on shipment size and weight, with a note that most sellers may not observe significant rate differences between eBay and Pirate Ship unless shipping larger or heavier items.
I recently became aware of Pirate Ship and am considering giving it a try. I saw a question posted several years ago but I did not see the response.
"...As we all know when you use Ebay shipping you choose a service and then a shipping cost will appear in the listing according to the buyers location. It seems Pirate Ship will only generate a price after the item is sold so is Pirate Ship only used if the seller is paying for shipping?"
Thank you!
mozartbach1971
·8 months agoI use Pirate shipping a lot for international orders, in many cases they seem to be the lowest cost.
tools*
·8 months agoThe most important reason to use a non-eBay vendor of shipping services has to do with how disputes are handled.
christworks
·8 months ago@milsyardsale No matter how you present shipping to eBay buyers, the buyers always pay you and then you pay for the shipping label.
You use calculated shipping. Unless you always know what box you are sending the item in along with the weight of the final package, then the data you input to generate the calculated rate for the buyer is an estimate. Sometimes you are going to be spot on. Sometimes you will off, maybe a little under or a little over. Either way the buyer has nothing to do with that. They are going to pay whatever the rate shown to them is, then you are responsible for paying for the label. If you are under, you eat the cost. If you are over, you keep the cost, though some sellers reimburse the difference which makes no sense to me in most cases.
Ultimately you can buy the shipping label any place you want. The buyer gets no say in that. You cannot downgrade the shipping service, but you can upgrade it. There is a debate among reasonable sellers as to whether a change in carriers violates policy, so be aware if you offer FedEx, Pirate Ship does not offer FedEx services.
Whether or not you change from calculated shipping to free shipping does not impact on where you buy the label. You do need to make sure you understand that shipping is never free for anybody. Free shipping on eBay means that you are not charging a separate line item for it. It is simply a marketing tactic used to appeal to buyers who specifically look for "free shipping" listings. Just as with calculated shipping, you buy the shipping label, whether on eBay or elsewhere. For this reason, you need to include the cost of the shipping into the cost of the item or else you will be paying out-of-pocket for shipping and that will eat in your costs. I do not recommend free shipping unless you truly understand the concept and know how to ensure you don't take a loss on it as a whole. Properly done, you lose a little on some and have a gain on others so that it evens out.
loose_goose_garage
·8 months agoAgree with above, for UPS it is usually a few bucks cheaper. USPS is generally the same, occasionally a few cents less but not often. The insurance is cheaper through PirateShip for both USPS and UPS, as is Signature Confirmation for UPS (I have not used with USPS through them so I do not know if there is a difference.
lakefor94
·8 months agoWhat you describe is all I use it for. Comparative pricing against what eBay is offering after the item sells.
For my business, PirateShip is winning the pricing battle on most all of my UPS shipments. Significant savings on a lot of shipments.
The tracking is automatically uploaded to eBay.
ltldpr
·8 months agoDid you have to give PirateShip access to your eBay account in order for the tracking to be automatically uploaded?
lakefor94
·8 months agoYou have to connect the two so logging in from PirateShip needs to happen if I remember correctly.
@wastingtime101 or others might know for sure.
wastingtime101
·8 months agoYes. Log in to Pirate, then synch your account from there. It will prompt you to log in to your eBay account. That process creates the access token. Pirate will automatically import your eBay orders, and will automatically send tracking to eBay when you buy labels.
Of course you can choose to not synch accounts, but then you will be manually entering label info on Pirate and manually entering tracking on eBay.
I know Lake tends to get lower UPS rates on Pirate. In my experience the rates are pretty comparable until you start increasing weight and package size. So it really depends what you're shipping. For most sellers they will not see much, if any, rate difference between eBay and Pirate.
tobaccocardyahoo
·8 months agoNo matter what service you use to buy shipping, the seller always pays for the shipping. The buyer may or may not pay the seller for shipping depending on whether the seller offers free shipping.
milsyardsale
OP8 months agoThat's really my question. So in your eBay listing, you specify Free Shipping for the buyer?
And then after the item sells, you compare Pirate Ship to other carriers and select the cheapest/best option?
Thanks!
mamacassidy
·8 months agoI'm not sure I understand what you're asking.
