Primarily Petroliana Shop Talk Forums Shop Talk Petroliana Forums General Petroliana Discussion Matthews Auction shipping costs

I won a thin metal 24x18 sign on one of the last auctions. Credit card bill came with a $35 shipping fee. I thought that was high. Throw in the 15% surcharge and it starts really add up.

Just thought it was high shipping..

packed and shipped for $35 is a good deal from an auction house

I bought five items from different Matthews auctions and never had a issue with the shipping charges. They are cheap compared to some stories I heard from other auction houses.

I agree with Neil, $35 doesn't sound bad. However, I'd suggest you contact the folks at Matthews Auction if you're not satisfied......they have a reputation for fairness and customer satisfaction. Then let us know here on Oldgas how it turns out.


Richard

It does sound reasonable given todays high shipping cost. Seems everytime I sell something I lose money on the shipping, rates just keep on going.
Craig

You have to remember also that they pay for the pacakaging materials plus the shipping. I have never had an issue, think that sounds reasonable.

Sounds like a very fair price. By the time he pays for packing materials and pays someone to package stuff he's probably losing money on the shipping.
Have you called Matthews? Not sure why you'd post here if you hadn't called him first.
For future auctions you could save on shipping by attending the auctions in person. With possible lost wages for the day of the auction and maybe a couple of travel days to and from the auction, meals, lodging, fuel......hmm, all of a sudden shipping prices don't seem so bad.

They could have done like some ebay sellers, Roll it to fit into a mailing tube or Fold to fit a Priority Box!

35. is cheap...

Barking up the wrong tree on this one. They are good people to work with.

Don't recall saying they were bad people..it was an observation I had.

I have heard many high shipping cost stories. Recently bought a few items from a Mathews auction and was pleasantly surprised at the reasonable cost to ship to Canada...

I have bought from a number of different auction houses including Matthews and have never thought any of them were out of line...I guess that's because I have also done a lot of shipping and packaging and realize that it is not cheap and is time consuming. Whenever I buy a globe off of ebay or elsewhere from somebody that is not familiar with correctly packaging it, I send my specific instructions as to how to pack it and offer to cover any additional costs they may have for proper materials or oversize shipping. Well...I ended up paying over a hundred dollars once to have a globe shipped from CA to MI...but it came in a box half the size of a refrigerator and was triple boxed. The point here is that it arrived UNDAMAGED...as many of us know it is a whole lot easier to pay for shipping, materials, and time to properly package an item than it is to receive a damaged item and then try to file a claim and hope for a refund. Just my thoughts on the issue.

Just as a comparison about a month or two ago I won a Quaker State tombstone sign that measured approx 26.5 x 28.75 off a Proxibid auction and I ended up paying around $47 for shipping.

$35 bucks to ship and insure a sign that size was not unreasonable at all. Shipping costs have gone up considerably in the last few months and good old FedEx and UPS are throwing in fuel surcharges on top of the increases. If I double box a globe going to the West Coast shipping and fuel surcharges are $60+, insurance with UPS is now nearly a buck per $100 in value, and it costs me $10-12 for boxes and bubble wrap. Throw in your time to pack an item properly and there are very few people that make anything on shipping.

Just my 2 cents!

Lonnie Hop