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SHIPPING MATRIX - By Ounces Pounds Whatever you need
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MoonwishesStore
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Posts: 17389

PostPosted: Tue Feb 07, 2012 2:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Sellers here have recommended Endicia for insurance purposes, but time wise a customer has to wait 45 days to put in a claim


The problem with the 'wait' is that no one wants to wait for anything anymore. Last I checked at the PO, they won't even file a missing item report until 14 business days have passed, which is about 21 actual days counting weekends and possible holidays, and that is for 1st class in the US! The 45 day wait has a reason especially for international items and that is it can take up to a month at time to still get an item where it is going across the ocean. Just because someone 10,000 miles away thinks that they should have received something in less than a week, doesn't mean that is how the mail moves and insurance for a loss, the company has to be sure there is an actual loss. Once all claim forms are filed with endicia, the money is paid promptly. With endicia you can also cover the cost of shipping the item in the insured amount and the check comes to the seller. I've never heard of anyone getting money back from the PO. I NEVER tell a customer a package is insured until they start complaining that something hasn't showed up. I'm afraid if you tell too many people that their package is insured up front, that many more of them won't show up either!
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UknowUneedAnother



Posts: 157

PostPosted: Tue Feb 07, 2012 4:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The ONLY downside, to me with the Endicia is that it is at the 45 day cutoff point with Paypal. I don't think that "I" would be overly comfortable with an online seller telling "ME" that I needed to wait past Paypal's protection time, and so want to look into any and all other possible options that can collectively be aligned with each other, so that no one is at risk.
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wtcollectibles



Posts: 2728

PostPosted: Tue Feb 07, 2012 4:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

UknowUneedAnother wrote:
The ONLY downside, to me with the Endicia is that it is at the 45 day cutoff point with Paypal. I don't think that "I" would be overly comfortable with an online seller telling "ME" that I needed to wait past Paypal's protection time, and so want to look into any and all other possible options that can collectively be aligned with each other, so that no one is at risk.

I use Shipsurance rather than Endicia, but they say 45 days, too. I've been fortunate not to have many claims, but when someone contacts me with the "where is my car" message, I tell them that it is insured and that if it hasn't shown up in 30 days, I will refund them and start the insurance process. Almost everybody replies that they will wait a while longer. At 30 days I contact them again and offer to refund (I don't do it yet). Almost without exception, they say that they will wait a few more days, another week, till the weekend, etc. By then, the car has generally shown up and it's a moot point.

I guess if I start to get a lot of jerks and frauds, I will change my methods. But so far I've had good luck, few claims, and nice buyers. I even finally refunded a guy in Canada, and the car showed up after something like 52 days! He emailed me and asked for another invoice to pay me again. (I hadn't finalized the insurance yet, so I didn't get paid twice!) A couple of months ago, a guy in Australia ordered something for Christmas but it hadn't arrived by 12/25. I kept in touch and kept offering him a refund, but he was so nice and said he'd wait a little longer. It finally arrived around January 15! I find that by staying in touch, while at the same time "dragging out" the insurance process, the items have mostly shown up.

It just hasn't been a big deal for me. I know it isn't the same for everybody. My $0.02.
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HechtoHouse



Posts: 99

PostPosted: Wed May 16, 2012 6:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

flame wrote:
How simple! Smile

Thanks! Smile


Oh yeah, real simple. The matrix is anything but simple.
It is not needed and a hindrance to getting started here.
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MoonwishesStore
moderator


Posts: 17389

PostPosted: Thu May 17, 2012 8:18 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Oh yeah, real simple. The matrix is anything but simple.
It is not needed and a hindrance to getting started here.


You do realize that you were replying to a 6 year old post?

For many of us, the matrix is simple and is not a hindrance at all to selling on eccrater. Each seller has to decide for themselves which is the best way to charge for shipping. Some sellers revert to 2 or more stores so that their items in each store can ship via the same way and may be similar weights, etc. so that it is easier to set up a matrix.

