discogs marketplace?

I would enjoy getting a record in a pizza box. One that had never had a pizza in it, I mean. Usually when you open a pizza box and there's no pizza in it you're sad but if there's a record in there!

guy i knew once explained to me that he would go to a local pizza chain every so often and get an armload of medium-sized pizza boxes for mailing LP boxsets.

i asked him, "really ? you send boxsets in pizza boxes ?" and he gets this look on his face, kind of mischievous, and says, "yeah man. i just love when i get to send 'em to italy."

😙

maybe a lot of these overgraders aren’t using artificial light or something

Re: Discogs address vs Paypal address. I'd always ship to the Paypal address as Paypal are unrelenting about refunds.

Huh. I never ship to the paypal addresses, always the Discogs addresses. I've never had a problem but for one time a buyer put the wrong zip code in. I guess I should be asking for confirmation, but often buyers do not respond to Discogs messaging, I've found.

if a buyer asks to return something for a refund, do you guys refund them the shipping costs of sending back? discogs and paypal don't give you that option so I'd have to do it manually. I think the guy was being a putz re: grading so my petty side doesn't want to, but I'm usually not an asshole seller.

Nah man, if he's not happy with your grading, that's his issue. If you'd sent him the wrong record or something, then it would be on you.

It depends how much you would mind if you want to get a negative review.

there goes my perfect feedback. forgot to de-list my CDs! lolz. If the buyer who wanted that Rolling Blackouts disc is on here, sorry!

What's the longest after payment you would wait for the seller to ship before requesting a refund?

I'm understanding that things can be slow at the moment and not that easy, but it's now 10 days since I paid and the seller still hasn't shipped my order. I'm going to give it a couple more days but this seems like a bit of a stretch to expect me to give glowing feedback when/if I finally do get the order.

I’d ask now if there’s a problem, maybe seller has been ill or some other issue, but ten days is more than enough time.

He said last Wednesday that he was waiting for packaging but I've heard nothing since.

i'd definitely follow up on in some capacity at this point. that's too long.

Thinking of making my first purchase, from a seller in Japan... they joined in 2013 and their feedback is 379 (pos) / 16 (neutral) / 26 (neg). Several of the recent ratings in particular are negative, saying order never arrived, no communication, etc. If item never ships, I’ll be protected via PayPal, yeah? Should be reasonable risk(?)

International shipping seems to be risky right now. I buy stuff internationally as part of my day job, and since March our order completion rate is near zero. Stuff just doesn't arrive. The orders never ship, they get stuck in customs or in courier shipping centers, or get marked as delivered but are nowhere to be found.

Thanks, good to know. I'll hold off awhile.

I'm not buying anything international rn either.

I went to a Japanese website I've ordered from in the past and they have big message on their site saying that Japan Post is currently not shipping to the US, so I'm holding off.

My deliveries from the UK to the US currently appear to be reaching my buyers after around 4 weeks, on average. Two packages which I shipped to India just before they suspended incoming international mail arrived after two months, once services had been re-instated. I've had to issue just one non-delivery refund since lockdown began, to a US buyer; thankfully it just was a dirt-cheap CD.

Somebody's supposed to be sending me a book from Germany; I have no idea how long it will take to get here, and have calibrated my expectations accordingly.

I'm in Australia, I got something from Boomkat that took a little longer than expected but still arrived safely

waiting on a delivery for the states and am feeling very shrug emoji about it

I bought a CD from a Discogs seller a state away who provided the tracking number, but the CD didn't show for a few weeks. They provided a refund, and eventually (five weeks later?) the CD showed up, so I returned the refund.

Ordered a couple of CDs from UK vendors on Ebay a month ago, I think they took about three weeks. Also tried purchases from German sellers on Discogs, one of whom just cancelled it, the other providing a more-than-doubled shipping cost from what was on the listing and saying I could cancel if I wanted (which I did). German sellers used to have pretty affordable international shipping much of the time.

This is not a thread about Jauce, but FYI if you dip into those risky waters for Japanese goods (they're shipping everything to the US via DHL now), be very sure you are actually buying the specific thing you want (I ended up paying double the typical cost for the US version of a box set when I thought I was buying the Japanese version, and I couldn't do a return).

i ordered a cd from the uk at the very beginning of the month and it took about ten business days.

was p happy about that.

probs not average tho.

I bought something from Germany in late May. DHL says it handed off to USPS on June 11, processed on June 12 in Frankfurt but it still says awaiting dispatch.

