Overseas Parts Sales

[swall]

I just sold a speedo on Ebay and one potential bidder wanted to know if I could ship to the Netherlands. As I am new to Ebay, I declined, but I would like to hear other's experiences with overseas sales.

[bselph]

I have done it with insurance and signature required every time. I have not had a problem so far. I only deal with people who have 100% feedback and 100 or more transactions. I have heard some horror stories but I guess I have been lucky.

[kunzog]

I shipped an Indian V twin motor to Italy, a Indian Bicycle to Austraila and many small parts to many other countries with no problems. I used paypal to receive payment and ship small parts by US Mail. The large items I used UPS from my local UPS Store. They handled all customs paper work. I have developed a relationship with my local UPS store and they can give me honest shipping information. A UPS Store may cost more than a UPS office but the service is more personal. I do the packing. The only problem with an out of US sale was a bicycle license plate to Canada. The buyer claimed he never received it, could have been due to no customs documentation. I just returned his $15 and wrote it off. Just a caution, a buyer wont want to pay for insurance or and will want to try to get out of declaring full value for customs but if there is a problem it is your loss.

[Steve Slocombe]

I'm having problems with Canada. One $100 packet sent uninsured just disappeared and I had to replace it. Another package was sent back because the return address was not written in capitals, so I was only out the postage and a two week delay on that one.

[sirhrmechanic]

Do it all the time with antique car parts... never a problem. We did about $200K in car parts last year. To all corners of the globe. Never had anything lost. A few packages banged up, but nothing destroyed ever.

Some tips:

Send UPS or DHL or Fedex... they can track from beginning to end anywhere in the world. Post office cannot. Leaves the border, they shrug and say "sorry" do you need a stamp?

Netherlands is a fine place to ship. Avoid, say, Lagos Nigeria unless you get paid up front.

Insurance is a must. Fill out the right customs clearance forms. There is a long form and a short form depending on weight and value. UPS Store in your area can help with this.

Intl shipping is not cheap. Your customer needs to know that and be prepared to pay for it. Something that is $12 in the US in a flat rate box can be $50 - 75 by the time it's insured and tracked. They need to factor that into their bidding. Worth mentioning it in your description.

Double box things... crate things... don't assume they will be handled sympathetically.

Use air shipment, not surface. Unless you are talking about a contained, air is more expensive, but the stuff is in the system for less time. In, out. No weeks-long loading/sailing time.

Get paid up front and look at feedback. Communicate, communicate, communicate.

All basic common sense things....

Oh and Steve... you are right. Canada is a PITA. They are 40 miles from us... and give me more shipping/customs headaches than India or Oz (they buy a lot of old Brit car parts). At this point, I charge $100 to ship anything into canada. Period. Don't care if it's a lock-tab washer. My time to fill out paperwork costs that. Most other places, it's about 30 seconds and done. Canada... who knows. But they require more hoops, returns, customs crap (I've had boxes of gaskets -- modern ceramic spun/copper -- held up at the border by Canada for a month while they asked for environmental impact statements and a notarized letter saying that there is no asbestos or harmful chemicals in these gaskets.)

But SWALL, don't feel bad about shipping overseas. It's no problem if you use some common sense. Do bad things happen. Sometimes. But so far not to us.

Cheers,

Sirhr

[marsh1915hd]

That's very good advice, Sirhr.
I use most of that in my shipping overseas.
Most of the time I use USPS as UPS and FEX charge 1/3 more. or more.
UPS wanted $180 to ship frame to Maine, FedX wanted $120, USPS wanted $89. Maybe that is why there going broke? But I think it is becuase of there retirement plans.

[cdndewey]

Oh and Steve... you are right. Canada is a PITA. They are 40 miles from us... and give me more shipping/customs headaches than India or Oz (they buy a lot of old Brit car parts). At this point, I charge $100 to ship anything into canada. Period. Don't care if it's a lock-tab washer. My time to fill out paperwork costs that. Most other places, it's about 30 seconds and done. Canada... who knows. But they require more hoops, returns, customs crap (I've had boxes of gaskets -- modern ceramic spun/copper -- held up at the border by Canada for a month while they asked for environmental impact statements and a notarized letter saying that there is no asbestos or harmful chemicals in these gaskets.)