For example if someone sells books and beanie babies. They would be better off having a book store so they can set their matrix up with media mail prices, and a beanie baby store to set up the matrix for the weights and shipping needs of the beanie babies.

There are many sellers here on ecrater all selling a variety of goods. You may want to seek out a seller that sells similar items to you and see how they are doing things. It might give you an idea. If you can't figure out the shipping systems here on ecrater and are so frustrated with it, there is also the choice of selling on another venue as there seems to be many of them.
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HechtoHouse



Posts: 99

PostPosted: Thu May 17, 2012 10:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

less than zero chance someone else is selling what I do. I have never seen how to search on here yet. Sell elsewhere? i have reasons for wanting to try Ecrater. The shipping is the biggest obstacle. So how do i search?????
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MoonwishesStore
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Posts: 17389

PostPosted: Thu May 17, 2012 11:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If you want to search the discussions you need to go to the top of this page and click on search with the magnifying glass icon. Then put into the different search boxes the words you might be looking for. It works like any other search on computers and sometimes you have to try several times to get the exact search and results you need. To search on the main ecrater go to www.ecrater.com and input what you are looking for into the serach box.

According to the categories you currently have set up by, looks like you are planning on selling books, magazines and photographs. Many sellers sell these item, just maybe not about drag racing. Unless you are selling framed photos, I would suspect most of them go by first class mail and the same with the magazines, since magazines with current advertisements (any advertisements for items still on the market basically) need to go first class not media mail and books can go media mail or first class depending on weight. If you want to use the matrix, I would split my store into a seperate store for the books assuming you have enough books to make that worthwhile (which I did when I was still selling books). If you only have 10 books to sell, I would try selling them on Amazon and forget the work of doing another store. Each column in the matrix can stand for one pound, two pounds, 3-4 pounds of books and the price is the media rate plus your handling fee. Your other two types of items can be in one store and the matrix can be used to show 1-5 ounces, then 6-13 ounces, then 1#, etc. Whatever type of average weight that will work for you.

It may be a little harder to have two stores, but it makes it much easier to have books although you can listed them with their shipping weight whichever column it corresponds to in the matrix. The big thing with the matrix is you DO NOT have to use it as ounces, pounds, grams, etc. (but you can). Each column as it gets progressively higher can be for average weights to ship your items. So if an average magazine costs X to ship, then you might have that as your first shipping amount in your matrix, and proceed from there. My matrix is set up by numbers of items since I go by average weights (occassionaly I get stung with something weighing a bit more, but I just eat that). My weight in the column 6 in the matrix is where I hit the 1 pound range to ship. Multiple orders are no problem since if your items have the correct shipping weight with the cost in the matrix as more items are added to an order, the shipping price goes up as it should.

Like I seid before, check what the other book sellers are doing and what other magazine sellers are doing. Hard to think that you are selling something so distinctly original that no one else would have anything LIKE it shipping wise. You also can't be so stuck on exact shipping costs and refunding anything that is more than actual postage. Many costs go into shipping an item and you need to charge for that. Unless your postage ends up coming to quite a few dollars too much, I wouldn't be giving out refunds for 'excess' shipping. The big on line sellers like Walmart, Amazon, etc. sure don't. Tehy charge what they charge and that is that.
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HechtoHouse



Posts: 99

PostPosted: Thu May 17, 2012 11:51 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I would rather burn my stuff than list on Amazon with all of its rules. Magazines have varying weights. The matrix is still a complex, unneeded waste
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HechtoHouse



Posts: 99

PostPosted: Thu May 17, 2012 11:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Making the matrix use ounces is something I keep hearing is possible. The explanations are incredibly obtuse and or complicated. Flat rate is the only way I could do this. I would need to forget international sales.
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elpereles



Posts: 3427

PostPosted: Fri May 18, 2012 8:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

