Combined invoice problem

[marschenegger]

Hello.
A buyer in the U.S. bid on and won 5 cheap items from me recently. The total for just the items is $5.61. I sent the buyer a combined invoice. The shipping was $2 x 5 = $10.00, but I added an $8 discount since combined shipping does not cost extra. I made sure to receive a copy of the invoice that eBid sent to the buyer. Right at the top of the invoice, it states this:

eBid Invoice from marschenegger
The total for this invoice is CA$5.61.

This is incorrect. It should say something like "The total cost of your purchases is CA$5.61 (not including shipping)". The reason it does this is that the buyer must select the shipping option for each item to complete the invoice. I always give at least two shipping options, even on international orders. Had I offered only one option, that option would be chosen automatically and the invoice would give the total including shipping. So the buyer sent me a money order in the amount of $5.61 US, probably because he saw the statement above and did not bother to look at the rest of the invoice. I will not cash this money order because I need $7.61 Cdn, and the exchange rate does not make up for the $2 shortfall. I have already sent the buyer an e-mail explaining this, though I don't expect this will do much good. The buyer sent me the wrong currency (I list everything in Canadian dollars), so I'm assuming he'll be less than understanding that the invoice he received is totally misleading through no fault of my own (unless offering more than one shipping option is a cause for assessing fault).

The invoicing system needs to be fixed for combining several items. The current system is silly for making the buyer pick the shipping option for each item. If the items are combined, they will be traveling together, so there's no need to require more than one decision. There should also be flexibility in allowing the seller to change the cost of the shipping service when combining items. Forcing the seller to add a discount after the individual charges are added up is silly. I hate to say this, but eBay does the combined invoice properly, and their system should be emulated. Those of you opposed to everything eBay will probably howl at this suggestion, but eBay does not own the copyright to the logistics behind their checkout system. They happen to do it right in spite of who they are. With their system, the quagmire in which I find myself would never occur. If eBid's invoicing system is not fixed soon, I might have to circumvent it and contact buyers outside of eBid... and that's a disaster waiting to happen.

[SalusLibrorum]

I totally agree.

We've been asking for the multipurchase invoices to be fixed for a while now, and now the site seems to be getting busier it's something a lot of people are running into.

We've also got the problem that if you offer collection in person, it's quite possible to get a negative invoice, if the buyer chooses that option but a discount has been given for postage rates.

It's nice to have a multi-purchase invoice which was developed because we really needed it, but I can't help feeling that it wasn't tested properly. It's a mess and needs sorting out quick.

[marschenegger]

If the invoicing system is not going to be fixed, the very least they could do is simply change the wording at the top of the invoice that is emailed to the buyer. I'm sure that it is the result of seeing the words "The total for this invoice is CA$5.61" that the buyer never thought twice of checking the entire invoice to see how the total was calculated and whether shipping was included. Another work-around solution would be for me to simply eliminate the expensive shipping options on all items below, say, $10.00. About 95% of the time, the buyer will choose regular mail, the cheapest option, even when combining multiple small items. That way, the buyer does not have to decide what option to use and the invoice they receive will not have to be completed by them to create the correct total. Workaround solutions, however, are poor substitutes for real solutions, and I agree that the invoice system needs to be overhauled.

[MHTTrading]

It does sound like its quite a mess and certainly needs to be sorted out pretty quickly.

[marschenegger]

UPDATE

The buyer has contacted me and has agreed to send the missing funds for shipping. As an adherent to Murphy's Law, I openly expect the worst so that the opposite happens, lol. Anyhow, it's unfortunate to have to hold up this transaction over a couple of dollars, but without hearing from the buyer, it's hard to know if I'm dealing with a genuine person who made a genuine mistake or if I'm stuck with the kind of person of which horror stories concerning eBay are told. You know, the kind of person who deliberately finds loopholes and causes problems. I thought about sending the items anyhow, but then I would not want to deal with the same person in the future, and that's not fair. Part of being a good seller means trying to help buyers learn about eBid and what are considered reasonable expectations of sellers.

I have also used the bulk edit facility to change the shipping options for all my auctions under $10. So next time someone buys a bunch of cheap items from me, they will get a combined invoice without being misinformed about the total owing, and if the buyer wants secure shipping, they will be informed to contact me with their request. Of course, now that I have taken this measure, Murphy's Law will kick in and I'll never get another multi-item sale Problem solved, lol.

[florida33549]

Invoicing for multipurchases has been a disaster for quite a while. Many requests have been submitted to admin to fix the problem but as of yet, it remains a problem. Maybe when the 'new' site is up and running, invoicing will have been addessed. Hope is eternal.

[deltadelta48]

Another case of opening a can of worms to allow buyer to select how YOU are going to ship the item. Easier to select the best way(s) and just use it without their imput..

Not doing this makes for numerous emails and delays and buyers might goof up, i.e. select 3 differnt ways, pick wrong way, etc, and more conversation to sort it out. Invoice is not one step but becomes several steps before it is finalized and paid.

