We're sellers -- let's be fair to our sponsors: eBay, PayPal, and the buyers. We lose nothing by doing so.

I have to take issue with one guide regarding shipping and 'handling' and the further supports offered in that review. It begins by agreeing that $10 is too much s&h for a DVD, and then takes issue with the fairness of a $2 s&h fee -- fairness to the seller. The reviewer uses First Class Mail, which is a little less than Media Mail, as a base in his guide, and then goes on to add 60 cents delivery confirmation 'recommended by eBay,' gas, and etc. etc. etc. to bolster the claim that $3.99 is a fair shipping cost for a DVD.

However, eBay provides all of us with the USPS services through which we can mail items for less than what it costs at the post office itself,

• so a $2.00 shipping fee for a DVD is fair to all and more than covers the cost of postage (at $1.35, delivery confirmation at $0.15, and an envelope) simply printing up the postage at home, with the further benefit of having our bookkeeping done for us as far as whether or not we have shipped an item.
• When you use the USPS print postage at home feature, through eBay and/or Pay Pal, delivery confirmation is only about 15 cents and is free with Priority Mail (which also provides us with free packaging courtesy of the USPS).
• The postman will pick up our packages for free and will also deliver us priority shipping boxes for free, so 'handling fees' for gas and packaging seem -- to me, in my world, IMHO, my way of thinking, my concept of eBay as a place to sell 'stuff' -- more an affectation than a reality.
• Furthermore, inflating the postage fees with miscellaneous handling charges (be they necessary, as in the case of envelopes, or unnecessary, as in the case of gas and 60-cent delivery confirmation), is a way to avoid paying eBay the fees it charges sellers for providing this wonderful venue: eBay takes its Final Value fee only out of the price of the item sold.
• Beyond that is the matter of PayPal fees: it charges us, the sellers, a percentage for providing its service of handling the payments for us. If we don't want to pay PayPal fees ourselves out of the price we sell an item for, we should accept money orders and checks in its stead, passing the fees directly on to the buyer. I have begun to do this myself with items that sell for under $5.00 -- the point at which the base fee from PayPal for transactions is equal to the percentage fee. (I have also had to remove PP as an option on those items, as I cannot depend on all buyers to read the request to send a check or m.o. for them, rather than PayPal). I have also, then, begun to start auctions at no less than $4.99 for the same reason, if I wish to use Pay Pal as a means of payment for completed auctions.

This is a long-winded way to say that people come to eBay looking for bargains, and those bargains should not be 'rounded up' by added postage fees. Further, eBay is offering us a wonderful venue founded on mutual trust, and sellers should do our best to make sure that it gets its rightful percentage without any 'squeeze' on our end in terms of postage and handling.

We're sellers -- let's be fair to our sponsors: eBay, PayPal, and the buyers. We lose nothing by doing so.

Update note: 13 July 2006.  $3.99 is not an outrageous price to pay for s&h on a DVD, though high.  However, if a buyer were to pay that, it would make more sense to pay $4.05 priority; online postage includes free delivery confirmation that way, and the shipper can use a free post-office supplied envelope.

I assume that the one person who rated this as unhelpful is the person who wrote in defense of higher than actual shipping fees.  It is up to the intelligent buyer to include in the cost the price of shipping and to buy from sellers who keep their costs low.

An exemplary seller is Vintage Treasures by Judy, who sells small items and charges basically the same postage for as many as you buy (although since postage rates have gone up, she has added $0.50 to cover additional postage incurred by the weight of a large number of  small items).

Last, as of 14 June, eBay has started more closely monitoring the practice of high shipping charges that some sellers use to offset low item prices, which is a flagrant avoidance of paying eBay its listing and closing fees, so we will begin to see some relief from sellers who offer, say, $7.00 items at $0.99 and charge $9.99 shipping and handling for those items which might actually cost $2.00 to ship.