Auctioncope Auction Blog

You might want to print those USPS labels this evening as rates will be increasing in the next few hours.  My estimation is around 12am EST or 9pm Pacific.  I have a detailed rundown of what’s changing available at USPS Prices Going Up, Staying the Same, Going Down in 2010.  The biggest change is that the cost to ship one pound or less Priority Mail is based on how many zones the package is traveling.  Previously, one pound or less Priority Mail was the same price no matter where it was shipped.  This makes the Flat Rate Envelope and Small Box my package of choice for 2010 for anything that will remotely fit inside of it, as the cost is the same no matter where it is traveling.  Otherwise it’s a fairly standard rate increase from USPS.  No major announcements or changes in service.

Hello and sorry I have not been with you for some time.  I know you are all madly refreshing the website for new updates and my family and I appreciate all of the emails,  phone calls, and letters we have received concerning my well-being.  Actually, I haven’t received any such correspondence, but I am sure at least one of you was thinking about shooting me a quick email and I appreciate your sentiment.  To ring in this arbitrary change of year to “Two Thousand And Ten,” I have updated the look of the website temporarily until I can find a theme as awesome as the content.  I have my doubts about whether that will be possible, but I have been assured by the “Wordpress Community” that I will find a theme at least 75% as awesome.

Hopefully the (C)Han(n)uk(k)a(h) holiday brought the usual increase in sales that only the Maccabees and dreidels can provide and you are celebrating in grand style by purchasing me a bottle of midshelf liquor as a gift.  It’s tax deductible if you tack on an extra 20 bucks to your next Salvation Army donation. My overall revenue was down slightly in December, but I ended up with higher profits (don’t tell the IRS) as far as I can tell.  My calculations may be somewhat optimistic as I try to justify purchasing another 55″ LED TV for my upstairs bathroom.  It’s just impossible to tell when there will be fourteen programs on I want to watch at the same time.

On occasion someone I know will bring up this website in “real life” conversation and the comments are usually the same.  “Really awesome site bro, but most of it is just too technical.”  I try to explain that I’ve dumbed things down so much that any moron should be able to grasp the ideas, but it seems as though my attempts at dumbness are for naught.  Luckily I have been preparing content for the new year that I am sure will be just as mind-numbing as the last.  Unfortunately, arbitrary date changes have limited impact on one’s auction blogging skills.  Maybe the smash sequel to last year’s “2012″ will be “2010 – Josh’s Auction Website Gets Slightly More Popular.”  Don’t hold your breath.

“Twenty Ten” promises to bring more changes to eBay.  Personally, I am excited that the last remnants of “eBay Live” will supposedly be hobbling into Seattle.  I plan to have you all over for a “pre-funk” before we roll out in yellow school buses to the grand spectacle which I imagine will take place at a retirement center just outside of town.  There’s always a lot of hubaloo (my word, not theirs) surrounding what eBay will do to screw us all over in the new year, as if there’s some kind of eBay death panel set up by the liberals in Washington.  I’ve heard Meg is running for governor so I guess anything is possible.  Personally, I’ll just wait it out.

Should have a few articles dropping in the coming days.  Nothing worth a movie deal I don’t think, but I’m sure at least one will be the next Watergate.  Will catch you on the flipside, Josh

Took the day off today.  Not by choice, mind you, but because eBay was broken and I don’t have anything to do other than tell people in Cyprus I really don’t ship via $1 horse and carriage.  In this case, I don’t mean broken like not conforming to what I want as I have in the past.  I mean broken like a dozen armless UPS employees decided to play “Super Bowl” with your Xbox 360 packaged in nothing but newspaper and prayer.  Normally I reserve Saturdays for playing with my IP address, buying stuff from my competitors, asking them how much shipping is to Cyprus via horse and carriage, and then leaving negative feedback.  I couldn’t even do that today though because every search I tried resulted in either zero matches or a message stating the “function” I requested was temporarily down.  At first I thought maybe all those listings I reported for bogus reasons had actually been taken down, but when a search for “expired pretzels” didn’t result in any hits I knew something was wrong.  I did what I always do when I think there’s a problem and called my mother.  She confirmed that her search for “Beanie Baby” resulted in an error and we agreed that it was unlikely no one was selling Beanies this week.  I followed up by doing what I always do and went to the internet to try to find doomsdaymongerers complaining about similar problems.

The best part of being a faceless eBay whiner with a clever URL is that there are so many people just like me.  Feels like I’m part of a real life family because we all love to complain about the same things so much we’re basically friends, if not lovers.  Today the internet was truly ablaze with hate because eBay’s own search function was not functioning properly, among various other things.

Most people found it impossible to search for items using eBay’s search on November 20^th, starting around 11am in the morning.  No matter what the user searched for, they would be greeted with either an error or zero search results.  This made it impossible for buyers to purchase or bid on items they weren’t previously watching or found via a method other than eBay’s search, like Google or via magic.  EBay made an announcement acknowledging the problems at 1:37pm on the System Announcements Board stating:

Due to errors in some of our backend systems, members may be seeing different errors in Search. This could be that “We were unable to run the search results you entered. Please try again in a few minutes” or a blank page, or simply the browser being unable to display the page.

This is also affecting the ability to access eBay Stores through search directly, and sometimes from the store URL.

Please note that we are working as quickly as possible to get this resolved. Thank you for your patience as we continue to work to resolve this.

The problems continued throughout most of the day.  Users have been reporting all kinds of issues including an inability to bid on items they could actually find and an inability to send or pay invoices.  Finally, around 11pm, eBay announced that they had found the problem and were working diligently to fix it.  Everything should be back to “normal” on Sunday the 21st, whatever that means.

Supposedly eBay is going to issue some kind of refund, but it is unclear exactly what that compensation will look like.  In reality, whatever eBay is willing to refund, be it insertion and final value fees or even some kind of “above and beyond expectations” package, will pale in comparison to the losses suffered by lower auction prices.  If you were selling an item you expected would sell for around $200 and it ended up selling for the $19.24 price it was at the day before because no one could find or bid on it then no fee refund could possibly make up for that loss.  Any eBay seller knows that the auction price can double, triple, or go up even more in the last 30 seconds of an auction.  This gaffe, probably the most serious I’ve ever seen, has no doubt caused some sellers serious money.  Granted, Saturday is not a popular day to end auctions, but that certainly doesn’t mean there are no items ending.  Once eBay realized the magnitude of the problem they should have extended the end time of the affected auctions until the next day.  Unfortunately, eBay chose not to act and millions of dollars were lost worldwide.

It must be November.  The weather deteriorates.  I wake up in the dark and go to bed in the dark even during months I remember to pay the electric bill.  Whole Foods tries to convince me their $34.99 a pound turkey will bring a smile to my children’s face the way a 39 cent turkey simply wouldn’t.  I have to upgrade (sad, but true) to Ezra Brooks because 80 proof doesn’t warm in the winter months the same way it does in the summer.  The United States Postal Service ruins my life.  Just another November.

