SCP Auctions and shipping cost

[William Todd]

I have always had good transactions in years past with Dan and SCP, especially Clay Hill. I think they are quality people. I think the auction houses could tweak their shipping charges somewhat in favor of their clients (us) especially concerning the elevated BP's. On that note, if you buy the Cal Ripken 1980 Charlotte card from Dan for $30,000 on ebay, I would imagine he would cut some slack on that $4.99 shipping charge. The auction houses should consider the same and not make shipping an added profit center.

[autograf]

It seems like many of them have set a floor for shipping charges and instances where folks buy a single card or a small lot, it seems like you're getting the shaft on shipping. Having worked for UPS for almost 30 years, I can tell you it's not cheap to ship stuff. Also owned a UPS store for about four years, so the packing side of it is tough too.

Legendary is the best packers in the industry. Period. They use top notch stuff, bought new, and don't scrimp on materials. What does that mean to the single card guy...not that much probably but they do a great job packing. REA and Heritage are top notch too. The smaller auctions don't spend the money that these big guys do on packing materials and don't have accounts with UPS or FedEx, use USPS, so it's tough to compare the two.

Regardless, like Jay said.....if you don't like it, voice your displeasure and if you don't get satisfaction, don't bid next time. Don't hesitate to tell them that's why you're not bidding as well. I agree with Jay on that whole they may be making a buck or two here, they're losing it there..,.you just hate to be the guy that feels like they're making it off of you all the time....

[sb1]

Having sold online for over 15 years and operating an AH for over 5 years, I have a pretty good feel on shipping costs.

We only use USPS and try to use the most economical way, which on larger lots is always the flat rate boxes. We try to factor in the appropriate shipping and enough to cover the prorated insurance we pay privately. At the end of each auction we are usually a bit short of the break even mark, but not enough to fret. Now we do not have a shipping department and we do recycle some packing materials, AND the USPS boxes are free. So we may have a slight advantage, but we try to keep the 1-3 card purchases that are $100-1000 at $6-12 depending on value, and the larger ones $14-20 again depending on the size, weight and value.

I will say many of the AH's I purchase from do packing to the overkill which is probably part of the inflated shipping. I recently received two SGC slabs in a box triple packaged that you could have fit 20 of them in. This is very much the norm for most of them. Extreme caution on the side of error, but again I would say a real shitstorm would hit if they threw your $2,000 card in a top loader and a legal (or even padded) envelope and you received it resembling a banana.

Most of their base cost seems to be with the carrier they use. Many folks detest one or all three of them, USPS, UPS, and FedEx, but you have to go with one of them. In all of the thousands of items we have sent thru the USPS, only one never got there. A postal employee stole it, the Postal Inspectors caught him and we eventually got the cards back through our insurance company. We have confidence in them and find their pricing to our liking

SO... after all of this I am not really sure I explained or justified anything, just some input that agrees with others, most AH's are not making a profit on the shipping/handling/insurance.

[CaramelMan]

Originally Posted by autograf

It seems like many of them have set a floor for shipping charges and instances where folks buy a single card or a small lot, it seems like you're getting the shaft on shipping. Having worked for UPS for almost 30 years, I can tell you it's not cheap to ship stuff. Also owned a UPS store for about four years, so the packing side of it is tough too.

Legendary is the best packers in the industry. Period. They use top notch stuff, bought new, and don't scrimp on materials. What does that mean to the single card guy...not that much probably but they do a great job packing. REA and Heritage are top notch too. The smaller auctions don't spend the money that these big guys do on packing materials and don't have accounts with UPS or FedEx, use USPS, so it's tough to compare the two.

Regardless, like Jay said.....if you don't like it, voice your displeasure and if you don't get satisfaction, don't bid next time. Don't hesitate to tell them that's why you're not bidding as well. I agree with Jay on that whole they may be making a buck or two here, they're losing it there..,.you just hate to be the guy that feels like they're making it off of you all the time....

I got a winning lot from Love Of the Game Auctions, and it was packed GREAT...maybe even overpacked! so even some smaller guys ship nicely

[ElCabron]

Originally Posted by William Todd

I have always had good transactions in years past with Dan and SCP, especially Clay Hill. I think they are quality people.

Well I wouldn't trust that shady Dan fella, but I couldn't have said better about SCP. Quality people all around. Especially my good friend Dave Kohler. I, too, have always had great transactions with SCP. The best part is their customer service and how well they take care of their customers. When SCP makes a mistake, like if they massively defraud a customer and misrepresent an item by doctoring photos of it and photoshopping damage out so it looks nice and purty in the catalog, or something like that, hypothetically speaking of course, they ALWAYS make it right. Instantly. Period. Just quality, quality people.

I mean, how can you not trust an auction house affiliated with the qualitiest quality person in all of Qualityville, Dave Kohler. Really do love that guy!

Go Dave! SCP rules!

-Ryan

[Jaybird]

Originally Posted by NoizeBringer

Well I wouldn't trust that shady Dan fella, but I couldn't have said better about SCP. Quality people all around. Especially my good friend Dave Kohler. I, too, have always had great transactions with SCP. The best part is their customer service and how well they take care of their customers. When SCP makes a mistake, like if they massively defraud a customer and misrepresent an item by doctoring photos of it and photoshopping damage out so it looks nice and purty in the catalog, or something like that, hypothetically speaking of course, they ALWAYS make it right. Instantly. Period. Just quality, quality people.

I mean, how can you not trust an auction house affiliated with the qualitiest quality person in all of Qualityville, Dave Kohler. Really do love that guy!

Go Dave! SCP rules!

-Ryan

Don't forget selling rebacked cards with no mention of that in the description. And muscling PSA to slab them as Altered - Authentic because they do contain some pieces of authentic cards. No problem there either. Totally above board.