posted on March 13, 2002 06:05:01 AM new
About two hours before an auction ended last night a guy emailed saying that he wanted to confirm the shipping cost so he could bid higher. He said he took an identical item and packaging to the post office and found the item would cost $3.95 to ship. I weighed the package and confirmed that that is what it would cost but that I insist on insurance on items over $10. He emailed back and said,
"thank you for the quick reply! Did you ever try to collect insurance? I
don't bother with it! you don't need to respond. thank you, JB"
He won the auction. I sent the EOA to him with the insurance added. This morning I get,
Hi! This is me again,xxxxxxxxx.Do you remember the note I
sent 3 hours ago confirming $3.95shipping(no INS.)I can put a check in the
mail tonight. Ship to; xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.
THANK YOU VERY MUCH! Just an old farmer.JB. PS.I started working fields
with a real tractor like that in 1954! We had one SC-CASE and one
DC-CASE!seeya!
I emailed back this morning telling him that I told him I insist on insurance. I never said I would drop the insurance part. Now what? I am listing it for a friend at no charge. This is an old coot though and I am tempted to just pay the insurance out of my own pocket to humor him.
posted on March 13, 2002 06:40:32 AM new
Wait for his reply. If he continues to object, just send without insurance since he doesn't want it. But he might pay up, rendering the issue moot.
BTW, maybe you should raise your mimimum required insurance threshold above $10 purchase price. At $10 the insurance adds 10 per cent to the winning bid. And the hassle of collecting on a $10 claim is hardly worth it.
posted on March 13, 2002 08:06:16 AM new
I would just send the package without insurance as he requested. Seems you may be creating more of a problem that need be.
posted on March 13, 2002 08:12:58 AM new
Why force insurance on someone who does not want it? Especially on an inexpensive item. Just tell him that you will be happy to send it without insurance but will not replace the item should it be lost or damaged in transit. Then it is his problem.
posted on March 13, 2002 08:21:28 AM new
After all of the problems I have had with the post office lately and the good feedback from the folks who give input on these message boards, I had started carrying my own insurance. I sell lower priced items, that rarely go over $20. The longer I do it, and the less content I am with the post office, the happier I am about the decision.
I don't know what your track record is, but if you think about how much you give the post office for insurance and the claims they have paid out... you might be better off just personally insuring it, and if the buyer does not receive the item, just giving them the money from your own insurance fund. It would make it a lot easier for the buyer and a lot easier for you.
Some people do have the DC on their items to assure that the item did in fact get there, or did not arrive... which seems to stop all of the "I did not receive my package" claims.
**** PS for anyone who was following my earlier thread about the post office not wanting to insure a "Piece of Paper". I had asked the post office if the bidding price from an ebay auction would be honored as the value for an insurance claim. I never heard back from the customer service site. When I emailed them back yesterday to inquire about the delay the complaint was so old that it could no longer be updated in their system. Just another example of bad service from the post office - that never seems to end.
I did hear from other people that they have had the post office honor their selling price for an insurance claim.
posted on March 13, 2002 09:12:31 AM new
I would probably not bid on a $10 item if the seller required me to have insurance. I know you are doing this free for a friend, but I won't pay such a high % on an inexpensive item.
I tend to start considering insurance over $30 depending on what I am sending, and rarely insure under $40 these days.
posted on March 13, 2002 09:58:49 AM new
I guess I have always thought by insisting on insurance over $10, I was saving myself a headache somewhere down the line with a buyer saying the item was never sent. Having the insurance slip proves I sent the item. I don't know if a delivery confirmation for items under $25 would serve the same purpose or not. Or can you even get a delivery confirmation without purchasing insurance?