On November 4 the Post Office announced pricing changes that will go into effect January 4th for Priority Mail, Express Mail, Global Express Guaranteed, Express Mail International, Priority Mail International, Parcel Select and Parcel Return Service.  Pricing changes for Media Mail and additional services such as Delivery Confirmation and Signature Confirmation are announced at a later date and will remain the same for at least the first half of 2010.

Just the Facts, Jack

What’s Going Down

The price of a Priority Mail Flat-Rate Envelope will decrease a nickel to $4.90 from $4.95 when purchased at the Post Office and decrease to $4.75 from $4.80 when purchased online.

The price to ship one pound Priority Mail locally (defined as only one or two zones away) is also decreasing a nickel from $4.95 to $4.90.

What’s Staying the Same

The price of domestic and international First-Class Mail, Standard Mail, and Parcel Post will remain the same in 2010.  This means a First-Class stamp will still cost 44 cents and a 19 pound Parcel Post package will still cost $24.64.

Customers who pay for shipping online through Click-N-Ship, PayPal, etc. will continue to receive a discounted rate when compared with the price paid at the Post Office or equivalent retail location.

The price of the recently introduced Small Flat-Rate Box will remain $4.95 when paid for at the Post Office.  When postage is purchased online the cost of the Small Flat-Rate Box goes up a nickel to $4.85.

No earth-shattering changes announced.  No mention of charging for shipping supplies, delivering only on days that start with the letter “T,” or a completely new class of mail.

What’s Going Up

Priority Mail

According to the press release, Priority Mail rates are going up 3.3% on average which is about the standard yearly increase.  Domestic Express, International Express and Priority, and Parcel Select and Return Service are also going up across the board.

The most glaring pricing change for those of us who sell on eBay is how USPS is treating Priority Mail that weighs one pound or less and is shipped in variable rate packaging (either your own packaging or branded Priority Mail packaging that is not Flat-Rate).  As you may be aware, the current price to ship a package weighing one pound or less is the same no matter where it is shipped.  The price of variable weight Priority Mail that weighs more than one pound is based on both the weight and how far the package will be traveling. For example, today I can send a one pound package from Seattle to Portland Priority Mail for $4.95.  I can send that same one pound package Priority Mail to Boston for the same price, $4.95.  Come January 4, 2010, I can ship a one pound package Priority Mail to Portland and it will cost $4.90.  If I ship that same package Priority Mail to Boston it will cost $5.55, an increase of 60 cents or a whopping 12.12% over 2009 prices.

Although the average price increase on Priority Mail is advertised at 3.3%, the price increase on lower weights is much, much higher.  For example, a two pound Priority Mail variable weight package from Seattle to Boston currently costs $8.70.  That’s going up to $9.55 in 2010, an increase of 85 cents or 9.77%.  A three pound package goes up from $11.95 to $12.70, an increase of 75 cents or 6.3%.  A four pound packages goes up from $14.70 to $15.30, an increase of 60 cents or 4.08%.  Finally, a 70 pound variable weight Priority Mail package goes up from $108.25 to $111.50, an increase of $3.25 or 3% even.  As you can see, the price increase on lower weights is much higher than on heavier weights by percentage.

The price of Flat-Rate Boxes is also going up.  Medium Flat-Rate Boxes go up from $10.35 to $10.70, an increase of 35 cents or 3.38% when purchased at a retail location and from $9.85 to $10.20 when purchased online, also an increase of 35 cents or 3.55%.  Large Flat-Rate Boxes go up from $13.95 to $14.50, an increase of 50 cents or 3.44%.

Express Mail

The price of the Express Mail Flat-Rate Envelope is going up from $17.50 to $18.30 at retail and from $16.63 to $17.40 when purchased online.  Both represent about a 4.5% increase.

Express Mail variable rate prices look to go up about 4.5% across the board as well.

International Mail

Priority Mail International Flat-Rate Envelopes are going up 50 cents to $11.45 for Canada and Mexico and 50 cents to $13.45 everywhere else.  The price is identical to the new cost of the Small Flat-Rate Box.  Medium Flat Rate Boxes are going up $1 to $26.95 for Canada and Mexico and $1.50 to $43.45 to all other countries.  The Large Flat-Rate Box is also going up $1 to $33.95 for Canada and Mexico and $2 to $55.95 everywhere else.  The maximum weight remains four pounds for Flat-Rate Envelopes and Small Boxes and twenty pounds for Medium and Large Flat-Rate Boxes.

Priority Mail International prices are also going up 2-6% for variable weight packaging.

Express Mail International Flat Rate Envelopes are going up $1 to $26.95 for Canada and Mexico and $1 to $28.95 everywhere else.

Express Mail International in variable weight packaging is also going up 3-4%.

“Innovations”

The USPS news release mentions “several innovations” that we can look forward to in 2010.  These include further discounts for those who qualify for “Commercial Plus Pricing” and also ship in whatever USPS defines to be environmentally friendly packaging.  To qualify for Commercial Plus Pricing one must ship 6,000 pieces Express Mail yearly or 100,000 Priority Mail pieces yearly.  Also available to Commercial Plus shippers will be a new 9.5 x 12.5 Priority Mail Flat-Rate padded envelope.

Commentary

Disappointment

I was going to turn this into one of my usual comedyfests, but decided since it’s a serious topic about all the money you’ll be losing in 2010 I would stick to the nuts and bolts.  Not sure you got through it, but if you did congrats.  I hope you learned something and are in a better position to prepare yourself for the changes coming.

I was “really” hoping that Priority Mail International Flat-Rate Envelopes would be scanned at the time of delivery and PayPal would treat these packages the same way they treat domestic packages with Delivery Confirmation (i.e. grant a claim in the seller’s favor for “items not received” when the Delivery Confirmation shows it was delivered).  This has been my dream for several years now and what I wish for every year my Mother remembers to bake me a birthday cake with candles to blow out.  The cost of trackable international shipping is ridiculous.  Thirty dollars for an International Flat-Rate Express Envelope?  Twenty dollars as an absolute minimum to ship a package with tracking abroad?  Customers scoff at paying $20+ for shipping on a package that’s anything less than a 25 pound solid gold bar. Shipping with tracking is the only way to protect ourselves as sellers accepting PayPal, so shipping without tracking simply isn’t worth the risk.  I know my sales would skyrocket if I could offer $10 Priority International shipping, but I also know my bottom line would suffer at the losses from fraudulent PayPal claims and the dreaded “lost package.”

The price increase on Priority Mail variable weight packages is rough.  Shipping a one pound package Priority Mail has always cost the same amount no matter where it’s shipped. The 12%+ increase in 2010 will take a noticeable cut out of my profits.  I will be utilizing Flat-Rate Envelopes even more to stuff in whatever I can.  I know in the past I’ve gotten some funny looks from Postal employees who balk at my “creation,” but the envelopes usually get to their destination more or less.  I know my customers are happier to receive a nice, well-packaged box, but if it means saving a McDonalds Small Fry I know how I’ll be packaging January 5^th.

