Postal Insurance

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Posted By: identify7

Yesterday I received a card which had taken three weeks to get to me from Canada. I am not sure what route it actually took, but the route did not include a postmark nor stamp cancellation. It was not insured. It cost me $48 for the card.

Although I was quite concerned about this shipment, my concern was directed toward the realization that I had been searching for this $48. card for two years. And I would hate to begin that again.

I didn't insure it because I have decided to risk the financial loss for all cards which sell below $100. This choice has already paid off, and if I lose a card now, I've saved enuff in insurance fees to compensate for the financial aspect of a postal error.

What is your policy on postal insurance?

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Posted By: Marc S.

<<What is your policy on postal insurance?>>

What I think is this:

A) The USPS postal insurance rates are exorbitant. It is $1.30 for $50 of insurance. I am 100% sure that 2.6% of packages are not lost by USPS. I see this as a huge profit center for them.

B) When I sell stuff - especially stuff over $100, I require (or just pay for) insurance to get rid of fraud, since I do not know the buyers - and it is easy to be opportunistic and take advantage of a situation.

C) If it is a seller that I have worked with before, and I trust them and know that the pack things well, for items under a certain threshold, I think insurance is not worth the cost. Delivery confirmation or something is fine - but not insurance.

D) For all high-dollar purchases, my preference is always USPS registered and insured mail. It's pretty cheap - and I've heard too many horror stories about both Fed Ex and UPS to be comfortable with them.

~ms

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Posted By: Charlie O'Neal

Buying standpoint

What I have done in the past is make sure that everything over $100 is insured for my extra protection. Under a $100 I don't insure b/c the seller has to prove that the item was delivered to me and it's in my possession or I can get my money back thru paypal.

Selling standpoint

Any auction that would end over $25 I have insurance already added into the shipping for my protection. Anything under $25 and if there is a problem I just refund the money for the auction as long as it's been missing for longer than 3 weeks.

Knock on wood I have only had to problems w/ shipping in the past twice. Both times the buyer was happy with the outcome and understood my concerns about not waiting long enough for me to be satisified that it may have been lost in the mail.

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Posted By: steve yawitz

I'm with you. I rarely bother opting for insurance on cards that are worth less than $200. I've probably had close to 2,000 transactions and have only had to file one claim on a $70 card, which was a complete pain in the butt. I've had maybe two or three uninsured items get lost or absolutely mangled in shipping, but overall it's just not worth it on relatively inexpensive items.

As a seller, I usually leave it up to the buyer, though I do require it on those rare occasions when I sell a costly card or group of cards.

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Posted By: jay behrens

The big pain with PayPal, from a seller's point of view, is that even if you provide proof of delivery, etc, the buyer can still claim they didn't get what was described and PayPal will blindly refund their money. I just went thru this where a buyer used paypal to get money back claiming the item was not as described becuase the post office damaged the item. PayPal's investigation (what investigation? I wasn't asked anything) concluded that the buyer should get his money back.

PayPal is almost a total joke from a seller's standpoint, but you pretty have have to take it if you want to be a full time seller on eBay.

Jay

My place is full of valuable, worthless junk.

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Posted By: BlackSoxFan

A couple of thoughts...and then i'm going back to my usual ... non inflamatory self. I am sorry about your experience with paypal. I will however say that as a buyer and a seller through their system..i've had experiences with not as described. Recently i sold a very rare lighter for my client...the item sold for $499.00 ...a day after receipt the guy sent me pictures of a similar lighter and said that we sent him the one in his pictures and not the one pictured in the description. I don't have any desire to go into the number of ways i know this guy was trying to pull a fast one on us... but the point is this. He tried to dispute the item as not as described...and as is paypal's policy..the burden of proof was on the BUYER ... the case is deferred by paypal.

As for postal insurance... as a buyer ... it depends on how well i know the seller and how expensive/how desireable the item is for me.

As a seller...insurance is required...all the time no matter what the cost no questions asked. Sorry but no good has ever come of an uninsured item and while i know how reliable we are with our service, we always send our items in a trackable and insured manner. Most of our items fall in the $300-$3,000 range so it's really not a big deal for us or the buyer as it's a small percentage of the sale. The problem is when we bend our rules for clients who have individual items that are only 50 bucks or so.

Regards,

Black Sox Fan

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

email me

* I'm smart enough to know that there are a lot of people who know more than I do.

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Posted By: Damian

i work for the USPS and i am here to tell you i would insure anything and everything the way i see these people handle your packages.

And i'm not saying it because i give a crap about their revenue stream, i just wouldn't want anyone have their item ruined by the clerks in these offices. The carriers, like myself , usually are pretty good about being careful.

plus if you really value the item you are buying whats an extra buck or 2.

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Posted By: warshawlaw

as a means of forcing the seller to mail out the item, until I realized that an unscrupulous seller is going to simply pocket the insurance money too. Since then, I rarely use it as a buyer. As a seller, I clearly state in my listing that if the buyer does not opt for insurance, he assumes all risks of loss. Since I will not take paypal, its treatment of insurance never enters my mind.