Combined invoices work fine if 1. SELLER selects way single item ships and marks this clearly in listig (and this remains on inovice DESPITE multiple item purchase which CHANGES IT of course) and 2. SELLER selects way combined package ships and puts it into a note to seller. It is obvious that a box with 20 items is not shipping by single item method, so why bother to try to change it as many people have suggested? Just tell buyer how you are gonig to send it.

The received invoice may say $5.61 (w/o shipping) at the top, but the proper breakdown is at the bottom, $5.61 + $4.00 or whatever. and then it says Total = $9.61. So it is correct.

The buyer does NOT have to pick the shipping method if you leave it locked in for the single item, and simply tell them in the note that you are combining and shipping by such and such. They will just pay and that is it. It is only more complicated when you allow buyers to start to select options. If you do not give them the options, they simply pay the invoice and check out if they agree with it.

I use combined invoices for almost every sale, and I can't not see why people think it is broken and must be fixed.

[marschenegger]

First off, the e**y checkout system works for multiple items and that includes situations with different shipping options available. So I don't know why I should HAVE to limit buyers as to the options available. Their invoice system allows the buyer to pick one shipping method for all the items combined together. Don't tell me there's nothing wrong with the eBid invoice system when it allows buyers to pick different shipping methods for different items that are supposed to be travelling together. The whole point of combining items on one invoice is to combine shipping, so why the system would have this back door to give buyers the opportunity to have combined items shipped separately is beyond my comprehension. And unfortunately, we have to declare the discount before they even get to choose the shipping method(s). It's totally backwards and convoluted.

You do whatever you please in telling your buyers how they must receive their items. I want to avoid situations where I list only the cheapest shipping option (regular mail) and then the buyer feels free to make a claim saying they did not receive the item(s) and they were never offered a secure shipping method. Even if the PayPal dispute resolution process was fair and equitable, I would be made to look like a monster if the buyer claimed to have been given zero choice in shipping options. Neither do I want to lose potential buyers because I have chosen only a secure shipping method that costs 10x what regular mail would cost. In my opinion, I don't think registration or tracking are necessary on items worth under $50, but the option needs to be there for buyers who want it. Having options also tells buyers implicitly "I trust you to make the decision that is right for you." Not all of them know they can abuse PayPal and claim any item is not received to get their money back. Some will choose regular mail knowing that they are taking a risk and they are willing to assume the responsibility behind that decision. Laws in different countries saying that the buyer has to get the item or it's the seller's responsibility to take the loss are a crock. That's like saying that if I lend a screwdriver to my friend and he pokes his eye out with it, I have to compensate him because it's my fault to letting him choose to use my screwdriver. I don't say it in my listings, but any buyer that chooses regular mail and then initiates a chargeback against me will be blackballed from my listings. I don't tolerate people making me responsible for their mistakes.

THE CURRENT INVOICE SYSTEM MIGHT WORK if eBid allowed sellers to add shipping options to the invoice after the listings have ended. Again, e**y has this ability built into their checkout system, and it's a good idea. What are we afraid of by avoiding this option? If anything, e**y's system is too liberal. Not only can you add shipping options to the invoice, but you can remove some that were promised to the buyer while the listings were active. That is deceitful, and I don't blame eBid for wanting to avoid the situations that can arise due to sellers changing things on a buyer. There is a suitable compromise as I see it. Why not allow the seller to add shipping options not previously listed but NOT to allow existing shipping options to be removed or changed? Then I could list just one shipping option with my active items, and after an item sells and the closes, I can either add options to the invoice OR I can tell the buyer "Here's the total with regular mail, contact me for a revised invoice that includes other shipping options (such as...)."

Anyhow, the whole discussion is mainly of academic interest because:
a) it appears that eBid administrators are totally uninterested in this discussion and in changing the invoice system, and
b) the invoice system lacks flexibility and is incompatible with the requirements of PayPal, the payment method chosen by almost every one of my international buyers to date.

In fact, the only reason I find myself in the current situation is that a buyer in the US decided to send me a money order, totally circumventing going through the invoicing system when he saw what appeared to be the final total owing at the top of the invoice. I have not yet had a Paypal user send me money without going through the invoice I sent to them, but it could happen. Completing the invoice system makes the buyer realize they have to add shipping to the cost of the items.

[SalusLibrorum]

I don't know the situation in the States, so I'm not going to presume to comment on deltadelta's system except to say that it seems to me that some buyers in further away locations are going to get ripped off because of the single rate he/she charges. Certainly over here if we tried something like that, we'd have a lot of complaints about overcharging by huge amounts.

It doesn't work over here, and I don't understand why deltadelta can't understand why his/her system doesn't apply to the rest of the world where postal systems are completely different, not just an extension of the US one.