This year’s “innovations” are a joke.  There aren’t even 50 sellers on eBay who ship 100,000 Priority Mail packages yearly to qualify for Commercial Plus.  The cubic volume-based pricing discount for whatever “space-efficient packaging” is would be welcome I’m sure, but I doubt whatever the discount is would cancel out the money companies save by only using one standard box for shipping everything from a camera battery to a mattress.  Let’s be real here.  The number one reason why USPS loses nearly a billion dollars a month is because companies are sending less dump-clogging catalogs.  No one at USPS was looking to slow down that fluff when the dollars were pouring in. Plus, how is USPS going to identify who’s packaging efficiently? Will they take Amazon’s word that the box is full of precious merchandise rather than plastic bags full of air? Most of us will never know unless we decide to start shipping 100,000 individual Lego pieces around the country just for fun.

I was hoping USPS would offer tracking similar to Express Mail or the more advanced tracking UPS and FedEx offer on Priority Mail.  If USPS could offer advanced tracking for a dollar or two per package many customers would likely be interested. It might also be enough to land them accounts with some of the larger corporations that tend to go with UPS or FedEx.  From personal experience I know that tracking a package is more fun than actually receiving whatever it is I purchased in a moment of weakness half the time.  I have a dozen damaged pears I bought from Harry and David coming on Tuesday that I’ve tracked online at least a dozen times.  I’m sure the pears will be good, but I doubt they’ll bring me as much joy as when I saw them finally leave Hodgkins, IL online at UPS.com.

Could Be Worse

We’re smart enough to know price increases are coming.  The price increase on Priority Mail variable weight will definitely be an issue for many in 2010 and will dramatically change how I package many of my items.  There was no mention of charging for shipping supplies or basic carrier pickup which were two of my fears.  There was also no mention of closing every single Post Office in Washington State which gives me hope for the future.  I actually expected USPS to do away with Flat-Rate Envelopes.  Some of the items I’ve crammed into one of those things have been ten times or more the original size of the envelope. I know many people “abuse” their originally intended purpose which was a sturdy way to ship documents.  Instead, USPS is giving us even more incentive to cram because it will now be cheaper to use a Flat-Rate Envelope than ship Priority Mail any other way.

Overall I am not crestfallen by any of the announcements, but time will tell how they play out.

Feel free to check out some of the literature USPS has provided us about the pricing changes:

See the USPS Press Release
See the Full List of 2009 Prices
See the Full List of 2010 Prices

Until next time, good luck and try not to get suspended.

I have been a staunch advocate for the United States Postal Service ever since I was born in 1985.  My parents lament every Chanukah that my first sentence wasn’t “I love you, Mom and Dad,” but, “If it fits, it ships.”  In my opinion, the mail system can give the Great Wall of China, the Grand Canyon, or Dippin’ Dots a run for their money as the eighth Wonder of the World.  On what other planet can I put a four pound pair of shoes in a box, print out a label online with the weight mismarked as one pound so I pay less than $5, throw the box outside, tell the postman (or woman) vaguely where to find it, and have it delivered two days later to pretty much anywhere in the United States?  Not more than three I bet.  Plus, USPS loses like 10 billion dollars a year so I know I’m getting a great deal.

Unfortunatley, October has been a particularly tumultuous month for the Postal Service as they wrestle with whose lives will be ruined and whose lives will just be slightly inconvenienced by the closure of various Post Office stations and branches around the country (Please keep Factoria Mall open, thanks).  For those of us who don’t necessarily care who gets fired, the Great October USPS Track and Confirm Debacle (copyright pending) has been an even bigger inconvenience.

As first reported here on October 8th , domestic USPS Priority Mail labels printed at USPS.com were returning the incorrect Delivery Confirmation number on every single label for every single customer for three weeks (hi sonic).  On top of that, USPS.com was down in its entirety for half of Sunday October 18^th and USPS Track and Confirm was down intermittently for more than 48 hours between October 18^th and 20^th.  Let me just repeat this so I know we’re on the same page.  Every single label printed at USPS.com for three weeks listed the wrong Delivery Confirmation number after checkout.  For those of you who would like to remind me that there are hungry kids in China or I should be more concerned with the declining furry lemur population, let me just tell you that this month’s problems with USPS Delivery Confirmation rivals the civil unrest in Madagascar in my book.

People on eBay go nuts for ‘tracking numbers’.  Over the last three weeks, many professional and casual eBay sellers alike have been giving their buyers the wrong “tracking number” because USPS in turn gave them the wrong number.  As many of you are aware, “shipping time” and “communication” ratings on eBay greatly and directly affect a seller’s ability not only to list and sell items, but also the amount paid to eBay in seller fees.  This month’s problems with USPS Track and Confirm could potentially cost sellers millions of dollars in additional fees and huge losses in sales if just one or two of a seller’s buyers are confused by their “tracking number” saying that “There is no record of your item.”  You can’t blame buyers for being confused either, as the Delivery Confirmation number clearly states its bogus on the USPS.com website.  Every single Delivery Confirmation number on every single domestic Priority label printed at USPS.com appeared to be bogus for three entire weeks, confusing countless thousands of people.  Does this seem like a debacle yet?

On top of problems with buyers, I have to prove to PayPal that I deliver what I’m selling or PayPal will refund the buyer if they say they “didn’t receive the item.”  At the same time, if a buyer returns an item to me, they also have to prove to PayPal that I received it back.  All of this was completely impossible when USPS was returning the wrong Delivery Confirmation number.  I had several buyers input the Delivery Confirmation number that they received from USPS.com only to be denied refunds by PayPal because the number returned nothing but “There is no record of this item.”  I won’t be complaining about that since I was able to afford beer this week because of it, but I think you get the idea that this problem cost lots of people a lot of money.  I will whine about the dozens of buyers who were pestering me for the “right tracking number” or accusing me of “not shipping the item” though.  It was annoying.

I know what you’re thinking though; “Josh, this really is a fantastic website, but debacle is a little harsh and this rant is unnecessarily wrong.”  Well naysayer, USPS grossly mishandled this from the start.  First of all, the problem and its solution were obvious from the first minute of the first day.  USPS changed their algorithm from a 20 digit Delivery Confirmation number to a 22 digit Delivery Confirmation number.  No big deal, except no one decided to update the “system” with that information for three freaking weeks.  I failed Computer Science in high school which is why I sell crap on eBay in the first place, but this couldn’t be a difficult problem to fix.  Since we figured out that the numbers “94″ were missing from the beginning of every Delivery Confirmation number, why not program Track and Confirm to automatically add those numbers in front of any number that starts with 0505 or whatever other numbers were identified as having this problem?  Why not add a warning screen with this information when someone prints a domestic label with Delivery Confirmation or when a user logs in?  Why not announce it on the USPS “blog” or the USPS.com website?  The only thing I can figure out is that those in charge of the Postal Service didn’t realize how big of a problem this was, simply didn’t care, or actually are as incompetent as so many purport them to be.