I'm having problems with Canada. One $100 packet sent uninsured just disappeared and I had to replace it. Another package was sent back because the return address was not written in capitals, so I was only out the postage and a two week delay on that one.

That is odd because you can mail to Canada in any box with writing on it, just put a paper with the address on it, whereas when I ship to the US I have to package everything in brown or plain wrapper with no additional writing or stickers on the box. I've never had any problems from anybody from the US that shipped up here and I've had a lot of stuff sent up. The Customs forms are pretty basic with items and prices, who to and who from. My worst case scenario is our Customs folks occasionaly opening boxes to confirm it is what it says.

[pisten-bully]

I think it's the insurance mostly, and we insure almost every parcel we ship for its full value. FedEx and UPS include insurance for the declared value, while Postal gives you the option. And if you ship a part valued at $500, and you indicate to FedEx and UPS that it's worth $500 then you'll be insured for $500, but if you tell the Postal folks it's worth $100 (or some other lesser amount) then that's what you're insured for. Tell Postal you want $500 insurance and suddenly the UPS or FedEx rate is really close to Postal. Having said that, for heavy stuff going overseas (starter motors cores for rebuild for example) we do ship Postal and it is less expensive... but we never know when it's going to get there and I think often it goes on the "slow boat to China"!

One small tip to Canada, never ship via Postal in a small flat rate box or envelope... there's no insurance available for that size.

[sirhrmechanic]

Dewey:

In theory, you are right. Canada should be no problem. But for some reason, I have had more flack from Canadian Customs than all other nationalities combined. I think they just object to the fact that our maple syrup is better. Just 'sayin. And it was not with every package. But enough of them and I got fed up. No Soup for You! ;-)

A couple of folks have pointed out the whole 'insuring for and declaring the real value' issue. YES. Do NOT let someone talk you into under-valuing the part so they can cheat their customs duties. I am all for saving money and not handing over more in taxes and duties than necessary. The gummint just spends it on gay midget porn and rolling papers anyway... the less I send, the better. That said, when shipping parts that I am liable for, I declare the real or sale value, period. Because NOT doing it honestly can hang the item up forever. Again, your customer at the other end should understand this.

One other thing... and this is so our Canadian AMCA Members don't think we are just bashing on them... US Customs can be equally inane. One thing I have learned is that there is something like a 600 percent tariff on ball bearings from England. Don't know why... probably has something to do with the War of 1812. But, rules are rules. That said, customs apparently does not have enough of an engineering background to figure out that Ball Bearings are NOT babbitted shell bearings or insert bearings. If it has the word "Bearing" on it, US customs will slap a 600 percent tariff on it and send a bill. %%$$##!!!! So if you are ordering anything that has the name 'bearing' on it from the UK... do yourself a favor. Make sure the part comes in from your supplier with an invoice/customs form that reads "Support" or a "Shim". Ball bearing sets... you're on your own. Pay the bill. But shell bearings and insert bearings are not tarifed... Ball bearings are. And you had better differentiate the two or your 1200 pound UK-made set of babbitted shell bearings... becomes a 8200 pound set of bearings.... Which has to be refused, sent back, re-ordered and described correctly.

Cheers,

Sirhr

[sirhrmechanic]

And one other thing that Dewey made me think of...

Brown paper or external paper/wrapping.

Sometimes the US post office will refuse boxes that have been wrapped in 'brown wrapping paper.' It may be because it makes it hard to open the package to inspect. But I was told because enough packages had 'shed' bad paper wrapping with the paper then jamming up automatic sorting machines that they do not accept externally-paper-wrapped packages.

I can't vouch for this 100 percent. It may be something that the Moonpie-sucking boozles at our PO came up with to be officious and a PITA. But I don't use wrapping paper any more for that reason.

Cheers,

Sirhr

[Kerry]

Hi, I'm in New Zealand and all the parts I buy on Ebay are from all over the world. Shipping is a big cost when purchasing overseas, FedEx & UPS are very fast, but expensive, if I'm not in a hurry, snail mail is fine. I have never insured any purchase and have not yet had a problem. As someone said above, beware of which country you deal with, but a clear payment through PayPal before shipping would be a must.