My experience as a defrauded buyer has been that Paypal doesn't give a crap whether you actually received the thing you purchased. As long as you got a package, they will deny your claim for buyer protection. That's why I always pay for things via a credit card when it comes to Paypal.

Paypal also has a huge hole in its rules that mandates any seller use delivery confirmation to protect himself, even if he doesn't insure: absent proof of delivery paypal will refund a purchaser's money on the purchaser's say-so, even if the item got there.

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Posted By: Rick

Hi, the reason for the 3 weeks shipping time from Canada is that everything coming from Canada is being checked by customs agents. 3 weeks is pretty standard, and several months ago there was a 4-6 week backlog coming through customs. The USPS delivers the parcels pretty quickly once they make it into our system.

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Posted By: John B California

I agree with Marc. The USPS rate of $1.30 for $50 of insurance is outrageously high. No one believes they are losing one out of every 38 packages sent. In a truely competitive market, no would be able to charge that amount.

As a seller, I've saved alot of money by not paying for insurance under $50. Out of 500 transactions, maybe a few get lost. The dollar amount lost is far less than $1.30 x 500, or $650.

For high dollar stuff over $100, I always include it. Peace of mind is worth more than a few dollars.

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Posted By: Elliot

1) Rick, what you said just isn't true. I'm not saying that customs does not check random packages, but even in the ones that they open the delay is rarely more than a couple of days.
2) Why would anybody bother insuring a $50 item, it's barely worth your time going through the forms that have to be filled out to get your money back.
3) As others have said there's no way 2.6% of packages disappear or get damaged, so if you do multiple transactions you will come out ahead in the long run, and any one $50 loss will not bankrupt anybody.

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Posted By: Tom Boblitt

I work at UPS and have spent quite a bit of time at our sites on the Northern border dealing with volume TO and FROM Canada and less than 1% of UPS's volume actually gets inspected by U.S. or Canadian Customs. Physically opened and looked at type of inspected.

I can pretty much guarantee you the post offices are less than that. UPS and the other private carriers are also subjected to having to pay duties and taxes on ALL shipments, not just a few high value ones that people send through the postal services. Hence the unlevel, monopolized playing field.

UPS and FedEx charge around 40-50 cents per hundred dollars insurance with the first $100 being free. Free tracking too. Neither of those at the post office. As far as delivery confirmation that just a sham basically although it is 'proof' it was delivered. At least at UPS and FedEx you get intermediate point scanning so you know where your package was last when they lost it (that's for Tbob.....).

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Posted By: dan mckee

A no brainer. Postal Insurance is the 2nd largest scam behind priority mail. You have to give blood to get paid a claim. You have to prove that what was lost is really worth what you insured it for. Also, be careful, A package insured for large dollars TIPS OFF warehouse postal employees that something very expensive is inside. I have had a registered package ripped open and the contents removed, also several other highly insured packages cut open with items stolen. Best thing to do is have a 3rd party policy that will insure your cards in place and while being mailed. There are a few companies out there, Enecia comes to mind, Will Hays uses them. Their labels do not disclose the value of the items inside. Dan.

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Posted By: Anonymous

I was sending a graded card wrapped in bubble wrap sandwiched between two pieces of cardboard and put in a bubble mailer. She asked what it was and when I told her it was a graded baseball card she told me she worked in the claims department at one point and that the way it was being sent it probably wouldn't be covered by the insurance I was buying. I asked how I should send it and it sounded like it would pretty much have to be sent in a box. I imagine you would probably get a different story from another postal employee but she seemed pretty credible.

Adam B

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Posted By: Charlie O'Neal

Adam,

When you was getting your info was she trying to pitch priority mail? Everytime I go to the post office they try to pitch it to me even though in most cases it only takes an extra day or two without priority mail. I have had a claim for a graded card packaged like what you posted and didn't have a problem with getting the money (even though it took 7 weeks).

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Posted By: Anonymous

She wasn't pushing priority. I have not had a claim in a long time so I thought maybe they were tightening up the requirements. I imagine if you pursue it hard enough they would probably cover an item such as I was sending regardless.

Adam B

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Posted By: barrysloate

One thing I've discovered from over twenty years of sending packages is that different clerks have different threshholds re: what constitutes a properly packaged box, especially when it comes to registered mail. I send everything $50-700 first class insured and all above that registered. Never had a reg package lost ever; haven't had an insured package lost in at least ten years. However, this past summer when one of my packages got delayed in transit (it arrived two weeks late) I had to get the claim forms and I realized at that point it was going to be a tremendous hassle if the package was actually lost. I was also shocked to learn that the bar code on an insured package tells you absolutely nothing and the post office still could not find the package. Only delivery confirmation will do that.

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Posted By: Robert {Bigb13}

OK here's my problem. I won a card and the seller does not take paypal. That is fine with me not everybody does but I have sent him three emails asking for a total with insurance and he has not responed with a total. One email asked if the shipping included insurance but he responded no, but did not tell me how much it would be. This morning I sent him another email again asking for a total WITH insurance and I am waiting for a responce. When he relisted the card he ststed that it was because the first winner did not pay I am starting to see why. Rob