HechtoHouse, I don't like eCrtaer's Shipping Matrix. It is the only bad thing I saw here in eCrater. You can read in the forum my comments about it. Obviously the Matrix isn't friend for seller trying to sell International, but the Matrix was never for me an obstacle to post and sell items in eCrater.
l
Also one more thing. Stop loosing your time arguing in all the forum. All that time you are loosing in the forum can be spend trying to understand how eCrater works.
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MoonwishesStore
moderator


Posts: 17389

PostPosted: Fri May 18, 2012 11:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Obviously the Matrix isn't friend for seller trying to sell International


Actually Elpereles, using the matrix when selling internationally is dependent on what you sell. I only use the matrix for shipping and handling for US and international sales and it works fine. I also sell a class of merchandise that all weighs around the same (flucuates 2-4 ounces per item) and so for me once I figured it out the matrix is easy for all postage.

Not saying everyone can do it, but it is possible and I'm sure many of us here are doing it. Just didn't want anyone reading this thread to think it is impossible to use the matrix for international shipping since that isn't necessarily so. I suspect that if you are having trouble using the matrix for international sales, you are probably having some trouble with it for US sales as well.
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elpereles



Posts: 3427

PostPosted: Fri May 18, 2012 8:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have items that weight 0.03lb to 2lb. So for my the Matrix isn't friend for International sales. I was thinking to tweak for ounces, but it means manually edit near 700 item one by one. It is time that I can prefer use to post more items than edit.

I just hope that finally the eCrater Team add more fill blanks for UK and AU or finally decide to use a custom Matrix table.
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HechtoHouse



Posts: 99

PostPosted: Fri May 18, 2012 9:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I sell and have sold on many other sites. None use anything remotely like the matrix and scales. I hope Ecrater will switch to something simple and flexible. Something not requiring "tweaking" and a huge learning curve.
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tiptopmgr



Posts: 9

PostPosted: Wed May 30, 2012 8:54 am    Post subject: Can I put ounces rather than pounds when listing? Reply with quote

Hello all.

I am using the shipping matrix for the smaller weight scale...1 pound, 2 pound, etc.

My question is this. When listing an item, am I able to put in ounces rather than 1 pound or 2 pound.

I am mainly listing media mail items and also wanting to ship to Canada, so this would be helpful if I am able to do this. If I am able to, how would I put the weight in for ounces when listing? For 1 pound I just put 1 but I do not know what to put for say an 8-ounce item.

I thought I had another question but now I cannot remember lol. I've been wrapping my brain around the shipping, so lots of info at one time. I may post another question in here about shipping later.

Thanks Very Happy

Editing to add: "Making the matrix use ounces is something I keep hearing is possible. The explanations are incredibly obtuse and or complicated. Flat rate is the only way I could do this. I would need to forget international sales."

I just saw this quoted above. There were lots of pages to read through, so I did not notice this before. Does this mean that we cannot enter ounces when we are listing an item?

I also just remembered my second question. On the shipping matrix, for the 16+, would I enter the cost increase for each additional 2 pounds over 16 as being say, for example, $1.50 or do I have to use what I put for 16 pounds, which was $9.99 plus $1.50 totaling $11.49 in the 16+ area? I hope this makes sense.
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cosmicray



Posts: 7286

PostPosted: Wed May 30, 2012 12:45 pm    Post subject: Re: Can I put ounces rather than pounds when listing? Reply with quote

tiptopmgr wrote:
My question is this. When listing an item, am I able to put in ounces rather than 1 pound or 2 pound.

The shipping matrix is very simple minded. You can redefine the meanings of the columns, but you must do it for all items in that store. Every item listed in the store must be entered using whatever system you have chosen the shipping matrix to represent.

And you cannot mix an atypical definition of the shipping matrix with USPS Calculated shipping. If you enable USPS Calculated shipping, then you must use the shipping matrix to represent pounds.
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