Like many people, on October 7^th I emailed USPS at their desired address and inquired about the problem.  They assured me my problem was important and I should receive a response within 48 hours.  I received no response until this morning, approximately 384 hours later.  ECustomerCare National (ECCADUSER@usps.gov) sent me the following:

Dear Unfortunate Postal Service Customer Whom We Care “Very” Little About,

Thank you for contacting the United States Postal Service.  I understand that you have not been able to track your Priority Mail Delivery Confirmation items, since 9/30/2009.

I do apologize for the inconvenience this has caused.  When using Click-N-Ship tracking number, use usps.com to track the item, please add two digits “94″ to the beginning of the label ID. This workaround will provide tracking information on the label.

Please accept our sincere apology for any inconvenience this matter may have caused you.

REALLY USPS??!!!  REALLY??????

As one of the Post Office’s best customers (or worst I guess since they lose more money on me than most people????????)? I expect a more properly, better worded punctuation and, sentence structure with words and, punctuation.  In addition to this babble, I received the following email to my account registered with USPS (with editorial comments of what was going through my head while I read it):

Dear Customer We Still Don’t Care Much About(YOU CAN SAY THAT AGAIN),

Due to a technical issue (YOU CAN SAY THAT AGAIN), you may (I DID IDIOT CHECK THE 100K I’VE SPENT ON POSTAGE THIS YEAR) have experienced difficulty receiving Track & Confirm data for Click-N-Ship domestic Priority Mail labels printed between Thursday, October 1st, 2009 and Tuesday, October 20th, 2009(ACTUALLY I DIDN’T HAVE ANY PROBLEM RECEIVING IT JUST WHAT I RECEIVED WAS COMPLETELY WRONG FOR LIKE A !@#$ing MONTH MORONS MORONS MORONS).

If (AGAIN I DID) you generated a domestic Priority Mail label on Click-N-Ship within the indicated timeframe and have had difficulty with obtaining Track & Confirm data from USPS.com, we apologize for the inconvenience (I DON’T FEEL LIKE THIS IS A SINCERE APOLOGY). If you would still like to obtain Track & Confirm data for a domestic Priority Mail label printed between the dates indicated above, please follow the instructions below:

In the Track & Confirm field on usps.com, please add two (2) additional digits, “94″, to the left most position of the twenty (20) digit tracking/label number. For example, if the tracking/label # is 0550 1699 3200 0006 9161, the tracking/label # necessary to receive tracking data would be 940550 1699 3200 0006 9161 (IF YOU HAD SIMPLY VISITED THE #37 MOST POPULAR ONLINE WORDPRESS BLOG WITH AUCTION IN THE URL THEN YOU WOULD HAVE KNOWN THIS WEEKS AGO).

Additionally, your domestic Priority Mail tracking number(s) for labels printed within the date range above will be automatically corrected Thursday, October 22nd, 2009, and available in your Shipping History. Please feel free to visit www.usps.com/clicknship (OHHHHHHHHH REEEEEEAAAALLLLY).

Once again, we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, and we sincerely appreciate your business(OK NOW IT’S SINCERE FINALLY).

Thank you,

USPS Click-N-Ship Team

OVER THREE WEEKS TO COME UP WITH THIS LITTLE GEM?

The Postal Service’s failure to fix this problem in a reasonable amount of time is inexcusable.  Even more inexcusable than their inability to fix the problem is their lack of communication about it.  USPS’s problems this month cost me and a whole lot of other people a whole lot of money.  I can’t tell you how much because eBay still won’t tell me what ratings buyers are leaving (lol) or why they feel that way, but I’m sure ratings declined, fee discounts were erased, and listings were bured in search.   Even now, if the originally returned Delivery Confirmation number is inputted into Track and Confirm, it will still return “There is no record of this item.”  USPS may now return the correct Delivery Confirmation number, but it doesn’t make up for all the wrong that’s occured due to their inability to act or communicate.

That concludes my coverage of the Great October USPS Track and Confirm Debacle (copyright pending).  Good luck editing all those Delivery Confirmation numbers in PayPal and trying to convince your customers with an IQ of one that they need to put a “94″ before the number they previously received to make it work.

Until next time, Josh

There’s an odd glitch when printing Priority Mail labels online at USPS.com. Beginning the evening of September 30, 2009 (Possibly October 1 Eastern Time which would make sense), USPS changed the prefix of its Delivery Confirmation numbers from 0103 8555 **** **** to 0550 3699 **** **** where * represents the rest of the numbers. When I check to see if any of these packages with the 0550 3699 **** **** Delivery Confirmation number have been delivered, USPS says “There is no record of this item” for every single package shipped since September 30th. I’ve been a little concerned over the past week that none of my packages have been delivered. Even more worrying is the fact that PayPal may think that I haven’t been shipping any items and will shut me down or buyers will think I haven’t shipped the item at all. Of course, without online verifiable proof that the item has been delivered, I would lose any PayPal dispute for Item Not Received which could potentially mean thousands of dollars in losses if buyers started to catch on. Several buyers on eBay have contacted me and asked for the “correct” Delivery Confirmation number and all I can tell them is that there’s some glitch with USPS Delivery Confirmation and their item has in fact shipped as indicated in the email generated by USPS and PayPal.

Well, I figured out that if you put “94″ before the 0505 3699 **** **** Delivery Confirmation number that USPS generates then USPS will return the correct Delivery Confirmation information online. For example, if the number USPS gives you is 0550 3699 3000 0110 1234 then simply put a “94″ before it to get 94 0550 3699 3000 0110 1234. This new number will generate the correct shipment information and your item should show up as it did with the 0103 8555 **** **** numbers.

Hopefully the United States Postal Service will get its act together here and fix this glitch as soon as possible. I’ve called and emailed and gotten nowhere as usual so only time will tell. Until then, if a buyer asks about the status of their order tell them to put a “94″ before the number they received and track it that way. If possible, print labels through PayPal, Stamps.com, or other means until USPS fixes the problem with labels printed at USPS.com.

If you would just like to read my pros, cons, thoughts, and alternatives to the MoneyPak please skip down to “Conclusion” at the end of this guide.

Gibberish Introduction / Buying the Card

There’s usually only one kind of email from PayPal I like to get – “Instant Payment Received.”  Actually, I miss the days when they included “Notification” in the subject, but I digress.  Yesterday, I received an email with an intriguing subject, “New! Add money to your PayPal account with MoneyPak” that looked something like this:

It’s now possible to fund a PayPal account using nothing but cold hard cash.  As your trusted Chief Correspondent (Think CNN’s Christiane Amanpour with bombs falling over Baghdad in the background), I took it upon myself to head down to the local Wal-Mart and check this MoneyPak out myself.   Luckily, my bullet proof vest just came back from the cleaners (blood, should have seen the other guy) so I wouldn’t necessarily be risking my life.  Plus, I needed an inflatable to add to my collection and Wal-Mart also happens to be wedged between Check into Cash and the Liquor Store so either way we’re set.  If only the Liquor Store took PayPal (I know, I know, PayPal Debit, but work with me here).

