How Much is too Much Shipping Charges- Auction Houses

[Exhibitman]

It is a complete rip-off and has caused me to rethink making bids on low price items with AHs, because between the vig and the shipping it adds a huge percentage to the price. I won a $125 card in the most recent Legendary auction. Legendary billed me as follows:

Sub-Total: $125.00
Buyers Premium: $24.38
Shipping: $16.46
Total: $165.84

$16.46 to ship one PSA-graded card worth less than $150! They claim it is $13.50 to ship via Fed Ex Ground [they won't just mail it to me because the post office is supposedly unreliable], $2.50 'handling' [materials I suppose] and $1.46 for insurance.

Let's start with the shipping charge itself. I happen to be a Fed Ex business customer so I have access to Fed Ex Ground's website calculator. I can ship an 8 oz package [2x the weight of a single PSA card packed in a bubble mailer with stiffeners] to Legendary from the delivery address at my office using a 12 x 9 x 1 box with a declared value of $150 for $11.48. WTF?!?!? How is their big shipping company rate worse than my little vendor single item rate? What's even more galling, I can make the same shipment through the mail for under two bucks w/o insurance, under $5 with insurance. And have been doing so for years with virtually no losses.

For the next round of stinkum on the rose, let's talk insurance. Rather than insuring to value on a per-item basis, any normal business would purchase its own inventory policy on consigned items. As a vendor, all shipments are covered up to an overall policy limit that I can choose, with a small deductible per claim that I can also choose, meaning that I don't even have to buy separate insurance. Even worse for me personally, I have my own shipping insurance from CIA with my card collection insurance so I am paying twice for coverage.

In my humble opinion one or two things is going on: shipping is a huge profit center and/or since it is an entirely externalized cost, the AHs just don't give a damn what it costs since it is all coming out of the buyer's pocket.

FWIW, after I gave Legendary the above info they offered to shave $2 off the bill. Thanks. Now I can get a small coffee...

Now, let's compare with the single card I won in the recent Love of the Game auction:

Sub-Total: $500.00
Buyers Premium: $90.00
Shipping: $8.95
Total: $598.95

That's how you get repeat business; way to go Al.