Rate Tables - expanded - better explanation please

[lintbrush*]

There have been a few responses regarding the rate tables - and this one I do like

lintbrush* wrote:
The shipping thing has me confused too.  Their example doesn't help. 
 
Does it mean I could have free shipping to those close to me and charge for those in Zone 8?  That might be interesting.  Include Zone 4 pricing in the "free shipping" listing and have the difference for Z4 vs Z8 as the charge shown to everyone in Zones 5 or higher. 
 Response from Greg_shipping:
Hi Lintbrush - yes you are right. Rate tables will allow you to customize your shipping charges by zones / region - so charge low or free shipping to neighbor regions and higher costs where approriate to zone further afield - to match how your carrier might charge you. You'll therefore be more price competitive where ship costs are lower, and not risk under charging buyers that further afield..

@greg_shipping

Since the thread that got moved here from another board and subsequently locked is a jumble of things, can you explain the shipping rate thing better as a whole.  Yeah you can post replies to the locked thread, but we can't 

[partial*eclipse]

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@carlmarxx wrote:

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 ... .  All it will do is make the buyers nutty. ... .

The buyers will just see prices, not tables.  

However, they apparently won't see specific services.   Just "Standard," Expedited," etc.  And we all know how common it is for buyers to think that "expedited" means "overnight" (or at least very fast).

[carlmarxx]

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@partial*eclipse wrote:

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@carlmarxx wrote:

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 ... .  All it will do is make the buyers nutty. ... .

The buyers will just see prices, not tables.  

However, they apparently won't see specific services.   Just "Standard," Expedited," etc.  And we all know how common it is for buyers to think that "expedited" means "overnight" (or at least very fast).

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Yea !  I agree .

[d-k_treasures]

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@partial*eclipse wrote:

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@carlmarxx wrote:

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 ... .  All it will do is make the buyers nutty. ... .

The buyers will just see prices, not tables.  

However, they apparently won't see specific services.   Just "Standard," Expedited," etc.  And we all know how common it is for buyers to think that "expedited" means "overnight" (or at least very fast).

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Well, if a listing has shipping charges AND free local pickup, search shows 'free shipping', and 'free shipping' is shown in the listing next to like 'long time member', but then shows a shipping cost where the shipping cost is. Clicking the details shows the cost, and also 'free local pickup'.

So I wouldn't hold my breath on what a buyer will see on search, in the listing, or on the imMobile App, considering that they can't get a simple function like that to work properly.

[greg_shipping]

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@partial*eclipse wrote:

@greg_shipping

Can you give us any examples of situations where a seller would be better-off using the new rate tables option, instead of the existing shipping calculator, in addition to:

1. Offer Free shipping to nearby buyers, but charge shipping for farther ones.

2. Offer prices lower than eBay's regular shipping calculator prices, due to access to better rates e.g., through high sales volume. 

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Hi partial*eclipse - you covered the main two (big) reasons. An additional reason would be that you also use a carrier that is not currently covered by calculated shipping. Calculated shipping is select services from USPS, UPS and FEDEX.

[ebuycdn]

@greg_shipping

Thank you for the explanation. If your example is how the rate table works, I am unsure if we would be able to set it up to accurately reflect our shipping costs. For us, it would be most accurate to be able to specify an exact cost for each zone for each weight for each service;  not a price per lb for each zone.

Would there be a way to specify a base shipping cost plus an amount per pound?

[d-k_treasures]

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@ebuycdn wrote:

@greg_shipping

Thank you for the explanation. If your example is how the rate table works, I am unsure if we would be able to set it up to accurately reflect our shipping costs. For us, it would be most accurate to be able to specify an exact cost for each zone for each weight for each service;  not a price per lb for each zone.

Would there be a way to specify a base shipping cost plus an amount per pound?

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I think this is more so that you can set 'flat rate' costs by region/zone instead of doing flat rate for all of the country.

For example, you can 'soon' will be able to offer 8.00 priority for the east cost, but 12.00 or whatever priority for the left coast for something like a 2-3 pound PM shipment.