Anyway, the idea behind this whole MoneyPak thing is basically that you go to the store, find the aisle where they keep all the good gift cards like Red Lobster and Jack Daniels and look for the “Green Dot” MoneyPak card.  Simply take the card to the register along with your cash or credit, tell the cashier how much you’d like to add to the card (Minimum $20 Maximum $500), pay the $4.95 service fee, and away you go.  Next, bring the card home, enter the MoneyPak number into PayPal, and the money will magically be transferred from your MoneyPak to your PayPal account.

The card looks like this:

Your receipt will show the amount you put on the card along with the service fee.  The email says “$4.95 or less,” but I don’t think you’re going to find it for anything less than $4.95 since it’s printed right on the card.

Transfering the Money From MoneyPak to PayPal via Magic

Transferring the money from the MoneyPak to your PayPal account is a fairly easy process.  To find out just how easy it would be I went ahead and opened a new Personal “Buying Only” PayPal account.  After the account is created PayPal wants you to add a credit card or bank account, but it is possible to skip this step and head right to the good stuff.

Next, or if you already have a PayPal account, click “Add Funds” at the top.

This will take you to a screen with a pretty little green “MoneyPak” icon.  Click it.

If you have questions about MoneyPak or want more information, I suggest clicking the “Learn More” button.

Next, you enter the 14 digit number that you scratched off of the bottom of the green MoneyPak card.

The following screen is where you decide how much of your MoneyPak you want to transfer to PayPal.  Remember, after 90 days your MoneyPak is charged a monthly fee of $4.95 per month so you’ll want to keep track of the money on it and disburse it within the 90 days.  It took about two minutes after clicking “Fund Account” for the next page to load so be patient and don’t click “Fund Account” again if you get impatient as it might screw up the funding.

The confirmation page is straightforward and should reflect your previous funding choices.

Notice though, that your yearly funding limit is $250 per year.  Mouse over the question mark and you’ll see that you have to give MoneyPak your name, address, date of birth, and Social Security number in order to raise the funding limit.  I’ll cover this more in the conclusion of this guide.

Clicking “Return to PayPal Account” should bring you back to your main account page with your new balance.  It took more than four minutes for MoneyPak to redirect me to the PayPal website though, which seems excessive.  I was about to give up when it finally loaded, so be patient as you might have to give it a few minutes.  Hopefully, as the relationship between PayPal and MoneyPak matures things will speed up.

Your account should show your new balance as well as a payment from “Green Dot MoneyPak” for the amount sent.  You should also receive an email with the funding information.

That’s about it.  It may take several minutes for MoneyPak to communicate with PayPal throughout the process, but overall the integration is seamless and it should be easy for most users to figure it out without much heartache. Plus, you have me holding your hand and I demand nothing less than success.

Conclusion

Pros: If you have absolutely no access to a credit card or bank account or anyone with a credit card or a bank account then MoneyPak may be your only option to use PayPal online.  It’s a somewhat convenient way to fund a PayPal account, especially if you plan ahead or are going to the store anyway.  If you’re in a hurry and can’t wait for an e-check to clear or funds to transfer from your bank account to PayPal then the MoneyPak is a faster option.  It can be used to pay for items on eBay.  Integration with PayPal is simple.  The $4.95 service fee isn’t ludicrous.

Cons: If you don’t have a bank account or credit card added to your PayPal account then you have no way to confirm your address.  Most retailers that accept PayPal will require a confirmed address, which means you won’t be able to use your cash-only account to pay with PayPal on most websites.  Most sellers outside of eBay also require a confirmed address.  To prevent money laundering, if you want to fund your PayPal account with more than $250 per year you will have to provide MoneyPak/PayPal with your name, address, birth date and Social Security number.  After 90 days, your MoneyPak balance will decrease $4.95 per month, or $60 per year, which means you will want to disperse your MoneyPak funds as soon as you add them.  PayPal advertises that it’s the “safest way to pay,” but that is only true when you use a credit card to pay and even then there are still inherent problems with PayPal’s dispute resolution.  When you use cash to fund your PayPal account, you are relying on PayPal to retrieve your funds if a problem arises.  It may be a hassle to find and go get a card to purchase.  The service fee of $4.95 is higher than most other account funding options.

Alternatives: Funding your PayPal account with a bank account is free and adding and paying with a credit card is the safest way to use PayPal online because of the added protection most credit cards may provide.  Debit cards also work on PayPal.  If you do not have access to any of these, but know someone who is willing to let you use their credit/debit card, you can purchase a Simon Gift Card or Simon Gift Account. To learn how to do it step by step see my guide, Verify and Lift Limit on PayPal Account Without Credit Card or Social Security Number With Simon.  Simon Gift Accounts only cost $2 and you can verify your PayPal account and confirm your address by using it.  You can then use it to pay for whatever you want just as you would use a regular credit card.  Remember though, that Simon cards offer no chargeback protection so you will want to be extra careful when deciding what to purchase and from whom.

In Conclusion:  The Green Dot MoneyPak is an interesting new option for funding PayPal accounts.  I wouldn’t recommend it since there are so many other options, but if cash is really your only option and you find yourself in a situation where you have to use PayPal then this may be it.  Just be aware of the restrictions on a cash-only Personal PayPal account, the cost of the card, and the lack of protection if something goes wrong.

EBay has introduced the (not so) much heralded “Search Visibility Report” as part of the new Seller Dashboard update.  To access it, simply go to “My eBay,” mouse over “Account,” Click “Seller Dashboard” and look on the far left for “Search Visibility Analysis” under “Reports. 

The report is supposed to give you insight into how eBay calculates your listing placement in Best Match search.  You can also type in various keywords to find out what page your listing will show up on. When it was first announced it sounded like it would be a helpful tool.  Unfortunately, like all new things eBay, at best it doesn’t work and at worst the information it provides is completely worthless.

One of my favorite guides of all time is How to Raise Your Listing and Gain More Visibility in eBay Best Match Search.  Follow these steps and you would find your listing at the top of search results every time (pending you follow the other 3,000 pages of advice on this website).  As part of the October update, eBay is mysteriously tweaking the “Best Match” algorithm.  For one reason or another, eBay won’t tell anyone how it decides what listings go where or what exactly you can do to raise your listing in search results.  Time will tell what changes they’ve made as sellers try to adapt, and in the process lose money on listings that are never seen by anyone other than their mother.

Let’s have a look at a Fixed Price listing that has been relisted after the first 5 items sold out. To run your own report, simply find the item number of a current listing and input it into the report creation box or select a category to run a report on all of the listings in that category:

Ok..we know the price and we know whether or not we’ve set free shipping so that isn’t much help.  If we click the little question mark icon next to each topic we get a little explanation of what eBay may or may not be thinking.  Next to “Free Shipping Boost” it says:

“If you offer free shipping you may be raised in search results. However, this boost does not apply to all listings or all categories.”

Cryptic as usual.  Luckily our listing in Clothing gets a boost.  Fair enough – we knew offering free shipping previously gave a huge boost in search results.

Next up is “Sales/ Impressions” with the explanation:

“The ratio of sales to the number of times the listing has been displayed to members in search results (using the midpoint of the impression range). This is a measure of how relevant members perceive the listing is to their search.”