For a follow-up I emailed the fellow and said I never told him he didn't have to purchase insurance. I told him when he preconfirmed the shipping amount that I always insist on insurance. He never told me until this that he wasn't wanting to buy the insurance for religious reasons. Well, here it is in his words:
"Back again! I preconfirm shipping with everyone first. the reason I
preconfirmed shipping with you is because we are Amish/Mennonite culture.I
do not believe in insurance, I believe in Assurance, like the Bible teaches,
not insurance. When our barns are burned down by the evil people that set
them on fire, we build them back up ourselves. WE don't believe it is worth
burning in hell for a million years for something as unchristian as
"insurance". I never had any one insist that I violate my religious beliefs
before. they never even made me explain.Ebay says ins is an option. I never
heard of a religion that insists on insurance,but if yours does,I will be
the first to honor your religion and let you refuse to complete the sale.
now you might understand,I can't collect insuranse anuways. I bet you
think I'm really stupid!!JB PS.Tell me if you want to ship
it to me for $27.00 or not. My check is in the mailbox, but I can take it
back out. thanks (If you put insurance on it anyways, and something happens
to it,I wouldn't have a problem with you collecting the insurance, because
that wouldn't involve me.) Out of 6000 years of people on earth, we fit into
society untill I was about 10 years old, then society changed. Don't blame
us.(this is now making me wonder why I bothered with this old toy, since I'm
soon gonna die anyways!)this is the way we learn. If this really upsets you,
I truely Apologize.JB"
Now I feel like a criminal expecting people to honor my terms of purchasing insurance. I told my friend about this and he is going to take care of the fellow the rest of the way through. Since 9/11 I have a real problem with religious fanatics. We have Amish Mennonites here in Iowa, also, and it seems a real contradiction of values to see them ride a buggy to McDonalds to get a burger or see them in the deli at Hy Vee.
posted on March 13, 2002 10:13:47 AM new
What a nut. Sorry, but I don't think there is a "religous" belief against insurance, it is an interpretation of course by him, and the great thing about religious fanaticism is that you can interpret anything to mean anything. That's why it is irrelevant concerning 9/11 what the Koran actually says (all this debate about whether it says to live in peace or to kill) because if fanatics believe that it says to kill non Muslims, that is what they are going to do. I'm all for freedom of religion AS LONG AS it does not infringe upon MY rights, and some guy saying that insurance is against his religion when I want to send a package insured IS infringing on me. It's against the law here (and in many states) to drive without insurance. I don't believe you can get an exception for religious beliefs. Out of principal I would probably back out of the sale and give the guy a negative.
Anyway, I have mailed perhaps 10,000 packages since 1993, and I have had about 10 go astray. That is a 99.9% Success ratio. The average is perhaps $10 (Many of these are not on ebay) - Two of them were higher value and insured, so I have been liable for about $80 but saved about $10,000 of extra insurance costs. I charge a little more to cover such losses, say 50 cents per package, so I have taken in $5,000, paid out $80, and saved each buyer from taking insurance (unless over $50, then I do require it, though with these numbers I should rethink that perhaps)
Insurance on low priced items is really a waste of money. Charge a little extra for handling, and just pay out if the package is misdirected. You have to wait 30 days to file a domestic claim, and then wait weeks or months to get, so you will have probably paid the customer anyway by that time...
posted on March 13, 2002 10:25:12 AM new
Im not well versed in what the Amish are permitted - Id probably just ship it w/o insurance and move on - But if you feel very strongly about it you can mutually agree to Not complete the deal and ebay refunds your FVF. Luck to you
posted on March 13, 2002 10:58:03 AM new
I agree that requiring insurance on $10 items may not be a good thing. As someone else said, this increases the total price by 10%.
Many buyers are willing to take a chance for
smaller valued items. I purchased a vintage
magazine from an e-bay seller about a year ago.
Their feedback was good and the bid price was low enough that I didn't pay for insurance.
I wrote the seller a nice e-mail saying that I didn't accuse her and realized that packages
do get lost at times. I asked her to please
look for the package if it came back to her.
She responded very nicely and offered me a discount on future auction items.
End of story. I gave her a positive feedback.
