I'm going to start selling, I need some help

[NES_Rules]

I really need to sell off some duplicates, but I've never sold anything online before. Actually, I've never had to ship anything, which is what I'm asking about now; how do I ship stuff? I've been saving used boxes and packing materials from work, but I'm lost after that.
So, I've got a few questions for you seasoned sellers.
1) Which carrier? USPS, FedEx, UPS, DHL? What do yo guys usually go with?
2) How do you figure out what shipping costs will be? Do you get an estimate based on weight, charge the buyer that much, and hope it costs that much to actually ship?

I guess that's all the questions for now, but I'll surely have some more once those are answered. And what I do sell, I'll put up here first, those who help could get a nice discount

Mods, if this belongs in a different board, feel free to move it.

[SparkB]

Hmmm doubles eh  ?? What do ya got, NES?? If so  im interested!

As for the selling thing,  one thing you can  do is go online to  Canada/US post and put in your weight, dimensions, ect and it will  give you and estimate of the shipping price to a specifiec location. But ebay doesnt work well with this, since how can you possibly give someone the exact shipping price before you  know who  will buy it. But if you sell on here it should be a problem.  I  ordered alot from ebay, from the US and it has always arrived by canada post.  FOr bigger parcels thinsg like UPS and purolator would work better because of tracking number,  but these companies tend to  add  customs fees that the seller nor buyer can  calculate until it arrives and you have to pay and sign to get the item.

[Tan]

but these companies tend to  add  customs fees that the seller nor buyer can  calculate until it arrives and you have to pay and sign to get the item.

Personally I refuse to deal with any American seller who will only ship UPS to Canada. I bought a loose Genesis deck for parts a few years ago, the shipping/customs was like $10-12, but the brokerage fees that UPS slapped on ended up being over $55 on top of the shipping total. Nearly $70 in shipping for a 1 cent auction LOL, let alone the ridiculous wait times and odd schedules if you need to pick it up at the depo yourself. Some brokerage fees were expected, but that was ridiculous.

I never blamed the seller, they wouldn't have known. But you never know who you deal with who may try to take a strip out of your hide for unsatisfactory service you have no control over. Stick with USPS for parcels outside Continental US, you'll be doing many people a favor.

[BadEnoughDude]

I use USPS for everything. It's convenient and reasonably priced.

[SparkB]

Yea custom fees can kill ya,  when the ps3 came out a while back, i was the one that went to  ebay to  buy one,  why?? well i just really wanted to play it early and thought it would  be a problem getting one here in our small city at the walmart, boy was i wrong, walmart barely sold any, wii's yes , but no  one here bought the ps3 on release. Anwyay, when i  bought it from ebay, i got it good price,  from the US, so everything was great, but it arrived.......the custom fees was 240$....i mean what the hell is that, it was rough, i ended up paying 900$ or less,  for the ps3 that originally i thought i had a good deal. I once read in an  article that  certain items fall out of the custom fees,  and guess what, video games and consoles fall into those categories, im not sure why but the article seemed pretty  sure that those items are not in the category for custom fees. Whether its rihgt or wrong i have no clue, i never went looking up on it because i  had already  received the ps3. The only way to  avoid customs is by putting  the price on the parcel low,  like 10 $ or so , and no fees will be applied,  although no one will  cover you item if its lost, kinda of lose win situation,  but  why should fees be applied when  the console was already purchased  in the US? Tax were paid already  ect,  basically somebody is getting alot of money for those fees a second time around. 

[Tan]

Yea custom fees can kill ya,  when the ps3 came out a while back, i was the one that went to  ebay to  buy one,  why?? well i just really wanted to play it early and thought it would  be a problem getting one here in our small city at the walmart, boy was i wrong, walmart barely sold any, wii's yes , but no  one here bought the ps3 on release. Anwyay, when i  bought it from ebay, i got it good price,  from the US, so everything was great, but it arrived.......the custom fees was 240$....i mean what the hell is that, it was rough, i ended up paying 900$ or less,  for the ps3 that originally i thought i had a good deal. I once read in an  article that  certain items fall out of the custom fees,  and guess what, video games and consoles fall into those categories, im not sure why but the article seemed pretty  sure that those items are not in the category for custom fees. Whether its rihgt or wrong i have no clue, i never went looking up on it because i  had already  received the ps3. The only way to  avoid customs is by putting  the price on the parcel low,  like 10 $ or so , and no fees will be applied,  although no one will  cover you item if its lost, kinda of lose win situation,  but  why should fees be applied when  the console was already purchased  in the US? Tax were paid already  ect,  basically somebody is getting alot of money for those fees a second time around. 