This is where things get a little bizarre.  First of all, if all of the buyer’s search terms aren’t in your item’s title then the listing won’t show up at all. For example, if your title is “Abercrombie Jacket” and a potential bidder searches for “Women’s Abercrombie Jacket” then your listing won’t show up in their search results even if what you’re selling is precisely a women’s Abercrombie jacket.  Conversely, if a bidder searches for “Women’s Abercrombie Coat” and your title is “Women’s Abercrombie $250 Wool Parka Jacket,” then your item won’t show in the buyer’s search results even if you’re selling precisely what the buyer is actually searching for.  Occasionally all of the keywords don’t necessarily need to be present though, which is also a bit contradictory (sorry, but things like this aren’t my fault).  For example, if you run a search for “Nintendo Wii,” eBay will return listings that do not have “Nintendo” in the title.  Don’t ask me how or why eBay makes this distinction especially because it makes it easier for sellers to stick “Wii” in items that have nothing to do with the Wii.

Ideally, sellers want their listings to show up as often as possible in order to reach as many bidders as possible.  There has always been a fine line between writing a “good” title and “keyword spamming.”  Keyword spamming occurs when a seller lists a bunch of keywords in their title that have nothing to do with what they’re actually selling.  For example, if I was selling a broken first generation IPOD I might write my title as “IPOD 30 60 80 120GB CLASSIC NANO TOUCH IPHONE ZUNE CASE HD.”  Clearly, I am using a bunch of keywords that have nothing to do with the actual item in order to get as many views as possible.  This has always been against eBay policy and if I did something like this I could look forward to getting the listing removed along with a matching policy violation.  What eBay appears to be doing here is make it so keyword spamming is counterproductive, at least as far as placement in Best Match search. In addition, eBay appears to be penalizing sellers for using titles that yield the highest number of relevant search impressions unless those impressions translate into sales.

Thanks to 21st century data collection, eBay knows how often your listing shows up in buyer’s search results.  What we don’t know is whether or not the bidder actually ever makes it to the listing.  If my item is one of 32,981 listings and it appears on page 175 of search results does eBay count it as an impression?  If the buyer purchases the very first item in search results and doesn’t even notice mine is cheaper, better quality, and ships faster, does eBay still count it as an impression?  Is it my fault that bidders search for irrelevant terms?  Is it my fault no one even trusts anyone on eBay anymore and no one is buying?  Is it my fault Best Match search is based on a stupid algorithm in the first place?  What is a “good” Sales/Impression ratio? Is it a set percentage in each category or some overall number? How important is this information?  Who knows!

The larger problem here is that the information listed in the report is inaccurate and as you run reports on your own listings you will notice the same thing. The listing used in this example has five original sales and three sales from the current listing, for a total of eight. The report doesn’t reflect these sales; nor does it reflect the past page impressions or clicks. On several of my other relisted Fixed Price listings the past sales aren’t noted at all. One of those listings also has five previous sales and three current sales and the sales are listed at two which isn’t true about the past listing or even the current listing! It’s unclear whether eBay uses this same information to actually place listings in Best Match search, but we have to assume eBay isn’t purposefully feeding us bogus information (????) If eBay isn’t even using valid sales data then how can Best Match Search work successfully?

Next up is “Seller Performance.”  You may have noticed on your Seller Dashboard that there is no longer a “Raised, Standard, and Lowered” search standing.  That’s because your Seller Performance no longer raises your items in search standing unless you’re a Top Seller.  At this time I’m not sure if you’ll be lowered if you aren’t “Above Standard” because I don’t have any accounts like that currently, but maybe I’ll try to lower one for research purposes.  I don’t recommend buying any tapered shirts from User ID AClockWorkOrange for the next 7-10 days.  How much does Top-Seller status raise your listings you ask?  We don’t know because eBay doesn’t say.

The problem with only raising listings from Top-Sellers is that there are plenty of great sellers who for one reason or another are excluded from “Top-Seller” status.  Many of these sellers simply had one bad buyer who bought six items and left six “one” ratings and ruined the seller’s star rating percentage.  Others have received bogus listing violations or don’t have the required 100 transactions.  Either way, no fee discounts or preferential search standing for the great majority of sellers on eBay is not the motivation many sellers need to offer this so-called “excellent customer service” that all sellers are supposed to strive for. Many deserving sellers have been skipped over while other sellers are awarded Top-Seller status with hundreds of negative feedback and a history of shifty selling practices. When eBay ran their free shipping promotion and gave a discount to sellers who offered free shipping thousands of sellers fell in line and offered free shipping. Now that eBay has discontinued that promotion there is less motivation to offer free or even reasonable shipping.

“Unique Click-Throughs” is up next, defined as “The number of clicks on a listing from search results. Duplicate clicks are not counted.”  This is pretty straight forward but it doesn’t really tell us anything we don’t already know.  I assume that the hits on your item don’t matter much in Best Match because it’s supposedly based on sales.  Nonetheless, in case you didn’t want to click on an individual item to check the hits counter you can see those hits here too.

Next up is another percentage – “Unique Click-Through Rate.”  Is it starting to seem like some intern is trying to show off what they learned in remedial mathematics to anyone else?

“The ratio of click-throughs to the number of times the listing has been displayed to members in search results (using the midpoint of the impression range). This may indicate your listing’s appeal in search results.”  Ok…….I guess.  It may tell us something or it may not tell us something.  EBay may use this number to decide where to put your livelihood or it may not.  Thanks report!

We know the number of watchers and the number of sales.  The final “Other Factor” is “The percentage of unique click-throughs resulting in sales. This is an indicator of your item page’s effectiveness.”  We could figure this out ourselves if we wanted to by simply dividing sales and page views.  Nonetheless, the brains behind eBay have calculated it for us. All you have to is pay 15% of your revenue.

Not exactly the most helpful report I’ve ever seen.  From the looks of it, the bullets listed under “Best Match Factors” would obviously be the most important.  I’m not sure what price has to do with it since eBay couldn’t possibly figure out if what you’re selling is a “good” price or not.  Free shipping seems to still give a solid boost, but it’s unclear how much.  The sales/impressions as a major factor is interesting because it’s unclear exactly what a seller could do to improve that percentage other than sell for a loss or write nothing in the item title other than a specific model number or something. Even a specific item title will have general terms like “camera” or a common brand name like “Canon.”

