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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

I recently decided to give buyers the option of FedEx Home Delivery in addition to UPS Ground. It's been a nightmare. I've attached an example of the problem.  In the example, you can see the retail price for the package I'm sending is $19.31 (which should have been the amount paid by the buyer). The eBay discount is $3.14, leaving a net cost of $16.17.  eBay charged the buyer $16.02. What makes matters worse is that after deducting eBay's FVF on the shipping portion, I'm left with $14.42 to pay FedEx.

I believe that the buyer should have been charged $19.31. Deducting the eBay FVF of $1.93 would have netted me $17.38, enough to cover the FedEx shipping cost of $16.17. This is the way it works with UPS.

Has anyone else experienced this problem with eBay's handling of FedEx Home Delivery shipping charges?

Message 1 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

Unless I'm mistaken, 15x13x10 would be an oversized box subject to dimensional charges, and I don't think Ebay shows those.  I'm pretty sure Ebay doesn't show the fuel surcharges and residential surcharges, either.  I could be wrong, though. It's been eons since I printed a Fedex label through Ebay.

The easier you are to offend the easier you are to control.


We seem to be getting closer and closer to a situation where nobody is responsible for what they did but we are all responsible for what somebody else did. - Thomas Sowell
Message 2 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

You might be on to something. If eBay is not taking into account FedEx Home Delivery dim weight calculations or residential surcharges, that might be the answer.

On the other hand, eBay (almost) always calculates the UPS Ground dim charges correctly and always charges the residential delivery surcharge. eBay calculates UPS charges correctly about 95% of the time (with the exception of the business delivery discount, which I usually refund to the buyer if it's over $3.00)

Message 3 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

@readybuyer

Please add the origin and dest. zip codes.  Also a screenshot of what you had in the listing for size and weight.

 

I've shipped a couple FedEx recently and not seen an issue.

 

@berserkerplanet Ping!

Member of the Grumpy Old Man crew
Message 4 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

@readybuyer  You should also make sure you don't have the box checked that passes the eBay discount on to the buyer.  It may be checked in error.

 

The only known possible FedEx issue involves charges on oversize items and yours is not oversize.

Member of the Grumpy Old Man crew
Message 5 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

The $19.31 is not the retail cost - it is the the online label cost before eBay discounts. FedEx retail pricing is a whole 'nother thing.

 

Are you set up to pass online FedEx shipping discounts to your buyers in your site settings? If so, then the buyer should have been charged $16.17 If not then the buyer would have been charged FedEx Retail prices which I can't quote you since you omitted the necessary info from you screenshot (I'm not in the mood to try to work backwards fro m the numbers there to try to divine the zone or other numbers)

 

You need to expand the transportation cost by clicking the little triangle next to it when creating the label, and then screen shot it. You can go to the sold item, do a "print another label", make sure the weight and dims are the same, expand the transportation cost, and report those numbers here. Residential and fuel surcharges should be there, along with the base rate. Or providing your zip code and the buyer's zip code would also allow breaking it down and figuring out what went wrong.

 

Are you passing discounts to buyers?

What are the origin and destination zipcodes for that label?

 

And forget about eBay FVF on shipping  - it has nothing to do with this (and why you are deducting the shipping FVF amount from the label cost totally escapes me). And focusing on the "discounts" shown also leads you off the path.

 

Message 6 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

>>Unless I'm mistaken, 15x13x10 would be an oversized box subject to dimensional charges,
>> and I don't think Ebay shows those. I'm pretty sure Ebay doesn't show the fuel surcharges
>> and residential surcharges, either. I could be wrong

So wrong my head hurts from slamming it on the desk. Smiley Sad

The Residential and Fuel surcharges are shown when the transportation cost is expanded (they are rolled into the transportation cost with the base rate), and there are no dimensional surcharges - the base rate is based on greater of the actual weight or the dimensional weight.

Yes, 15x13x10 would have a dimensional weight of 15x13x10/166=12lb which eclipses the actual weight, so the base rate would be calculated based on 12lb. Without the zip codes or zone I'm not going to bother iteratively reverse engineering it to figure out the zone and any surcharges, or if the numbers are right.
Message 7 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery


@berserkerplanet wrote:

Yes, 15x13x10 would have a dimensional weight of 15x13x10/166=12lb which eclipses the actual weight, so the base rate would be calculated based on 12lb. Without the zip codes or zone I'm not going to bother iteratively reverse engineering it to figure out the zone and any surcharges, or if the numbers are right.

cranky we are tonight, yes...  hehehehehe....

Member of the Grumpy Old Man crew
Message 8 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

>>cranky we are tonight, yes...  hehehehehe....

 

There is no try, only do, but I cannot do, and can't be bothered to try. Or to do the Dew....

Message 9 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

Here a screenshot of my Domestic Shipping settings in the listing

Message 10 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

Here is a screenshot from my Site Preferences

Message 11 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

The last three sets of ZIP codes that this occurred on were:

 

77406 to 85365

77406 to 07470

77406 to 14127

 

All were charged $16.02. As I mentioned in my original post, this behavior doesn't occur when the buyer chooses UPS Ground

Message 12 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

Here is a screenshot of the expanded transportation costs

Message 13 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

Your site settings show you are NOT passing discounts to buyers, so they should be getting charged FedEx (and UPS and USPS) retail counter rates.

 

Your last screenshot shows that the residential surcharge is being added to the list rate based online label charge as expected, so that isn't an issue (not that I expected it to be), and for FedEx, residential surcharge isn't an issue for retail rates anyway - it is already rolled into the higher counter rates along with the Fuel surcharge (effectively, FedEx counter/retail rates are a fixed price Home Delivery price - delivery to a commercial address isn't any less)

 

Looking the base rate of $14.62 up in the FedEx Service Guide list rates table shows that that amount is for 12 pounds (the eBay online dimensional weight based on using a 166 DW divisor) to zone 6.