In my case I think the customs was like a couple dollars or something which wasn't a big deal, and the shipping only like $10. The Item value was extremely low to keep the customs reasonable. But I couldn't get a straight answer from UPS as to why the brokerage fees were nearly 5 times that of the shipping/customs.

It's like how one ant will only give you a minor bite you'll probably ignore, but 10,000 combined will eat you alive.

The best thing you can do for your buyers regardless of what your selling, is keep in contact with them every step of the way. Emailing them the day you send it goes a long way to keeping them assured of good intentions.

Don't overwrap either. An unneccessary extra layer of wrapping from trying to stay on the "safe" side could bump the package into the next higher level of cost without really offering any more protection because it requires a slightly larger box or tips the scales a bit.

[NES_Rules]

Thanks for the help guys, but I think the only way I'm going to learn how to do this is if I just do it. So watch out for some of my posts.

[DefaultGen]

Everyone is just going on about custom's fees so i'll see if I can help you out more (assuming you really haven't shipped ANYTHING).  Ok if you have a substantial amount of carts and have never shipped ANYTHING but you'd like to start selling online...

- Go buy a case of #0 100-500 bubble mailers on Ebay.  Should cost ~$15 shipped for 100.

- Buy at least 100 (50 double sided) shipping labels.  Get the cheapo 2-per-page kind.  200 will run around $9 shipped.

- Find a scale, a common food scale if you have one in your house for a while, if you plan on selling a lot you can get a cheap electronic scale off ebay for a bit less than $20 shipped.  Don't get into a bidding war for this, they're listed all the time for <$20 shipped.

- Use Paypal shipping (or whatever mail service online... I just really like Paypal's setup)  Just google "Paypal Ship Now" and it will be the first result.  You have to set up Paypal to use your 2-per-page mailers, it isn't hard to figure out.  It forces you to buy DC (at a reduced rate of around $0.17, free for priority) which is nice.  No DC form to fill out either, I hate doing that at the post.

- Drop stuff off at the post office, schedule a pick up, or if it's small enough, drop it in a mailbox.

Links:
#0 Mailers
2-per-page Shipping Labels
Postal Scale
Paypal USPS Shipping

That's just how I do it, I dunno how anyone else does.  For boxed games, I reuse boxes that are sent to me, I have a huge stash of boxes, bubble wrap and peanuts for this purpose.

- Shipping to Canada, work it out with your seller cause of customs.  You have to goto the PO and get a customs form to fill out.  Paypal is too stupid to handle international shipping online.

- In a mailer, most NES games weigh 5oz or so, so expect to pay around $1.99 shipping if you use Paypal shipping.  I would charge $2.50 or so to ship an NES game to be safe.

- Flat Rate Boxes are your friend.  If you're shipping... 12 or 13 games (some number around that) they fit perfectly into the box and don't require a lot of packing materials.

- Do you REALLY mean to say that you're an NES collector and you've managed alone without shipping ANYTHING?  You're either a hero or you have very deep pockets!

I hope that was at least a little helpful and not overly basic 

[NES_Rules]

Thanks, that does help a lot.

Everyone is just going on about custom's fees so i'll see if I can help you out more (assuming you really haven't shipped ANYTHING).  Ok if you have a substantial amount of carts and have never shipped ANYTHING but you'd like to start selling online...

- Go buy a case of #0 100-500 bubble mailers on Ebay.  Should cost ~$15 shipped for 100.

I think for now, I've saved enough boxes, packing peanuts, and bubble wrap from work. But it depends on how quickly stuff sells.

- Find a scale, a common food scale if you have one in your house for a while, if you plan on selling a lot you can get a cheap electronic scale off ebay for a bit less than $20 shipped.  Don't get into a bidding war for this, they're listed all the time for <$20 shipped.

There is a real nice scale at work, so next time I go, I will take a variety of games to get an idea of how much stuff weighs. And I will be looking for one of my own too. Hopefully I can get a cheap one at a garage sale or something.

- Use Paypal shipping (or whatever mail service online... I just really like Paypal's setup)  Just google "Paypal Ship Now" and it will be the first result.  You have to set up Paypal to use your 2-per-page mailers, it isn't hard to figure out.  It forces you to buy DC (at a reduced rate of around $0.17, free for priority) which is nice.  No DC form to fill out either, I hate doing that at the post.