So called “Top-Sellers” seem to get a serious boost in search standing.  For example, a search for “Canon EOS” results in 15 of the top 25 items from Top-Sellers.  Of those 15, nine offer free shipping.  A search for “Nintendo Wii” returns only four of the top 25 items from Top-Sellers.  Fifteen of the first 25 results offer free shipping.  Interestingly, the first item listed was item 330364763012, or “Dirt 2 (Nintendo Wii) – Codemasters – BRAND NEW.”  The item ships for $3 and there is no actual picture of the item or any original content or any mention of selling terms or conditions.  Odd search returns like this make me wonder how the eBay algorithm actually works.  Sure, the item is probably fine, but why does eBay assume that some random video game is what I’m really searching for and what is so special about this item in particular that it’s listed first?  Even stranger, Item 400075816190, or “Major Minor’s Majestic March (Wii)” was also returned on the first page.  First of all, the title does not include the “Nintendo” that I searched for.  Second, the game is used, horribly reviewed, the seller doesn’t accept returns, the listing only has 14 views, and shipping is a ridiculous $9+.  The bidder could have purchased the game brand new from Amazon for 92 cents more.  Why on earth is that item listed on the first page of search results?  It appears that eBay is currently favoring auctions based on ending time, rather than any kind of algorithm.  If you look at a page of search results you’ll notice that they’re mostly in order of ending time with a few Buy It Now listings from Top-Sellers thrown in.  It’s unclear if this will continue or if we’re simply between when the new Best Match algorithm will be implemented and the old algorithm will be phased out. Taking away a set “Raised, Standard, or Lowered” search standing may actually level the playing field for most as the great majority of sellers do not qualify to be Top-Sellers.

The goal of Best Match search is to bring the cheapest, most relevant products from the best sellers to the top of search results so buyers can have the best eBay experience possible.  Unfortunately, eBay cannot possibly figure out who the real “top” sellers are or what items buyers are actually searching for with some automated algorithm.  As evident by our bizarre “Nintendo Wii” search, eBay returns items that are not in demand from sellers with less than stellar feedback, ridiculously high shipping charges and no returns.  At this point, it doesn’t seem like eBay has made any meaningful changes to Best Match search that actually translates into a better shopping experience for the buyer. For sellers, the added confusion will simply make it more difficult to write successful listings and convert sales.  The new Visibility Report is inaccurate and unhelpful.  Overall, I am not impressed.

How It Used To Be (Sonny)

It’s rare that eBay adds a feature to its website that is purely beneficial for the seller without any monetary advantage to eBay itself.  One of those recently added features is the ability to block bidders in specific countries.  Previously, it was only possible to block bidders by entire continent.  This forced many sellers to select “Europe” as a location they ship to and then within the listing write that shipping is not available to say Russia or Italy.  Of course, many buyers, especially those that don’t understand English well, would disregard that warning and bid or purchase an item even when it explicitly states in the listing that shipping is not available.  This puts the seller in a difficult situation because technically they have to ship the item to the buyer no matter what it says in the listing or they risk negative feedback and the dreaded “Seller Non-Performance Violation.”  Ship the item and the seller risks a PayPal dispute which could result in the seller losing the item and the payment or some other form of extortion or unauthorized payment reversal.  For a while I stated in my listing that I didn’t ship to “Eastern Europe.”  Unfortunately, as I came to understand, there is no set definition for what countries comprise Eastern Europe. Because of the stigma attached to Eastern Europeans many people who live in what you and I consider “Eastern Europe” actually believe they live some place called “Middle Europe” or “South Europe.”  I was to the point where I had to list every undesirable country by name in every one of my listings. Even then, Italians still loved to buy from me. Hopefully, much of this miscommunication and misunderstanding will cease with this new ability to block certain bidders by country.

Why Block Bidders in Specific Countries?

There are a number of reasons that a seller might want to block bidders by specific country.  First of all, international shipping is much more complicated and expensive than domestic shipping. There is also much less recourse if you get ripped off by someone in Bosnia compared with someone Chicago. At the very least it’s more believable to pretend you’re in the Russian mob and threaten that you’re going to show up at their house when you’re emailing someone in Tuscaloosa instead of talking to someone who is actually in the Russian mob in Moldova.  I explain many of these international shipping problems in my article, The Perils of International Shipping With eBay and Paypal – A Guide to Successful Shipping Practices as well as how to correctly fill out customs forms at USPS, How to Print USPS International Shipping Label With Required Customs Forms .  In short, if a seller does not have online verifiable proof that an item has been delivered to the buyer then they will always lose a PayPal dispute for “Item Not Received.”  If a seller chooses to ship an item via USPS First Class, USPS Priority Mail Flat Rate, or any other method that does not show delivery then they have to trust that the buyer will be honest about receiving the item and know that the buyer could file a false dispute at any time within the 45 day filing deadline.

In the year 2009 I can’t really come out and say that all Italians or all Russians can’t be trusted and risk getting 1,000 gay porn stars sent to my house by 4chan so I won’t do that.  What I will say is that the majority of people living in Italy are absolutely nuts.  On top of that, the Italian postal system is terrible and Italian customs is one of the worst (or best depending on which side you’re on I suppose)in the world, making Italy by far the most commonly blocked country by name. The Italian postal system is so bad that at one point it was the only country in Europe that USPS Priority Mail International was not available. USPS would brave civil war, the downfall of communism, and roads made out of spikes, but wanted nothing to do with Italy.

What Countries Should I Block?

The countries you ultimately choose to ship to and the methods of shipment you offer are personal decisions based on the level of risk you’re willing to assume.  Many eBayers have never had a bad experience shipping internationally and swear by USPS First Class anywhere in the world.  All I can tell them is the fact that they’re taking on an incredible level of risk depending on what they’re shipping and to whom they’re transacting with.  If you’re on Etsy selling $5 earrings then it may not be a wise business decision to charge $25 for Express Shipping because no one would ever buy anything.  In order to conduct business, a seller like this assumes more risk, but the ultimate loss from an “Item Not Received” PayPal dispute would be much smaller than a seller on eBay who is shipping collector’s items worth hundreds of dollars in a similar fashion.  My point here is that you have to assess the risk of “fraud” in your business.  If you’re selling Christmas cards or used baby clothes then your level of risk is much lower than a seller shipping expensive high fashion items or electronics.  More sales and higher prices from offering international shipping are quickly erased by forced PayPal refunds and “lost packages.”  Never ship without tracking what you aren’t willing to lose.

The countries you choose to block should also depend on what method you use to ship. If the only service you offer is Express Mail then you have little to worry about pretty much no matter what country you ship to. Bidders intent on committing “PayPal fraud” will ignore your listings because it isn’t worth the risk of losing a dispute when there are so many other sellers offering completely untrackable methods such as USPS First Class. On the other hand, offering USPS First Class to Russia simply isn’t worth it because of the risk that the bidder will file an Item Not Received dispute with PayPal and you will not be able to fight it.

There are shysters in every country around the world and possibly more in the United States itself than any other country.  What I don’t recommend doing is letting one “rotten apple” cause you to block bidders in a particular country forever.  If you’re shipping USPS Express Mail then it should be safe to ship just about anywhere in the world other than maybe Africa or the bowels of Asia.   The other thing to keep in mind is that you don’t want bidders purchasing your items and instead of paying try to send you phishing emails with the intent of stealing your password and financial information or try to sell you counterfeit products.  These kinds of things are common in the electronics categories more than any other.  If you have ever tried to sell a Laptop on eBay then you know what I’m talking about. Blocking bidders in Africa and South America will decrease the number of bidders who buy your items and instead of paying try to hassle you.

