So I made the mistake of letting an international bidder bid on my ebay auction

[eflat]

how common is this? he is making it sound like no big deal -- however it is obviously illegal and i'm not too keen on bending over backwards for this guy after doing him the favor of letting him bid on the auction to begin with.

argh some people.

 

[mzkhadir]

he doesn't want to pay for the custom fees. How much did he buy it for ?.

Or you can tell him that you abide by the laws and you have to ship it the way it should be shipped.

 

[eflat]

Originally posted by: mzkhadir
he doesn't want to pay for the custom fees. How much did he buy it for ?.

Or you can tell him that you abide by the laws and you have to ship it the way it should be shipped.

yeah unfortunately there is not much i can do at this point.

i'm probably best off just giving him a discount and doing it legally so that i don't risk any negative feedback.

shame i was all excited about shipping internationally for a change. it's the future, afterall.

 

[Leper Messiah]

anyone reminded of p-p-p-p-p-powerbook?

 

[opticalmace]

what's the big deal? just mark it as a gift..

 

[Jeff7181]

This is why I don't ship overseas. When international bidders contact me asking if they can buy my item, I tell them if they have a family member or friend in the US with an eBay account and a PayPal account who wants to buy it... that's fine with me, I'll ship it to them, and they can send it along to Germany or Israel or Madagascar or where ever the hell they are.

 

[eflat]

Originally posted by: Jeff7181
This is why I don't ship overseas. When international bidders contact me asking if they can buy my item, I tell them if they have a family member or friend in the US with an eBay account and a PayPal account who wants to buy it... that's fine with me, I'll ship it to them, and they can send it along to Germany or Israel or Madagascar or where ever the hell they are.

Well, there is money to be made shipping overseas.

It was a real eye opener to see how real "globalization" is when I received five requests, from 4 different countries, to ship overseas.

It's a fact that if you ship overseas your items will sell for something like 7% more. Ebay/Paypal figured out the exact number

 

[jagec]

what country is it? Because in a lot of third-world countries, the customs officials aren't exactly honest anyway, so I'd have no qualms about marking it as a gift...

 

[DaWhim]

how much are we dealing with now?

 

[C'DaleRider]

Don't give him a discount and explain that he bid on the item and should expect to pay appropriate customs fees. Of course, you could be a "nice guy" and list the item as a gift this time and with your next listing, include how you will and will not ship to international buyers. What we do when we list for international buyers.

 

[firewall]

That often happens. Personally, if it was me, I would have it marked as a gift before the seller sent it due to absurd customs rates. It is okay if the rates are fair, but when there are incompetent fools who don't know a hard disk from a printer, I draw the line.

Which country is the buyer in and how much does the sale price+shipping cost comes to?

 

[Pepsei]

this happens all the time, you're not breaking any laws in this country. you'd be doing a favor for the other guy.

 

[MrBond]

Originally posted by: CitizenDoug
Well, there is money to be made shipping overseas.

It was a real eye opener to see how real "globalization" is when I received five requests, from 4 different countries, to ship overseas.

It's a fact that if you ship overseas your items will sell for something like 7% more. Ebay/Paypal figured out the exact number

Sure, there's money to be made - but there's also WAY more money to be lost.

You can be paid with stolen paypal funds (which are taken from your account when the real account owner finds out), fake money orders, fake cashier's checks, fake wire transfers. In every case, you're out whatever you sold. In some cases, they pay you more than you sold it to them for, then ask for the balance to be wired back to them - so when you find out the money you got was no good, it's too late and you're out cash + your item.

Just out of curiosity, how much is the item worth that you sold? I wouldn't send anything worth more than $100 overseas to someone I didn't personally know.

 

[Kelemvor]

Just tell him you don't want to endanger yourself so you will follow the laws when shipping your item and he shouldn't have bid if he didn't want to follow the rules.

 

[speg]

What's the item? I see no reason not to mark it as a gift unless you want to give him a hard time.