I guess this is the part I was most confused about. I'm not signed up for PayPal, but I suppose it's about time I do. So I couldn't view the pages in that link. So I assume this is how it works; the buyer transfers the money to me (including shipping) I then buy a shipping label from PayPal with that money, print it out, stick it on the box and put it in a mailbox or drop off at the Post Office?
And what does DC stand for?

- Do you REALLY mean to say that you're an NES collector and you've managed alone without shipping ANYTHING?  You're either a hero or you have very deep pockets!

Yep, I've never shipped anything, the closest I've done is send my iPod back, but it was just a matter of pulling off the outer shipping label and putting it in a mailbox.
I think I'm just really lucky. I get all my stuff in the wild, so it's all cheap enough to buy on my income. This past year I bought 800+ games and spent around $900 for systems, games, and everything else. So it works out to be less than $1 per game in the end, which I really am grateful for and hope it continues. I'm not selling because I need the money really, more I need the space.

[DefaultGen]

I guess this is the part I was most confused about. I'm not signed up for PayPal, but I suppose it's about time I do. So I couldn't view the pages in that link. So I assume this is how it works; the buyer transfers the money to me (including shipping) I then buy a shipping label from PayPal with that money, print it out, stick it on the box and put it in a mailbox or drop off at the Post Office?
And what does DC stand for?

Paypal is a nice thing to have.  When you sign up you can (and should since it confirms your ID) add a bank account and credit card.  You can pay with either of these and when you receive money you can transfer it to your bank account or use it to ship things (or buy other things).  But yes you have it right, the buyer will pay you with paypal, you use paypal shipping, fill in their info, print out a neat little thingy, put it on the box and drop it off at your post office.

I highly recommend upgrading your Paypal account to premier (it doesn't cost anything).  It lets you accept credit card Payments.  If you've seen people who say "non-cc paypal only" it's because they have a personal account, and not everyone has Paypal funds handy all the time (on Ebay, forget it, you're going to need premier).  The only disadvantage of premier is that it takes away ~4% of incoming funds.  You can use ppcalc.com to calculate how much more someone needs to send you so you get the right amount.  You'll get used to the fees associated with selling, they suck.

DC = Delivery Confirmation.  You should *always* use it as it proves that a package was delivered somewhere.

Also if you're planning on selling carts individually, you might want to get a case of bubble mailers only because shipping costs are absurd these days.  For the 15 bucks you'll spend on a case you'd save a hell of a lot compared to shipping single carts in boxes.

Just a nice rundown of USPS services:

First Class: 13oz and under, generally costs $2-3 and takes a couple days.  Awesome.

Priority: Costs a minimum of $4-5 and takes 2-3 days.  For 1-2lbs, this is your best bet.  Personally the cost is too high for anything more.  This also forces you to measure your packages which is really annoying.

Parcel Post: Teh ultra cheap.  For 1-2lbs it actually costs a few cents more than priority so just use Priority for those.  This mail is usually a lot cheaper than priority for things like consoles and huge lots.  It takes up to 10 days or so, but usually takes half that for me.  Generally if shipping is unspecified, I use parcel.  No measuring either.

[agz381]

I ship USPS or UPS Ground. Anything large and Domestic is a definate UPS. Anything smaller, like a Game console and some games all the way down to 1 game should go USPS.
 Our town has a 24 hr. postal machine so we just go drop the stuff on the scale, pay with a credit card and drop it in the box 24 hrs/7 days...its in the lobby where the PO Boxes are so its always open.
 1 bubble mailed game is roughly $1.50 + evelope cost. 1st class domestic. It's about $1.10 more to add DC since they don't do DC on 1st class, it has to be bumped up to a "package" class.
  I will never use fed-ex again...never ever....I sent 2 large boxes ( section antique cabinet ). They broke it before even getting it where it had to go, less than a 2 hr drive from my house. The boxes were marked UP and Fragile in huge letters, yet when they returned the boxes to me they were on their backs or sides.
  UPS is good because they track everything. And they are "fair" for domestic shipping. They also deliver 2x a time like clockwork, where USPS and Fed-ex are on their own schedules.
  Internation shipping is a USPS must. Priority International Flat rate envelopes will be your friend for large or expensive items. You always know what the cost will be. $11 for the envelope.. i forget the box.
  I haven't had to ship more than 10-15 games at a time but i've been told you can fit roughly 26 games into a flat rate priority box ($8 shipped domestic)
 I use alot of bubble mailer #1 and 3s. 1's fit 2 games comfortably 4 tight, and 3's fit 4 comfortably and 6 fairly easily. use 0's for single carts.
  Thats about all i can type atm, my son is climbing all over me now. PM me if you need more help.
Good Luck