Most of my items sell for between $30-$100 and I offer USPS Priority Mail International and USPS Express Mail International.  If you’re going to ship USPS Priority Mail Flat Rate then I suggest listing only “USPS Priority Mail International” in your listing rather than “USPS Priority Mail International Flat Rate” because this won’t tip off bidders looking to scam you that you’re going to leave yourself vulnerable to a PayPal dispute because Flat Rate International isn’t at all trackable.  If you get any bidders asking if you ship Priority Flat Rate or wanting “The cheapest shipping to Czechoslovakia” then I would either ignore it or block the bidder specifically if you really want to be careful.

I don’t ship to the following locations:

All of Africa

All of Asia except Japan

All of Middle East

All of Southeast Asia

All of Central America and Caribbean except Puerto Rico

Under North America: Bermuda, Mexico, St Pierre and Miquelon

All of South America

It’s easier to state which countries I DO ship to in Europe because there’s so many listed.  These are the countries I DO ship to in Europe:  Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and United Kingdom

In Oceania, I only ship to: Australia, New Zealand

Blocked Bidder Exemption List

Within your listing you can also state you do make exceptions for certain bidders.   Even if you block bidders in Lithuania for example, if you want a particular bidder in Lithuania to be able bid on your items then you can add an exemption at EBay Block Bidder Exemption List.  Simply click “Add an eBay user to my Blocked Bidder/Buyer List” and copy/paste the eBay UserID.  Adding exemptions is a good way to screen bidders so you aren’t stuck sending a $500 item to a bidder in Slovenia that just registered yesterday and has purchased 37 items in one day.  When screening, remember that buyers cannot receive negative feedback so feedback alone may not be a good indicator of a buyer’s temperament.   You can read eBay’s take on buyer requirements at EBay Buyer Requirements. You can also exempt bidders who are registered in countries to which you don’t ship, but want the item shipped to a United States address. Just make sure they choose this address as the shipping address in PayPal. Only ship to the address listed in the PayPal payment. Another common scam is buyers who live abroad and choose their address abroad, but try to get the seller to ship to an alternate address. If you do not have online verifiable delivery confirmation to the address listed in the PayPal dispute then you will always lose a PayPal “Item Not Received” dispute. Be careful.

OK, OK HOW TO DO IT ALREADY

Sorry, I’m long winded, but since I don’t have any friends to talk to this is all I have. Also, eBay is incredibly complicated and covering all of our bases takes a great deal of care. If you do read the entire guide then you should pick up on things you were previously unaware of.  The process to set this up is relatively easy with the following instructions.

First, go to My eBay.  Mouse over (but don’t click) the account tab as shown and click on “Site Preferences.”

This brings us to this next screen.  Look for “Shipping Preferences” and click “Show” to expand the options.  Click “Edit” next to “Exclude Shipping Locations From Your Listings.” Sorry, I had to chop this image to fit properly on the site. You should see the “Edit” and “Show” buttons on the far right.

Now we can choose which countries we don’t want to ship to.  Clicking the box next to the continent will select all of the countries on that continent.  It may be easier to click on the continent to select all of the countries and then uncheck all the countries you do want to ship to.  If that’s confusing then go ahead and click each country you don’t want to ship to individually.  You can check the box to “Apply to all current listings” which should apply your preferences to all of your listings that do not have a bid or a prior purchase.  Note that if your auction does have a bid or a purchase then you can’t change those listings.  Also notice the disclaimer at the bottom of the page referring to setting your “global requirements.”  Simply filling out this form doesn’t do anything unless we go to buyer requirements and choose not to allow bidders in countries that we don’t ship to bid or purchase items.  We’ll do that next.  After you have selected all the countries you don’t ship to, click “Apply.”

Now we go back to step 1 by mousing over “Account” in My eBay and selecting “Site Preferences.”  This time scroll down to “Buyer Requirements” and click edit next to “Block bidders who:”

Hopefully you have been to this screen before.  If you haven’t, take a look at all of the different ways you can block undesirable bidders.  Unfortunately there is currently no way to block “crazy” bidders or bidders with 0 feedback.  For our purposes here we want to check the box next to “Block buyers who are registered in countries to which I don’t ship.”  Check the “Apply” box at the bottom and then check “Submit.”

Congratulations, you should never have to deal with another Italian again.

One of the more amusing problems people have on eBay revolves around eBay’s use of anonymous emails from buyers.  Prior to purchase, a buyer may send a question to a seller about anything.  When the buyer sends the question they have the option to keep their email address private.  If the buyer selects this option and the seller tries to email the buyer back directly from the email they receive from eBay, they will see that the buyer’s email address is UseTheYellowButton@ebay.com.  This means that the seller has to click the yellow “Respond” button within the email if they want the buyer to receive a response.  A response emailed to UseTheYellowButton@ebay.com of course will not be received by anyone.  This is confusing to most new sellers.  A couple of years ago I caught my girlfriend responding to an email at UseTheYellowButton@ebay.com.  I asked her what she thought she was doing.  After I explained her mistake she said that it made a lot of sense because it seemed like none of her emails had been received by her buyers.  For more than three years eBay has tried to devise a system that will allow sellers to email the buyer directly while still keeping the buyer’s actual email address anonymous.  It seems like eBay has finally implemented such a system, although I have been drinking all weekend so it’s possible that I am confused, so don’t hold me to this one,ok?

On Friday evening I noticed that when I went to reply to a buyer’s email that their email address was s00-cnqabcgp8a@members.ebay.com.  This leads me to believe that eBay is trying to implement their anonymous email forwarding system as part of the October update.  EBay first tried to implement such a system in October of 2006.  Like most things eBay, it of course didn’t work and eBay nixed the entire program the following month.  It seems like they haven’t quite figured the system out in 2009 either, because after replying to the buyer’s question I received an email from failurenotice@members.ebay.com stating:

Your recent message to megwhitman was not sent because that member’s mailbox is not accepting messages. This could be for several reasons, including:

• The email address is no longer valid
• The member’s mailbox is full
• The member’s email server is not working
• The member’s email provider is blocking messages

You can still send the member a message through eBay. Here’s how:

1. Click on the member’s user ID anywhere it appears on the site.
2. You will see the member’s Feedback page. Click “Contact member”.
3. Enter your message in the form and click “Send”.

For assistance, please contact eBay Customer Support at: http://pages.ebay.com/help/contact_us/_base/index_selection.html

Thanks,

eBay

Interestingly, none of the reasons mentioned for failure were “EBAY IS RETARDED SO SRRY TRY AMAZON OR SOMEFING.”  It’s possible they’re still tweaking the failure email as well.

If eBay can actually figure out the anonymous email system it would be a step in the right direction.  I’m sure eBay gets really annoyed with the six million daily emails they get from confused eBayers at UseTheYellowButton@ebay.com.  One might assume eBay would want to limit the failures they’ll be experiencing over the next few weeks with all of the October changes coming, but it appears that they don’t think there’s much of a difference between 1,000 failures and 1,001 failures.  I suppose I am inclined to agree.

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my seven loyal readers for making September the most visited month ever for AuctionCope Auction Blog.  It looks like we’ll be over 2,500 unique visitors for the month.  Until next time, Josh