If you say Free Shipping in your listings, then the buyer is only paying you the price of the item.
You as the seller still have to pay to buy the label, whether you use ebay labels or Pirate Ship or go to the post office. Some services are cheaper than others, so it's wise to compare prices.
But offering Free Shipping only changes the amount of money the buyer sends to you. It has nothing to do with where you can buy the label.
milsyardsale
OP8 months agoI'm sorry my question wasn't clearer.
I'm accustomed to using Calculated Shipping in my listings so the buyer knows how much they will have to pay for me to ship the item to them. If you're using Pirate Ship, if I understand correctly, you (as the seller) won't know the actual shipping cost until after the item has sold. So how does the buyer know before the sale what their shipping cost will be? Does this mean that if you plan to use Pirate Ship you have to offer the buyer Free Shipping (and of course add some shipping cost into your item price)?
Thanks.
stainlessenginecovers
·8 months agoThe buyer will ONLY know what it costs using ebay. You then can use anyway you want (over the counter at the post office paying MORE) or (using Pirateship- which is about the same).
Overall, it does NOT matter. You use Calculated and that is what $ you get to then 'purchase' a label.
You need to know:
1.) ebay charges their fee on that shipping amount, so you should add a 'handling' fee to the calculated to at least cover that amount (14% average)
2.) you should ALSO charge an extra ?? for the packing materials (bubble wrap, paper, box, envelope etc.)
3.) You can also just use a 'flat rate' shipping price ($5 for example) and the rest is covered in price of the item
4.) when using calculated, you need to have the correct weight and dimensions inputted or the amount will not be shown accurately and you may wind up over or under 'collecting' for that shipping
5.) when using calculated, you need to determine who you are using (USPS? UPS? Fedex?) as they vary quite a bit when you go to 'print' as well as you should be shipping to what you show (what you chose)
mamacassidy
·8 months agoPirate ship is just a website to purchase a shipping label. You can buy a label there just like you buy one from ebay or from USPS.com. It's not some special service.
You go to the website, type in the weight and measurements, then buy the shipping label.
You do not have to offer free shipping to buy a label from Pirate Ship.
In my experience shipping mostly clothing, I've found that the Pirate Ship costs for USPS Ground Advantage are usually the same as the ebay label cost.
In my opinion, calculated shipping is the safest option of getting the correct amount of postage from customers. I find it particularly helpful when it automatically updates whenever the postal rates change (If you offer free shipping with the postage cost built in, you'll need to increase your item cost to keep up with postal increases)
debs_popnstuff
·8 months agoHi there,
I just wanted to say, FWIW, that I understood what you were asking the first time, the second time & the third time 🙂 I thought you were very clear. I'm always surprised when people seem to be answering a question that wasn't asked.
I did a quick scan of the replies, and they're so confusing (some are way too long for what you asked) ... I'm going to read through them more fully — but if you see this and could reply whether or not you figured it out and share the answer, that would be great!
milsyardsale
OP4 months agoThank you for responding. I'm all set. See the explanation below from @sassyclassyemporium.
sassyclassyemporium
·5 months agoYou would still use eBay's calculated shipping portion of the software and enter the dimensions and weight. That will tell the buyer how much he is paying for delivery. When the item sells, you have a choice of either using eBay's shipping label or "IMPORTING" the sales information into PIRATE SHIP (PS) in order to get the rate. Pirate Ship will give you the wholesale rate. Now you can decide whether you want to use Pirate Ship's label or eBay's. The person who said that going to the PO or going to PS is the same rate, was wrong. PO rates are retail, PS's rates are wholesale. AND, I'm assuming you know that within eBay's setup area, you can choose to either keep the savings (wholesale) for yourself or pass it on to the buyer. All that stuff that person said about charging 'handling fee' and so on is also incorrect. The way you save the most money is to NOT pass wholesale postage rate to the buyer, but to keep it for yourself. THAT is what pays for the packing material and tape, wrapping paper, bubble wrap, etc. Do not build it into your handling fee because eBay get a portion of that too. So you just defeated the purpose of keeping the wholesale rate for yourself. Do you understand what I'm trying to say?
milsyardsale
OP4 months agoYes, I understand. Perfect explanation. Thank you very much for your response!