I have bought and sold on eBay since 1996, and I've gotten a lot of great bargains along the way...but some of those great bargains have suddenly lost their "bargain" quality when the invoice arrives!

Ever won a gorgeous item on eBay, and excitedly realized that you just won it for a pittance...waaaay below what you would expect to pay in a store...only to have the low priced item soar up to five times the price with those shocking and often unrealistic "Shipping and HANDLING" fees?

Been there...done that.

It's called "sticker shock" at your favorite used car dealership...and if you're not very, very careful, and forget to read that fine print on the sticker on the window, you could end up paying an extra $300 bucks for that snazzy cigarette lighter than graces the dashboard.  :(

Same goes for reading all the fine print on that eBay auction item listing!

I've learned the hard way a number of times, but it's so easy to think that everyone selling on eBay is ethical and honest...and you jump in and just can't resist bidding!  I do it regularly.  I recently purchased a gorgeous lot of small, lightweight gemstones on eBay.  Lovely stones!  Stunning!  Not diamonds, mind you, but some super nice topaz and garnets...and I got them for a song!  Waaay less than I would have paid in my corner mall.

Then I got the invoice, and realized that the twenty-two stones I had bought (totaling just under $30) were going to cost me a whopping and completely unreasonable $85.00 in SH charges!  Good lord!  Does it really cost $29.00 to ship a one ounce package from Thailand?  Does it really cost $2.00 a stone for insurance to cover the $.99 I paid for the stupid rock in the first place?

The answer is NO! 

But what're ya gonna do when you've bid and won, and then you get slapped with outrageous SH fees?  You pay or risk negative feedback!  And you never bid on that seller's items ever again.

Same goes for those very real-looking Chinese "antique" statues that you can often pick up on eBay for a few measly bucks...plus that $195 SH charge!  Maybe you are getting a nice gilt wooden god of war for under $10...but after you pay the nearly $200 in SH, you might as well have gone to an antique store and bought a REAL Chinese antique, instead of a copy made in Hong Kong.

This little "Tibet Silver Antique" Buddha and Boys is selling for just 96 cents!   However, before I reported this dude for excessive SH, you could have this baby shipped to you for the tiny SH fee of only $79!   Now the dude says "ask me" in the SH field of his item description.  This statue is only about 8 Inches high.

EBay stresses time and again "Caveat Emptor...let the buyer beware!"

Read that fine print.  Never buy unless you fully understand the cost of SH.  Make sure you aren't being forced to pay insurance of $10 on an item you just paid $7.99 for.   If the seller "combines shipping" on multiple buys, make sure you understand whether all the items get shipped for one SH fee, or he just discounts the SH a buck for each additional item.

This lovely Breyer-sized horse statue (actually a Chinese copy of the Breyer Big Ben mold from a few years back) sells for prices ranging from under a buck to about $10...with SH from $68-$125 bucks!  It is not solid silver.  It is silver paint.

Last month I bid on several pretty gemstones from a certain seller, but won only ONE out of the dozen or so I had bid on.  The cost of the actual gemstone was only $1.75, but the bill I got asked me for nearly $20 for the privilege of buying one tiny half carat round semi-precious gemstone.  When I tried to bid on more of that seller's items to combine SH, I found that my bids were blocked!

Well, I cut line and lost the sinker, but all it cost me was the $1.75.  I e-mailed the dude and told him to keep the little sparkler and paid him the $1.75.  I told him it was my Christmas gift to him.  Of course he kept dunning me for the full $20 for a couple of weeks, until he finally got it through his head that I was not going to pay $18.00 for SH.  It was way cheaper for me.  (I removed him from my seller list.)

And please...if a Chinese seller won't give you the actual SH on the item description, and says, "e-mail me for SH price", don't automatically figure the SH is going to be reasonable.  He is most likely one that someone reported to eBay for charging $200 to ship a $10 item, and he is relisting with the extortionate SH under cover. 

And definitely watch out for the seller who states "Take our beautiful statue to your local museum for authentication.  Money back if the item is discovered to be a fake".

This guy sells a an item for $.01, and charges $80 (or more) SH.  He just made a neat $69.00 profit without having to pay any eBay fees.  You get the item and decide you want a refund because it's not real "antique" Tibetan Silver and Jade as the item description states, (it's just silver colored metal and green glass) and the seller happily offers to refund you the $.01 you paid for the item, but only after you ship it back to him so he can resell it.

The "Tibet Silver and Jade ring" below sells for under a buck.  SH is $11.00.  It can be shipped from China for under $6.00 airmail.  It is not solid silver.  It is silver wash.  It is not Jade...it is a cats-eye manufactured "stone", and mine feels like hard plastic.  I know, because I bought one to check it out.  But I only paid $6.00 SH.  Another wholesaler offers these "Jade and Silver" rings for $.25 a pop if purchased by the dozen.  SH?  A mere pittance at $50.00.

And if you get upset because it's nothing but base metal with silver wash and plastic?  Yup...he'll refund the $.99 just as soon as he gets the bauble back.

Gotta love these guys.  They have all the scams down pat.