 

According to the USPS online tool,

  77406 to 85365 is zone 5

  77406 to 07470 is zone 6

  77406 to 14127   is zone 6

but this is a rare borderline case where there is a subtle difference between USPS zones and FedEx zones, and it turns out that the FedEx zone charts show that 77406 to 85365 is also zone 6.

 

(note to all: keep this in mind when blindly using USPS zone charts for FedEx calculations as I do - it works 99% of the time, but there can be differences. You can obtain the FedEx zone charts via ftp from the FedEx site: ftp.fedex.com/pub/us/rates/downloads/documents2/95600-95899.pdf etc are there in that directory in pdf, txt, or csv formats. They are old from 2015 but what the current online FedEx tools point to)

 

 

So, the base rate we see in that label details does correspond to a zone 6 shipment and reality. The $16.17 amount shown on the label flow screenshots is the correct eBay discounted online amount for that package (ships at 12lb eBay dim weight) to zone 6.

 

 

 

Let's look at the $16.02 the buyer paid. It should have been $26.41 (looked up using the eBay estimating calculator http://www.ebay.com/shp/Calculator in "in-store rates" mode)

 

$26.41 is the FedEx Retail amount for a 15lb package to zone 6.  (15 pounds because retail rates are not calculated based on the nicer eBay 166 online rate divisor, but instead use the standard FedEx 139 dim weight divisor: 15x13x10/139 = 14.03 = 15lb

 

We cross check that amount in the 2018 FedEx Counter Rate tables, and it matches. $26.41 IS the correct charge to the buyer for a 15x13x10 package to zone 6 when you are NOT passing your online discounts on.

 

The buyer was charged $16.02, which is the online discounted rate (the 15¢ difference is a typical discrepancy between the label calc and the estimating/listing/checkout calc -and I don't know why. Always a few cents diff and usually in buyers favor)

 

 

I couldn't find the 3 sold and shipped you mentioned (were they on the ID you are posting with here?), and can't tell much from your active listings but I did see one: The Dept 56 Halloween thing that appears to be 4 lb from your description and the shipping rates I see, and probably not too huge (dim weight not a significant factor?).

 

The USPS Priority Mail Price is correctly being shown as retail, the UPS price is also correctly retail, and it looks like the FedEx rate shown is also the correct retail rate.

 

Without seeing the actual listing (or the listing shipping and payment tab shipping rates) for either one of the sold ones that was wrong, or a current listing that is affected, I can't be sure, but I think an old bug has resurfaced or was never fixed.

 

There were issues a while back where something similar to this was happening. The site setting for "pass shipping discounts to buyers" was being ignored for some listings with FedEx shipping for some sellers (I think it may have been more widespread, but most sellers were oblivious and/or didn't report it here in the forums), but in the opposite way.

 

There were instances where the site setting set to pass discounts to buyers was being ignored in some cases, and buyers were charged the higher retail rates (and were furious because they had been shown the correct lower discounted shipping amounts in search and the listings). There were also happenings where the setting was ignored, and was showing the incorrect higher retail rate in search and the listings (which can scare buyers off before they even click into the listing to look). Unknown if that bug was actually charging the higher retail rate at checkout.

 

Your issue is the opposite (sort of), and I can't recall if it also happened (forum search sucks, and I just don't recall all the permutations of bugs for the various FedEx Services over time).

 

In your case, you want to show buyers the higher retail rate in search and the listings, and charge them that higher retail rate, but what seems to be happening is that the listings appear* to be showing the correct retail rate, but the discounted rate is being charged at checkout.

 

*again, I can't tell what exactly is going on because I can't see the original listings with the problem or find any current live listings where I can see a pattern.

 

 

Either post an item number for one (or more) of the 3 where the buyer was undercharged (or PM it to me), and/or see if one of your active listings seems like a candidate to fail the same way. That way we can see if it is only at checkout that the site setting is being ignored, or if it is also in search and the listing shipping amounts shown to buyers.

 

That info will help to define the problem, and reveal a path for testing. If it is only at checkout, I can't test because nothing of mine is selling, odds of the one or two FedEx shipping items I have selling is low, and I pass discounts to buyers anyway, If also search and/or listing shipping amounts are affected, than I and others can play with it to see.

 

As far as fixes? Once the problem is defined we can notify eBay and they can proceed to not fix it.

 

It may be similar to a previous (Smartpost bug) where the glitch is "stuck" in your listings  and has to be
"exorcised" by toggling the site setting, revising the listings (any revision to shipping like adding a handling fee just to change something), toggling the setting back, revising again,etc to purge the demons, or as in my case, ending the listings and starting over from scratch (I only had two affected in that similar but different bug a while back).

 

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Technical-Issues/Search-results-show-inaccurate-amp-HIGH-calculated-sh...

 

 

Message 14 of 26
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eBay Undercharging Buyers for FedEx Home Delivery

Addendum:

This thread involves what may be a similar issue with USPS shipping rates that may also involve weirdness/glitching with the carrier discounts site setting.

Also pay attention to Trinton's post #6 there where he recommends a bulk revise to force listings to respect site settings change - not exactly your issue (you issue isn't a change to the site setting that isn't being respected but just a general ignoring of the setting for FedEx Ground), but close enough to suspect it may be related and similar to dcintennessee's procedure for fixing the other problem in the thread I referenced in previous post

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Technical-Issues/Calculated-Shipping-Errors/td-p/28953299
Message 15 of 26
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