My turn to whine about an AH - Saco River
 

I won a $90 card (I know, big spender) in last week's Saco River Auction. I received an email invoice indicating a $20 shipping fee exactly one week ago. I promptly replied to the email requesting an adjusted shipping charge. I've since received 3 more email invoices from them, each with the same $20 shipping charge and no communication/correspondence. I've replied to each of those as well, with no reply other than another copy of the invoice. I also PM'd the Saco River Auction member here, but no reply from him either.

Anyone have a similar experience? Was there fine print I agreed to when bidding that I'd pay 20% shipping fee? I guess the next step is to call, but its a PITA for me (no celly, no long distance home phone, long distance calls are tracked at work). I guess they'll call me (or email) if they ever want me to pay. :)

Here are shipping charges I've been charged by other auction houses the past year or so:
I won a $50 card from JVSC, was charged $3 shipping.
Heritage $500+, $12.60 shipping/handling.
Goodwin $1k+, $22.25 shipping
BST $1k+, $10 shipping
Sterling $250+, $8 shipping
LOTG $500+, $7.20 shipping
B&L $500+, $8 shipping
Baggers $100+, $4 shipping

Ironically, Saco River is likely the closest to me (I'm in Connecticut).

Ok, thanks for listening. Now I feel like part of the gang!
Rob
:)
p.s. my name is Rob Gordy and I approve my whining

That's a ridiculous shipping charge. I will never bid in Saco, ever again (unless they have something I really need or even don't need), in fact I will never visit or drive thru the State of Maine again, and in fact I'll never go near a river or any body of water, for that matter, ever again...:rolleyes:

In all seriousness, that is an excessive shipping charge and should be adjusted. Good Luck! (If you get this resolved keep me posted, because I like Lobster).

I think we have all learned a valuable lesson here, and that is that you and my dad are the only two people left on earth who don't own a cellphone.

In March 2014 I questioned a $15 shipping charge on a $30 lot of 5 raw cards. I thought that was ridiculous. Here is an excerpt from the explanation I received:

I employ a full-time shipper who makes $15 per hour. If you figure it may take him 20 minutes to process and pack your order, I'm into it for $5 before I even purchase postage, insurance or pay for the bubble wrap and the box. I purchase roughly $1000 every two weeks in bubble wrap, peanuts, boxes and tape. The cost of shipping is enormous, however we like giving customers the option and the convenience of having the shipping done in house, rather than using a packing company who gets ridiculous rates for their service.

edit:

My mistake. The lot was 2 PSA graded cards and 2 raw cards

Does look like a candidate for adjusted shipping. Good luck.

MLB Auctions - $70 lineup card, shipping from NYC to Canadian address - charged $50 USD! Criminal!

Isn't overhead what some of the "BUYER'S PREMIUM" is supposed to take care of? And if a person is making $15 an hour, I'd expect way more than three boxes packed per hour. That seems like a small throughput. You didn't mention the auction house in your post; was it the same one in the top of the thread?

I don't have a cellphone, and never did. Make that three.:)

I don't own one either. I don't know if we're right or the rest of the world is.

They said that about the indoor toilet when it came around. ;)

$1000 every 2 weeks? Who is that auction house? That's a LOT of shipping supplies.

sadly...shipping has become an income generator for many businesses these days.

Only for bad businesses.

That's why REA is great.....no charge for shipping, unless you are buying a large item like a stadium seat.

Me five!

I just received a package from an AH which charged me $20 for shipping for a package that was worth $375 and weighed 7 ounces. If you sent that Priority mail plus insurance, it would have cost less than $8.00.

It's no use to complain about these outrageous fees. They will still charge you whatever they want.

Currently, I bid in over a dozen Auction Houses. I would say less than half of them are fair with their S/H costs. Moving forward, I have decided just not to bid in any of the AH's which have overcharged me.

If you are not happy with their S/H costs, just find another AH. Eventually, they will get the hint.

This auction house shall remain nameless, but if you think you got it bad take a look at this BS:

Sub-Total: $30.00
Buyers Premium: $5.70
Shipping: $13.91
Insurance: $3.00
Amount Paid: $0.00
Total: $52.61


Charged me nearly 50% of my winning bid for shipping. I will never bid with them again, large or small.

