@ryan-and-danny wrote:
New seller here,
I was curious about using PirateShip shipping so I made an account and connected it into my eBay. However, I have a couple questions that PS support couldn't answer fully.
Scenario: Let's says someone buys an item and pays me $10 for shipping via USPS. I log into PS and see that I can ship via UPS for $5.
1. I get to keep the $5 difference, right? Yes of course. Any postage over the actual cost can be kept by the seller as handling, supplies, etc. Many sellers add a handling fee to their shipping rates. If you want you can refund a buyer the shipping difference and they will certainly be happy to see that.
2. Will the customer see that I shipped via UPS instead of USPS? Yes they use completely different tracking systems and tracking numbers are easily differentiated between all carriers. The label will also be different when the customer receives the package.
3. Is it within eBay's policies to ship with a carrier that the buyer didn't select? It doesn't violate any specific eBay policy to use a different carrier than what the buyer paid for but if eBay really wanted to they can find you in violation for just about anything. Buyers may get mad if there is a switch to a slower carrier. Most buyers will be happy if you upgrade them to a faster service (which may be cheaper for you).
4. What if the buyer needs USPS for a specific reason, like they live on a military base, or they only want USPS for some reason? HI, AK, APO addresses, Guam, Puerto Rico, etc. are much more expensive to ship UPS/FedEx as they have to be UPS/FedEx air shipped only (if it's even an option) so you usually want to stick with USPS (if you can use Priority Mail flat rate for this that is the best option). PO boxes are only deliverable by USPS and UPS/FedEx will not deliver to PO boxes in most cases so you are stuck there with USPS.
I've read that PS is situationally cheaper than eBay. Just want to make sure it's all legal and not a hassle.
Thanks!
We use Pirate Ship almost exclusively for UPS and USPS except for some reason they think Puerto Rico is an international destination most of the time while eBay does not. Through Pirate Ship you will have to fill out customs forms for PR shipping, while eBay doesn't make you do that. We used to use ShipStation but found it wasn't worth the subscription compared to Pirate Ship.
Pirate Ship offers the exact same rates as eBay for UPS, but they do offer higher insurance options if you have high value items. They also offer more shipping options for UPS. They offer UPS 3-day service which eBay doesn't have, and they have more Next Day Air options (i.e. Next Day Air Early). Another thing to note is because both eBay and PS have negotiated rates with UPS, you have to look closely at the delivery date when buying their postage. For instance, UPS 2-day is not actually guaranteed to be delivered in 2-days in most cases even though it usually is delivered in 2 business days.
PS rates for USPS used to be much better with the cubic rates but recently eBay supposedly started using the cubic rates (if you are not familiar with those rates you can do a quick search in the PS help section as they have lots of info. on it).
PS doesn't offer FedEx and eBay now has a FedEx 2-day flat rate which is a big savings in some cases if you want expedited option. eBay's FedEx Ground rates are also usually cheaper than PS/eBay UPS Ground.
The biggest advantage for PS for us is speed. You can pre-store your most common (or all if you want) box sizes so the shipping flow goes much faster if you ship a lot of packages.
One other note is Pirate Ship doesn't allow you to edit the destination shipping address at all so if you need to change the shipping address you will need to make a custom label rather than use the auto-import.
