International shipping

[coas18]

Why am I being charged over $20 USD for postage on each item that I buy from different sellers? It's a stamp or a Wheat penny or some small items that don't weigh anything or a little. It is frustrating as a buyer to find I can purchase a stamp from Uruguay with a postage price a fraction of the cost to the US postage. I would like to buy from the US but can't as the cost is half times again. $20 US=$30+AUD. Weights and dimensions don't really come into it when the price for stamps and single coins are the same. A stamp should not and could not cost over $20 US to send to Australia. A sting in the tail. How much difference is there between standard international shipping and eBay international shipping?

[wastingtime101]

The problem is USPS implemented a rule several years ago that prohibits shipping merchandise through First Class Mail International. As a result, to comply with USPS, sellers are required to ship with Package service which is significantly more expensive.

You may find some sellers that still ship with Mail service, but those sellers are subjecting themselves to problems with a federal entity if they get caught.

That's the "why" of it, in a nutshell.

[deserdog]

It may also be that the sellers you are looking at are only using Ebay's offered shipping for international. I can ship a 4 ounce package to Austrailia for $12.99, a 1 lb. 4 counce package for $20.99. 

[marnotom!]

Adding to @wastingtime101‘s excellent post, the prohibition of the use of international letterpost with goods and merchandise isn’t just a USPS thing, it’s a Universal Postal Union convention.  Other countries’ postal systems are in various stages of complying with this convention.  In Canada, where I am, sellers of small, lightweight items such as trading cards have been seeing random returns of items they’ve tried sending out of the country via letterpost.

As for your query about eBay International Shipping, eIS is in essence a glorified forwarding service that uses tracked shipping.  You’re paying the seller as well as eIS to have your item shipped to you.  It relies heavily on the seller providing accurate information on the item’s shipping dimensions and weight in order to calculate its share of the shipping charge properly.  Some sellers don’t do that and it really messes up the eIS shipping calculation as a result.

[tobaccocardyahoo]

Many Ebay sellers are small, do not know International Customs Regulations, and do not wish to know them.

Ebay International Shipping is the only way they export.

Although some buyers complain that is is expensive, it is often cheaper to buy on Ebay with EIS than to buy the item in their own country. Buyers need to decide what an item is worth to them, and ignore what it might sell for in the USA or any other country it will be exported from.