My biggest complaint is that most don't disclose the estimated shipping costs. Nothing worse then winning a lot and then getting the final bill with outrageous shipping and insurance fees.

Jeff

Same thing just happened to me a few weeks ago. It is outrageous.

Jeff

I was charged $55 by an auction house to ship a single photo worth $400. Needless to say I bitched and ended up paying $20. Still high but.....$55?

Tom C

I agree that AH's should disclose up front what the S/H fees are. Then we can decide whether it's worth bidding at their site. If they post the fees upfront, then we have no right to complain.

There are more than enough AH's out there now. We can pick and choose who treat us fairly.

The Effective Buyer's Premium was created to quantify these whines.

Wouldn't it be nice if the AH used such a method before the auction closed?

http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=188256

How long does it take your grandkids to print all of these Net54 posts to put on your wall? :D

http://image.cdn.ispot.tv/ad/7T0N/es...ce-large-3.jpg

Frank,

I love the EBP formula. AH's should be using this.

So, instead of the already too high 20% BP that we now see, they would be stating a EBP of 25% - 30% or much higher.

One day when I have some spare time, I am going to calculate the EBP's that I have paid over the past year. Luckily, I have copies of every receipt.

The REA free shipping sounds great at first, except since they initiated the free shipping, they have also raised their buyers premium by over 2%. 2% of a $1000 is $20.

I have also never understood why the auction houses can't provide an estimated shipping for each lot, at least for shipping in the US. They have your address when registering, they usually have a good estimate of value, and they know how much the lot weighs. If you win more than one lot, the shipping simply cannot be more the sum of shipping each lot individually.

DJ

I'm new to the whole AH thing - never used one. Is there a reason the shipping prices aren't disclosed up front?

Sacco River March 19, 2014

Item Total: USD 30.00
Buyer's Premium: USD 6.30
Sub Total: USD 36.30
Sales Tax: USD 0.00
Shipping: USD 15.00

Total: USD 51.30
Balance Due: USD 51.30

sent them a check for $36.30 with a postage paid padded envelope addressed to me. They chose to use their own box/postage.

DJ, It doesn't matter what the Buyers Premium is, I just bid accordingly.
If a lot is worth $1000 to me & there's no BP like eBay, I can bid the full $1000
If the juice is 10%, I bid up to $900 and I adjust my bid to the Buyers premium.
I still pay what I can afford, its the consignors that may get the short end of the stick.

I grew up without cell phones, we used pay phone in phone booths, that worked for me and the world. I call this cell phone issue the one of the biggest scams in the world. A trick on society. I do have a cell phone now, not many incoming or outgoing calls.. On a side note I had a trac phone which I call my Tiger Woods phone, he should have had this phone, throw away.:D

If this was a card it was too much. If it was a stadium seat, not so much.

My mom was shopping online and said "Free shipping!" I informed her than nothing was free. $20 + $5 shipping and $25 with free shipping is the same price.

I remember when I sold an item for $220 shipped and the buyer asked how much of that was for shipping. I said "It's $218 with $2 for shipping or $2 with $218 for shipping. Take a pick, it doesn't matter to me." I can promise you my mom would have picked the former to save on shipping cost.

i took part in Saco's Portland Pt.2
won item 125.00, BP was 26.25, and S/H was 15.00
also P.S. no cell phone ever here.

This was a single card. The auction house is a complete turd and I will never bid with them again. Auction houses should take note of this thread. Even though this time I only spent $30, I would spend any amount of money for something I want. That is of course unless your business is selling it.

I understand your sentiment. I only mentioned what I did because I have shipped low cost, but very bulky, items that were expensive to ship. Even though an invoice might be $100, if it is 30 periodicals plus an over-sized but cheap sign , you will have shipping be 30% of the invoice....

We have all been way over charged on shipping at some point. Either call the auction and get them to amend it or do as you do, and don't bid with them. Personally, I have never been so upset about shipping costs I have said I will never bid with an AH again. But that is me and I have a fairly high tolerance for that kind of pain and just deal with it. To each their own.

ps..I should add that I HAVE called AH's many times and have always gotten what I wanted in fair shipping amendments. Though a few times I didn't bother and just ate it and moved on....

