Date: Fri, 23 Mar 2012 09:44:37 -0400
Reply-To: The Bus Depot <vanagon@BUSDEPOT.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: The Bus Depot <vanagon@BUSDEPOT.COM>
Subject: Re: Oil Filter
In-Reply-To: <97300E04-E6CA-4A85-9907-AA2AF7FC1231@gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
> It's the 'handling' charge in 'shipping and handling' however what mostly
happens
> is when I go to a shipping website like Canada Post for a quote -
inevitably their
> quote will be off... Sometimes as much as $5 on a $20 shipment...!!!
> This is quite frustrating and I've spoke with the counter people who then
give me
> the deer in headlights look...
> Honestly, for us anyways, we don't try to markup our shipping at all, it
just
> sometimes accidentally happens, but to be honest it's more than 50%!of the
time
> we are eating a portion of those shipping costs!
The same applies to us - averaged out we don't profit on shipping, but in
individual cases the actual shipping may be more or less than we charge.
The situation that Cheri describes is not limited to Canada Post. All of the
carriers have a laundry list of surcharges - fuel surcharge, home delivery
surcharge, outlying area surcharge, special handling surcharge, dimensional
surcharge, shipment adjustment surcharge,
I-just-feel-like-charging-you-extra-because-it's-a-Tuesday surcharge, the
list goes on and on. Not to mention the insurance, which is extra on all
mail packages and also on all Fedex/UPS orders over $100. What's more, UPS
and FedEx can levy these charges after-the-fact if anyone along the way sees
the box and decides for any reason it needs special handling, or is one inch
over the claimed size, or six ounces too heavy, or whatever ... in which
case you not only get hit for the extra charge, but also a billing
adjustment fee for the privilege of having been charged it! So we do our
best to estimate the cost, factor in the surcharges, and in the end we make
a little profit on shipping some orders and lose a little on others (Unless
shopping cart is way off, as can periodically happen with certain
large/heavy items, in which case we may have to requote before processing.)
One exception is small orders, where we have a $4 minimum S&H charge. That
is to prevent us from getting thousands of $2.00 orders every time someone
thinks of a little item they need. We make about 35 cents on the typical two
dollar order, yet pay about two bucks to process it (not including the
actual shipping cost), between the credit card processing fees, packing
materials, insurance, manpower to pick and ship the order, etc. The minimum
S&H charge covers that gap, allowing us to accept small orders from
customers who are in a pinch without bankrupting ourselves in the process.
- Ron Salmon
The Bus Depot, Inc.
www.busdepot.com
(215) 234-VWVW
_____________________________________________
Toll-Free for Orders by PART # : 1-866-BUS-DEPOT
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