I was with you marschenegger until you got to the bit about blackballing anyone who made a chargeback because they used regular mail. Things do get lost in the post (the Royal Mail manage to lose one around every 9 months for me), and it's not the buyer's fault that RM lose it, the buyer shouldn't have to pay a silly amount just to ensure that it gets to where it's addressed. I think it's reasonable in that case to just refund and make a compensation claim, then seller and buyer don't lose out, and the cost is defrayed to the people responsible for the loss. Doesn't the Canadian postal service pay compensation for lost packages?

[marschenegger]

I was with you marschenegger until you got to the bit about blackballing anyone who made a chargeback because they used regular mail. Things do get lost in the post (the Royal Mail manage to lose one around every 9 months for me), and it's not the buyer's fault that RM lose it, the buyer shouldn't have to pay a silly amount just to ensure that it gets to where it's addressed. I think it's reasonable in that case to just refund and make a compensation claim, then seller and buyer don't lose out, and the cost is defrayed to the people responsible for the loss. Doesn't the Canadian postal service pay compensation for lost packages?

I guess I should have qualified what I said with a statement to the effect that the things I sell (coins and paper money) cannot be insured by Canada Post. When I say these items cannot be insured, under certain circumstances they can be, but the system is really convoluted. It was easier years ago when Canada Post said flatly that they would not insure coins and paper money under any circumstances. Also, PayPal didn't exist beyond 10 years ago. Anyhow, when CP became an official distributor of Royal Canadian Mint Products, they had to bend the rules and allow insurance for coins. They used to say that they would not insure documents, and paper money is considered a document (it is legal tender printed and distributed by the Bank of Canada). Now they say they don't insure "paper". Those are the words I hear every time I bring a package to the post office and I ask for insurance. So I usually end up telling fibs to get my packages insured because CP employees are like most normal people in the sense that they don't understand the difference between regular paper money used as legal tender and numismatic collectables (i.e. merchandise). Even if the CP rules allowed paper money to be insured, I'm not sure that it would prudent to walk into the post office and declare that your package contains rare old paper money worth X hundreds of dollars.

Merchandise can be insured by the post office, and I understand laws that say it is up to sellers to insure the items they deliver. But what about my situation when I can't buy insurance or I am breaking the post office rules to obtain insurance? I believe at least some responsibility has to reside with the buyers of coins and paper money because the seller can't properly protect him/herself since there's not a shipping company in Canada that will knowingly take a package containing money and guarantee its delivery. All of this discussion becomes rather moot when PayPal is rolled into the equation. PayPal operates under its own set of rules and it doesn't matter what are the laws of the countries in which it operates. PayPal chooses to refund the buyer almost all of the time. PayPal requires sellers to protect themselves by using only a shipping service with tracking and signature on delivery. So PayPal is twisting my arm to limit the shipping options I use. Even when I sell something worth $1, I have to use a shipping service with tracking to make sure the buyer gets it? The lowest cost of which I know is registered mail, and I charge $10 within Canada for that. The quick solution would be to not use PayPal. That's a great idea if I want to see my sales go down by at least 50% domestically, 90% internationally. Since I want to stay in business, I must keep using PayPal.

You say that you lose packages in the mail every so often. How do you know they were lost? Unless you had tracking on every one of them, there's no way to tell the difference between a genuinely lost package and a false claim made by the buyer. When I say there's no way to tell, there's probably circumstantial evidence that every seller uses to assess whether a claim is real or not. When a buyer does not communicate and goes straight to PayPal to open a dispute, I tend to believe that the buyer is not sincere and is trying to get a freebie. So instead of blackballing every buyer who files a claim against me, I would use my discretion to evaluate the situation and determine if the buyer is a high risk to repeat the behaviour. It's the same kind of discretion used by insurance companies who decide if they want to offer a car insurance policy to a high risk driver. I have to assume that every buyer is perfectly aware of PayPal's inherent bias as well. This is why I feel that I have to offer buyers the opportunity to select a secure shipping option in lieu of just telling them they have to accept one shipping method of my choosing. If I do this and the buyer turns down the secure option to save a few dollars, and then the buyer files a claim against me, I feel entitled to blackball that person, though it is completely at my discretion. Ultimately, when the post office loses a package, it should be the post office's fault and the claim should be against them, but they shirk the responsibility even though the workforce of Canada Post is composed of well-paid union members who would never knowingly do anything wrong, like stealing mail (uh-huh). PayPal certainly will not fill the void, so I think the responsibility then shifts to the seller and buyer (or sender and recipient). Of course buyers are going to want to get the things they purchase, so it's always the seller who gets the poopy end of the stick when something goes wrong. Not coincidently, it's the seller that does all of the work to sell an item, so it's only fair that the hardest-working person involved gets shafted when something goes wrong. No wonder so many sellers are leaving e**y and, to a lesser extent, PayPal.

In theory, Canada Post does pay compensation for lost packages that are insured. But you can't insure regular mail. The insurable shipping options cost a heckuva lot more.