The way I look at it is you're gouging me for as much as you can on a $30 purchase. That's poor business practices and a real turn off.

I had a similar experience with their last auction.

Won a card for $80, with the 21% premium it came to $96.80 and then they charged me an additional $15 for shipping for a grand total of $111.80.

I emailed them about the $15 shipping charge and they basically sent me an email saying "We provide shipping as a service to our customers"...well thanks. I also wasn't too happy that the card I received had a large crease on it that didn't show up in the pictured scan nor was it ever mentioned in the description. Oh well...kudos for an impressive EPDG find.

A few days ago I won a few cards at JVSC for $135.50, shipping was FREE (sent them a check). Without sending a check the shipping would have only been $5. God Bless Joe's.

Non-cel phone owner here!

I just won two baseballs from another auction house, $70 hammer price. Shipping was $25. After complaining, they called me back with $22.50. I don't plan on bidding with them again.

Never mind I realized that they could use the old "handling" excuse for the cost.

And Joe's Buyers Premium is zero %
You win a card for $50 & pay by check, your cost is $50 dlvd
Joe & Tim are the best!

UPDATE!!!!!

Troy from Saco River emailed me this morning. He apologized for the mistake while he was out of state. He picked up the shipping.

Thanks Troy!
Rob
:)

My turn to rant
 

Same experience for me too. I won one card for $125 and got jobbed with the $20 shipping/handling fee (on top of the 21% "internet premium").

For $20, I would have expected priority shipping in a sturdy box package. Instead, it comes in a bubble mailer that the FedEx guy leaves on my front porch.

If I knew that the S/H was going to be that exorbitant, I would not have bid on any of their lots. Rest assured, I will never participate in one of their auctions again.

Tom $@ndl!n

Sorry to hijack the thread, but I have to give kudos to Leon. In the last B&L auction the shipping cost them more than I was asked to pay. B&L is the best. Thanks Leon.

Jeff

That's awesome. I'd vote this as "most effective response" to high shipping charges.

Steve

nevermind

Mike, well said!

Charter has the same policy. Call and they give you the current "new" customer promotion. I've been doing this for years.;)

I do this with DirectTv too. They even told me if you call every 6 months we will give you a discount for asking...but you have to call, it's not automatic. So I call....

The squeaky wheel gets the grease...All the other wheels that diligently work without squeaking get no grease...:(...

OMG!!
I had Direct TV and all i got with them is %^&*.
I was nearly paying 100 buck for 200 channels, and no extra sports or anything, riduclous!! and dont get me going on their services.
I had a established pole, with piping underground. They say they couldnt attach to it and install a new one next to it. For god sakes! they had no problem using that pole for the last 6 yrs. Their claim is that the company split into 2 parts. But i made damn sure they dug the old pole up and haul it off. To make it more frustrating is they did not dig the wires deep enough thru the mulch ant etc. (thats why i had a buried pipe on the old one) to prevent the edger or tiller tearing the cord up. Now i have 3 receivers and 6 remotes controls (count them- 6!!!) and i tried to give the others back to them. They say no! to keep them. Now i am waiting to receive the prepaid boxes so i can send their $%^& back to them! And while on the phone, the polite person kept trying to give discounts and offeres, which i dont care about any HBO crap, most of the time its $%^ i already seen. I just wanted to lower my bill back down to what was around 70 or so buck when i started.
Basically told her, it was too late!!!
Last week i dropped them for AT&T u-verse as a bundle deal, as i already had phone & internet with them. I am not 100% keen with either, as their tech's did not dig the line deep enough, basically 1-2 inches in the ground, and did not dig the old line up. Previously, my neighbor had new service, and the techs were unaware of our house in the back, and decided to cut our service and the tech tried to cover his ass by burying the line, so the new tech cant find it- Arrgh!
I am unable to have xfinity for some reason, as my utilities are under-ground.
To make a long story short, you got to be bitchy! or keep switching every 2 yrs.

We did the same with Dish Network. Told them we were going to Direct TV and they dropped their bill for us from nearly $100 per month to $34.95 per month AND they added about 50 channels.

Good to see that integrity ranks near the top for them [emoji57]