Why have my shipping policies changed? Now prices are crazy high. What happened?

[roachmart]

So one day I get on ebay to check how my auctions are going. I noticed that my shipping policies have been deleted and ebay is filling in the info with outrageous shipping costs. I shipping a record media mail for $5 and now it posts at over $60! I have felt the chill of low sales so this really sucks. What is going on?

[mam98031]

Check your settings.  If you are using calculated shipping, there is some bad info in there, so review it and get if fixed.  If you have Business policies set up, check them for accuracy.  

Media Mail rates went up on 7-14, in case you didn't know that.  Around 50 cents.

I don't see any of your listings with a $60 shipping fee.  Did you fix it?

$5 for MM under 15.99 oz is a little low.  The USPS cost is $4.63, so you are only leaving yourself 37 cents to cover shipping supplies and fees on shipping.

[toysaver]

I see reasonable shipping for your items.  If it says $60 you must have an international location for the ship to address. Check the blue zip code link in upper right is your zip code.

[slyders_finds]

In my experience most buyers  want free shipping. I get so many messages asking for free shipping. So padding $2 or $3 to cover fees/supplies will turn most buyers off. They will go to your competition. 

[dbfolks166mt]

     Did you get this issue resolved? None of your current listings have that high of a shipping cost. 

[ittybitnot]

What is going on?

@roachmart 

Have you by chance LOOKED at a listing lately and under the shipping tab changed the country of origin to see what the cost might be to another country?    If you did not change it back to US with your own Zip Code before exiting the page, when you look at listings going forward you will be shown shipping to that country, even though you are still logged into ebay.com.   You can go to any listing, repeat/reverse the process,  and fix it. 

[mam98031]

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@slyders_finds wrote:

In my experience most buyers  want free shipping. I get so many messages asking for free shipping. So padding $2 or $3 to cover fees/supplies will turn most buyers off. They will go to your competition. 

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Well likely once was true.  But as time marches on things change.  Now some buyers like free shipping and others don't.  One big draw back of free shipping for some buyers is the lack of combined shipping savings.  

Items I sell often have buyers purchasing multiple items so stated shipping is important to most of the buyers I have and I do extend combined shipping discounts.

If you aren't covering your fees and shipping supplies, that is your choice of course, but it doesn't have to be that way.  Charging a reasonable handling fee is completely acceptable.  

From a quick review of some of your listings, you have a handling fee on your stated shipping in some if not most cases.  A couple are exactly what it will cost for the postage.  

You have 23 active listings.  How many emails could you be getting per week from buyers asking for free shipping?