Purchased $3,800 in insurance coverage through eBay and got $150.

[ryan-and-danny]

Hear my tale of woe, and learning a hard lesson about eBay's terrible shipping insurance program.

I feel like I just got scammed. I shipped a high end speaker through eBay via FedEx. 5 packages in total. When purchasing the shipping labels, a pop-up appeared asking if I wanted shipping insurance on each package, I purchased $950 on 4 of the packages. $3,800 in total.

Fast forward to delivery, packages were damaged and buyer wanted to file a claim, fair enough. The damage was estimated at $700, so I filed a claim on one of the packages figuring the $950 should cover it. My claim is approved....for $150. The email says there's no declared value.

I call eBay, they say to call FedEx. I call FedEx and have them run all 4 tracking numbers. No coverage on any of them. There's no way to view insurance coverage through eBay, so I have no proof of it.

So I bought almost $4,000 in coverage, but have no proof of it, so I get no coverage.

Long story short, when shipping with insurance, use a third party like Pirate Ship.

Thanks for reading.

[gator08041971]

@ryan-and-danny 

Honestly, I'm not sure what to make of this.

I did look to see if it was one of your recent sold listings, but nothing seems to line up with the figures you are talking about.

As for checking for your coverage:

While I can pull up a transaction where I know I paid extra for coverage above $100 on a recent item, I cannot pull a break down of the shipping transaction, despite knowing I paid a bit more for coverage of the item's cost.  So that option doesn't appear directly available.   Meaning that I can't seem to find "proof" that I paid for extra coverage.

In your case, it sounds like it should be a larger value spent on the label, but it also may depend on whom you bought the insurance from.  Typically there are more than one option for insurance provided too.  But without some sort of screen shot or receipt of the purchase, not sure what direction I can point you on this one.

[dryophelia]

Did not intend for this to be a direct response to gator… 

Can one buy insurance for more than the product sold for?

@ryan-and-danny 

Is this the listing?

316388546446

[wastingtime101]

Is this about item 316388546446 which sold for $950 + ship?

[pastimpressions]

You should be able to establish declared value with a copy of the sales transaction.

You should be able to locate additional insurance paid in your shipping label itemized detail (drop down menu).

Best of Luck

[kalyoth]

If you went through ebay to print the Fed Ex label & buy the insurance, you have to claim through whom you purchased the insurance with (a 3rd party company).

[ryan-and-danny]

It was a speaker system. You described my issue, no proof of insurance, so no payout.

[ryan-and-danny]

Yes, each package was insured for $950.

[ryan-and-danny]

This was a speaker system that required all 4 speakers to function. So if one was destroyed the whole system was basically useless. That was my justification for putting the maximum insurance value on each box separately.

When I was given the option to purchase $950 on each package, so I did.

[ryan-and-danny]

Can you be more specific? I don't see that, and I contacted eBay several times and they couldn't find that information either.

[ryan-and-danny]

Problem is I don't know who the insurance would be through, if not FedEx or eBay. I didn't bother screenshotting the insurance popup, since I figured I could get that information later. Lesson learned.

[wastingtime101]

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@kalyoth wrote:

If you went through ebay to print the Fed Ex label & buy the insurance, you have to claim through whom you purchased the insurance with (a 3rd party company).

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I don't understand @kalyoth . Are you talking about a separate 3rd party insurance company? On eBay, 3rd party (ShipCover) insurance is only available on USPS packages.

The seller shipped FedEx with eBay labels which means any additional insurance purchased was with FedEx which means the seller files the claim with FedEx - which they did.

The seller confused the process with the insurance amounts on multiple packages. They also said they insured 4 out of 5 packages so we'd need to know if they filed a claim on one of the insured packages or on the package that was uninsured, whether they provided proof of value and other factors. We don't know if FedEx is looking at this as a multi-package shipment or what's happening here. It's an out of the ordinary situation and there are too many unknown factors involved.

[kalyoth]

Things must have changed since I last used FedEx, I was able to purchase insurance either from FedEx or a 3rd party at that time. So I was seeking clarity. Knowing its only FedEx now, yes as you suggest, we need more info because real carriers have very specific rules.