1. eBay news – INR – more thoughts.
5. Ask Molly – How can I find my picture?
OK, so two bulletins in one week is a bit excessive but the next one will probably be late as the days draw out and I lose track of time.
A sigh of relief could be heard around HQ as the first VAT inquisition came and went; the Elves were nowhere to be seen, ready to jump ship at the first sign of trouble.
It’s a bit of a bumper issue this week as I had so many responses to issue 251. I have said it before and I’ll say it again, I don’t actually work for eBay so easy on the hate mail [Ed - we are independent and proud]!
On a serious note the issue of ‘Item not received’ is the big debate at the moment so more on this below and also an idea to get around the punitive postal price increase.
When a buyer asks for a tracking number three times after dispatch you just know that it won’t arrive and so it was this week. Surprise, surprise in pops the email “where is my item”. Smelling a rat I explained that I, Molly, single handed was trying to solve the world’s postage problems and that in conjunction with the police, eBay, PayPal and even Vince Cable’s office would investigate any claim for non-arrival.
I further explained that if after all these warnings the buyer felt they should still maintain that the item didn’t arrive they should open a case against me – which they did. Blast!!
Great reading as always; in particular the concerns over INR.
* Your local Sorting Office (your local Post Office can inform you where this is) as the posties don't always leave a 'while you were out' card.
Once you have tried the above and informed me it is still not to be found I will issue you a refund and inform Royal Mail of this loss.
Royal Mail have recently been liaising with sellers to provide details of all items lost in transit so that they may investigate shortcomings in their service/and or postal staff.
One last point on this subject, I have asked for confirmation from my secret inside eBay contact (you know who you are!) about the impact of opened INR cases on seller performance. I’ll feed back the response as and when it arrives.
Have been selling on eBay now for some five to six years and hope to take the plunge shortly to go into semi-retirement, open a shop and do a lot more.
I currently sell collectable stamps which normally go into a small envelope.
I am looking to cut admin down to a bear minimum if turnover increases and think that if I could print off at source some kind of invoice/order detail sheet I could fold this up into a window envelope and that would be sufficient for postage.
Attempts so far have resulted in a faint address portion, not as readable as I would be happy with so I would worry about the item getting lost in the post.
M - I still write out addresses by hand albeit in the shortest format I can get away with, my new PPI stamp saves a lot of time and that will have to do for the moment.
However, saying that I have just switched away from my old Kodak printer and bought an Epsonm [Ed - that should keep you at the races (do you mean Epson??!)] which has a much better print quality.
Before I start on this article I must make it clear that the following is for information only, I do not have an interest in this business and receive no payment (although I am always happy to do so). I just bring these things to the table, it may work for you or it may not.
On the subject of postage, franking is certainly an expensive way of paying for postage because of all the hidden costs (Bulletin 251).
We have negotiated some very good rates with both Royal Mail and several of the couriers.
We can offer something for everyone, but in order to take advantage of the rates, all parcels have to go through our premises.
We have a growing number of sellers who send us quantities of their stock for us to despatch, as and when sold (we send to all corners of the world).
As it is possible to send up to 30kgs to anywhere in the UK mainland for about £10 then 100 smallish items (300 grams each) in a box would cost 10p per item to get to us.
The saving over sending via RM is anything from 10p to over £1 per parcel on 1st class inland parcels and there are no extra costs. No ink, no machine, no costly licence fees. The savings on international parcels are even greater.
We are also looking at the possibility of opening different branches in strategic places for sellers to be able to drop off their stock/parcels.
This way we can maximise the savings and our bargaining strength.
I am sure you will have seen this service but some of your readers may not be aware of it as it is a recent addition to the market.
I use the ‘Collect & Drop Off’ service for parcels over 2kg (and sometimes over 1kg) as it is much cheaper than the Royal Mail.
There is a drop-off point en route to my local Post Office too and I think this is generally the case.
Users can enter their post code to see where their local stations are (usually a news agent of fuel station). As long as the parcel isn’t too large, it is possible to use the service (you will need a regular printer at home).
M – I must stress that I don’t actually use this service; I am a Hermes convert as you know, with a touch of PPI for good measure. If you do give them a try, please let me know how you get on.
I am stuck on downloading pictures from ‘Photobucket’. I did as you suggest in your book and hovered my cursor over the selected image and then as you said three boxes appear underneath the image.
The book says copy the code in the second box "direct link", but as the box is so small it does not show all of the code. I clicked on the box and the word "copied" flashed up and then disappeared, I thought "Great that's done that", but where did it copy it to?
I still cannot find a way to download the pictures I need to put in my eBay listings.
Can you run me through it again?"
M - You are halfway there, when the 'copied' flashes up you have it stored in a small part of your computer and the next time you use the 'paste' function (right click on the mouse or from the 'edit' menu) it will appear on the screen.
Getting the picture address into your listing is a little more involved.
List an item as you would do normally and when you get to the description field select the 'HTML' tab. This could look very scary depending upon the content of your description; it is a bit like looking at life as in the 'Matrix' movie.
Every element of an internet page has some code which makes it function, reading this code does take a while and a lot of coffee.
For the sake of practice highlight everything on this page from top to bottom and delete the lot. Now include this code . Revisit your Photobucket picture and copy the code in the second box just as you did before, now paste it into the code between the two sets of "".
Switch back to the standard view and you picture will be shown.
You might want to move it about a bit and insert it into your text; this will become easier through trial and error.
On a side note when I decided to try my hand at HTML and website design I had mixed success, it has to be said; the book I read was about 3 inches thick with no pictures, not for the faint-hearted.
One thing I have realised over the past few weeks is that should you choose to store bubble bags in an outbuilding it is a good idea to raise them off the floor. Why is that, you ask? Well you may remember my leaky shed roof; alas this was not the only leak I had and now I know just how absorbent bubble bags and boxes can be.
The Elves have been busy with hairdryers but I fear some of them may have to be discarded [Ed - Sad news about the elves, but the hairdyers will survive to be used again in future].
I did smile when this arrived, the advancements in technology are so rapid now that one day we won’t need buyers at all!