Sold item where buyer is based in Turkey but shipping address is in FL?

[danslai]

So I sold a ~$50 consumer electronics item and I saw that the buyer is based in Turkey. I especially noticed this when my sale got charged an extra 1.65% international fee. My listing said that I only ship within the domestic USA.

The buyer's shipping address is to a Margate, FL address, which I looked up to be a single house residential address. The name of the person to ship to is definitely not Turkish sounding. The buyer is an ebay member since May 2022 and has about 100 feedbacks received as a buyer (0 as seller) and has left about 20 feedbacks (all positive).

Do I have anything to be concerned about here? What might be going on here (is the person I'm shipping to not the actual buyer)? Is there anyway to restrict buyers to be based in the U.S. so that I don't get dinged for the international fee on my sales?

[simply-the-best-for-you]

---

@soh.maryl wrote:

What extra fees would you be paying in this case?

---

@soh.maryl  They would pay the 1.65% International Fee.  

[meekamaye]

In regard to no invoice being enclosed, he may be trying to avoid his country's import tax or VAT. Turkey is very strict on items entering their country and that is why I quit shipping there several years ago so it may be he is avoiding being caught with a prohibited item.

[isaiah53-57]

---

@danslai wrote:

Do I have anything to be concerned about here? What might be going on here (is the person I'm shipping to not the actual buyer)? Is there anyway to restrict buyers to be based in the U.S. so that I don't get dinged for the international fee on my sales?

---

You are getting a lot of you sold it, you need to ship it advice from the cheerleaders.

Since ebay offers negligible up front protections, I believe a bit of due diligence on your part  is the right way to go to ensure a trouble free transaction for yourself from start to finish - Could be their account needs updating and it hasnt been done - Could be its going to a reshipper.  In these cases, I always send an email to the buyer to have them verify and validate the situation - I would google the shipping address and see if it is a known reshipper - If they tell you in the reply that all is well and they are shipping it to a reshipper then you have all the information you need to win a case if need be as the reshipping of an item voids the Money Back Guarantee - My advice is to send an email to verify what information you can in writing for your own piece of mind.

[soh.maryl]

But, as has been discussed here endlessly, he is not shipping to Turkey.  

[soh.maryl]

That whopping 1.65% which he would be paying if he was shipping directly to Turkey also? 

[chapeau-noir]

OP apparently has not run into this before and so asked a good question, and got good advice.

Cheerleading...or experience?  **You decide!**

[keziak]

why is there an international fee when it's going to Florida?

[slippinjimmy]

---

@soh.maryl wrote:

Perhaps that FL address is that of the friend for whom the buyer is purchasing the gift.

Or perhaps, considering that request of no invoice or packing slip, that buyer is using you as a drop shipper.  

Regardless, you have a sale which you need to ship to the given address, regardless of what you believe it to be.  

---

Tagging on........

People need to understand that at any point in time there are 10 - 20 MILLION legal temporary residents in the US, a large percentage of those are in Florida. Some are here on vacation, some for school and many for temporary employment (not including temporary farm workers etc.). Besides the primary reason for their visit one thing that almost all of them do is SHOPPING.

[danslai]

Thanks everyone for the comments and suggestions. I think this is the first time I've been in this kind of situation as a seller and I only noticed it when seeing the international fee being charged. (Maybe it's happened before to me, but I just didn't notice the international fee.) I've gone ahead and shipped to the FL address that was provided. Just hoping everything turns out ok and no issues come up later.

The 1.65% international fee isn't a big deal for my sale, and I'm just a casual seller. I imagine though that it would be a bigger deal for higher volume sellers and those that rely on ebay for a significant portion of their income. Margins are pretty tight with all the increased costs involved these days (shipping expenses and other ebay selling fees) and I got to think that a 1.65% fee is not an insignificant cost for some sellers out there.

[richard1rst]

---

@keziak wrote:

why is there an international fee when it's going to Florida?

---

The fee has nothing to do with where the SHIPMENT  is GOING. The fee has to do with where the PAYMENT is coming FROM.  Somewhere between where the buyer pays with Turkish Lira and the payment the seller gets in U S Dollars a money changer or brokerage house is involved in converting one to the other. Nobody works for free.

[maxine*j]

---

@soh.maryl wrote:

What extra fees would you be paying in this case?

---

If a buyer's credit card issuer is a non-U.S entity, such as a foreign bank, the seller will pay the nominal "international fee," to cover currency conversion, etc.   (I agree with another poster who said it's a silly holdover from the pre-whiz-bang-electronic processing days, but what can you do?)

-

[dbfolks166mt]

@keziak wrote:

why is there an international fee when it's going to Florida?

The fee has nothing to do with where the SHIPMENT  is GOING. The fee has to do with where the PAYMENT is coming FROM.  Somewhere between where the buyer pays with Turkish Lira and the payment the seller gets in U S Dollars a money changer or brokerage house is involved in converting one to the other. Nobody works for free.

     It has everything to do with either where the shipment is going or what the buyers registered address is regardless of the payment source. The CC company charges the buyer though their CC statement for any fee conversion. EBay charges the international fee:

International fee

If your registered address is in the US, we charge an International fee if either:

• The delivery address for the item (entered by the buyer during checkout) is outside the US, or
• The buyer's registered address is outside the US (regardless of the delivery address for the item)

[dbfolks166mt]

@soh.maryl wrote:

What extra fees would you be paying in this case?

If a buyer's credit card issuer is a non-U.S entity, such as a foreign bank, the seller will pay the nominal "international fee," to cover currency conversion, etc.   (I agree with another poster who said it's a silly holdover from the pre-whiz-bang-electronic processing days, but what can you do?)

     It has nothing to do with the location of the bank and everything to do with either where the shipment is going or what the buyers registered address is regardless of the payment source. The CC company charges the buyer though their CC statement for any fee conversion. EBay charges the international fee:

International fee

If your registered address is in the US, we charge an International fee if either:

• The delivery address for the item (entered by the buyer during checkout) is outside the US, or
• The buyer's registered address is outside the US (regardless of the delivery address for the item)

[soh.maryl]

The "funding source" is presumably international.

[dbfolks166mt]

The "funding source" is presumably international.

The international fee has nothing to do with the funding source.