When I buy things on ebay it is usually OOP
CDs and OOP novels etc. Insurance is not justified on those cases. I may be disappointed if the item goes lost but it may
not even be worth my time or the seller's trying to collect insurance on a $5 CD from the PO.
If you use Priority Mail a lot, you could always print the free DC labels and ask the
PO worker to stamp your print out. That will
probably give you the proof of mailing you desire.
I wouldn't make the buyer pay for insurance.
He could be correct when he states that
the PO can be hard to collect insurance from anyway.
If you sell a lot of $10 items you could always add $0.20 on to your shipping (which I doubt buyers would complain about).
If you collect $10 per every 50 packages sent, you are covered if one goes lost.
If you only lose 1 out of 100 packages, you've made $10.
Consequently, buying insurance for 50 items at the PO would be $55 (an extra $1.10 fee per package). If one goes lost, the PO may pay up $10 but they will still be left with $45 pure profit.
The Post Office loves it when people buy insurance because they could probably use the money.
Too bad that K-Mart can't sell insurance on items you purchased like the PO does.....
posted on March 13, 2002 11:12:36 AM new
LOL! Last I heard..The Amish dont use electricity so unless he is hooking his laptop upto the sun, he's full of crap. Besides..he claims insurance is against his faith but everything associated with auctions arent? HA!HA!
MEOW
posted on March 13, 2002 04:19:37 PM new
One final thought before I let this thread die. Isn't the check he is sending me a kind of "insurance"? If he trusted in "assurance" I would think he would send cash!! Oh, and can the Amish/Mennonite people play guitars? That sounds irrelevant unless you know the username.
posted on March 14, 2002 12:23:08 AM new
What I do is LIST IN MY TERMS that I require MANDATORY insurance (which I do ) . No one has ever questioned it, and I think that 40 cents + is worth it, considering it helps ensure the item reaches them safely .
The first mistake you made was letting the customer take over the transaction. They can weigh stuff and go to the post office all they want. But YOU tell them the shipping/handling fee -- PERIOD.
posted on March 14, 2002 01:50:10 PM new
Before we all go bashing this guy's religion, it is a belief among certain Amish and Mennonites that buying insurance is an insult to their faith in God. There are Mennonite communities in Tenn. in which they are not required to carry auto insurance, and just put their Bible on the dashboard. I have a problem with that, because of the lack of protection for the other person. But, in this case, it sounds like the truth to me.
After all, it's no more illogical than hundreds of other religious beliefs and practices that anyone could remember with five minutes of thought.
posted on March 14, 2002 02:08:31 PM new
Again, it comes down to how it affects ME - They can live without electricity, I don't really care. They can go through life closing their left eye. Whatever. However, when a buyer starts to dictate MY auction terms because it violates their religious beliefs, then they should have determined this BEFORE the bid. I could have told them no, and they wouldn't have bid.
As far as the bible on the dash board, that is fine for them if they do not want to insure themselves, but what about liability for others if the accident is their fault. There are a bunch of stupid lawmakers in Tennessee if they are not required to carry that type of insurance.
posted on March 14, 2002 02:11:08 PM new
I thought of a better response...
Go through with the sale if he agrees to the following terms: If there is a problem after you ship, tell him it is against YOUR beliefs to deal with a problem caused by someone else (in this case the postal service) and that he is on his own. Or better yet, tell him only after there is a problem, not before.
posted on March 14, 2002 03:41:52 PM new
What gets me still is that I told him before the auction ended that I insist on insurance. His response was that he doesn't bother with insurance and that there was no need for me to reply. I guess I took the reponse he gave me wrong. I figured he didn't like it but would do it. When he emailed me before the auction ended telling me that he had taken an identical item and packaging materials to have it weighed, I got a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. I figured I had a kook on the line. To tell the truth I almost committed auction interference to avoid selling to him. I came close to emailing the high bidder at that point to tell them that I would pay the ship-ping if they wanted to go higher.