 

[CalvinHobbs]

i have been buying on ebay from the uk, i'm frm mauritius, the people mark the item as gift when they send it and i pay them with a bankers draft! they send the item once the funds have been cleared, the transaction seems straightforrward to me...why you're so worried about marking it as a gift? si there any rule in the states that prohibits this? and anyway if the item is declared more than a certain value he'll have to pay vat, i got a mob the other day, if value more than 20pounds i gotta pay 15% on the excess amount, the item was declared as a gift and 30pounds, so i paid 15% on the surplus 10pounds. why you don't wanna mark it as a gift? oh and i forgot to mention that i never asked anybody to mark an item as gift...the seller did it himself,

 

[IronWing]

I've had postal workers tell me to mark things as gifts. It saves headaches at both ends.

 

[DeadByDawn]

I ship internationally, but I refuse to mark merchandise as a "gift". The people at my post office know me by name, and shipping international "gifts" across the globe to different people every week would make me a liar. My integrity is worth more than you saving 15%. If you don't like paying customs fees either move or don't bid.

 

[CalvinHobbs]

Originally posted by: DeadByDawn
I ship internationally, but I refuse to mark merchandise as a "gift". The people at my post office know me by name, and shipping international "gifts" across the globe to different people every week would make me a liar. My integrity is worth more than you saving 15%. If you don't like paying customs fees either move or don't bid.

who is saving 15% ?

 

[firewall]

Originally posted by: speg
What's the item? I see no reason not to mark it as a gift unless you want to give him a hard time.

 

[HumblePie]

Hrm.. hard choice.

By truth, there are no outport taxes or custom fee's to ship outside the US for the seller beyond the normal cost to ship. As such, marking something as a "gift" is not illegal in the United states. However, it is a breach of international protocol. It's not the seller that can get in trouble but the buyer for the law.

However, there are odd little suprises for shipping international items out as a gift for people here in the states. Ever try going or holding a security clearance? Yah, it's not going to happen if you keep shipping items overseas as "gifts." LOL. That stuff does get tracked.

Either way, it's up to you. There is no harm to you as a seller. The only harm is to the buyer because they can get caught and fined and have their merchandise confinscated. I doubt you will cause an international scene as this happens alot and your item isn't even worth the attention of diplomatic leaders. Now, if you were sending millions or billions of dollars worth of merchandise across international borders and not letting the proper people get their cut.... oh yah, you are going to be starting a BIG scene.

 

[CalvinHobbs]

Originally posted by: HumblePie
Hrm.. hard choice.

By truth, there are no outport taxes or custom fee's to ship outside the US for the seller beyond the normal cost to ship. As such, marking something as a "gift" is not illegal in the United states. However, it is a breach of international protocol. It's not the seller that can get in trouble but the buyer for the law.

However, there are odd little suprises for shipping international items out as a gift for people here in the states. Ever try going or holding a security clearance? Yah, it's not going to happen if you keep shipping items overseas as "gifts." LOL. That stuff does get tracked.

Either way, it's up to you. There is no harm to you as a seller. The only harm is to the buyer because they can get caught and fined and have their merchandise confinscated. I doubt you will cause an international scene as this happens alot and your item isn't even worth the attention of diplomatic leaders. Now, if you were sending millions or billions of dollars worth of merchandise across international borders and not letting the proper people get their cut.... oh yah, you are going to be starting a BIG scene.

lol...

 

[sixone]

If it's not a gift, don't you have to declare what it is? IIRC - and I might not - certain items are pretty much guaranteed to be stolen, depending on the country it's going to, so the package should be marked as something else.

 

[mercanucaribe]

How does the customs thing work? You write what the item is and its worth on the box and hope no one steals it?

 

[DarkKnight69]

i have problem writing gift on it, it is the buyer who is choosing to risk, not me. And heck, ill save them the 5 bucks if they want me to!