I just got a package from France mailed on April 17 (to Australia)

xp DHL to USPS in Germany is very delayed right now and I've noticed a lot of German sellers have just stopped offering US sales altogether during the pandemic.

My deliveries from the UK to the US currently appear to be reaching my buyers after around 4 weeks, on average.

This is how long it took me to get something from Norman, when usually stuff from the UK will arrive within 8-10 days.

uh oh, I bought something from a French seller and as a seller have never had any issues with anything other than International standard for inter EU shipping.

Now I think maybe I should have ponied up the extra £4 for tracked as I might never see this, or it might arrive after months wrecked.

It took 2.5 months for me to get a registered package from Japan recently. Ordered first week of April, just showed up last week.

In early April, a colleague in Beijing sent me a package of PPE masks as a goodwill gesture; they just arrived today. (I was surprised to see the package on our doorstep... I had assumed it was intercepted or something.)

So it sounds like 2.5 months for shipping from Asia is a good benchmark at present.

Detail on a copy of Spearhead's Stay Human, Media: NM, Sleeve: P

* * * * WATER HAS STUCK IT TO MAXI PRIEST SOME GUYS HAVE ALL THE LUCK * * * *

Do all the Discogs sellers on here know that from October 1st, automatic shipping policies will be mandatory for all orders? As it currently stands, the shipping policy editor is impossible to configure for a full range of UK orders (i.e. that can take account of large letters vs small parcels), but a new, improved and more flexible shipping policy editor has been promised; I wish they'd hurry up and release it. In the meantime, I'm having to weigh all my LPs, 12-inch singles and CDs, and record each weight in each individual sales listing. What a joy that is.

i wonder if it wouldn't be easier to set your prices close to the maximum of what you'd expect based on region + speed (slow UK / fast UK / slow europe / fast europe etc.) and then just make clear in your seller terms that you offer a partial refund on shipping expenses that come out to below what you've calculated

i ship in / from USA and have always used the automatic shipping policies so the policy change won't affect me. i'm curious what's so different about shipping records in / from the UK that makes it so hard to predict what your prices will be.

It sounds like you might be over complicating it? I have it set up for a around 4 weight bands for under £20 (standard) under £50 (signed-for) and over £50 (special delivery)

There are nine weight bands for UK small parcels under 2kg, many with significant price jumps, so establishing the precise weight of packages is important if you don't want to risk under-charging or over-charging. This makes setting up shipping policies by format/quantity impossible, as weights vary so much, especially with "Vinyl (large)", where a heavy single LP can be twice the weight of a light 12" single.

So, OK, maybe you could set up all your shipping policies purely by weight instead. This means you'll need to individually weigh every item you've got for sale, and enter it into each individual sales listing, as the default Discogs estimates (eg. 230g for large vinyl) are often way off. (The exception here is 7" singles, as the weights don't fluctuate much, and so the Discogs estimate of 60g is basically fine).

However, purely weight-based policies don't work with UK pricing either. This is because almost all your packages will fit into one of two categories - large letter and small parcel - based on dimensions. These can also significantly affect pricing, but you can't always deduce the size of a package purely on its weight - there are too many overlaps.

Discogs are promising a more flexible shipping policy editor, which allows you set up rules based on a combination of format AND weight. This may make things feasible, but we can't be certain until we can see exactly what it entails.

I always add some extra into my postage + packaging costs to cover my time, packing materials etc, sometimes you might get a bit less, sometimes you get a bit more. Prices are upfront to the buyer, so they can choose not to buy.

e.g. under £20 (I would send 2nd class Royal Mail):

1 > 99: £1.59
100 > 220: £2.39
221 > 1850: £4.39
1851 > 3700: £8.39 (would go into two separate parcels)
3701 > £9.99 (I doubt I would every get up to this threshold from under £20, but just in case)

under £50 (will send 2nd class, or perhaps courier if cheaper)

1 > 220: £3.49
221 > 1900: £5.49
1901 >: £10.99 (If someone does a large

For all other orders (Would either be special delivery or a courier):

1 > 400: £8.99
401 > 900: £10.49
901 > 1900: £12.99
1901 > : £27.99

Have people shared their accounts here by the way? Mine’s https://www.discogs.com/seller/Chewshabadoo/profile

i've just started using this to buy vinyl and I love it. have had a great experience with every seller.

will check your prof out!

OK, thanks, I can see how that works for UK to UK postage - for UK to the rest of the world, I'm still not so sure. I also add extra sums on for packaging, which are separately calculated by format, i.e. I have different packing materials for 7"/12"/CD. Your rates are a fair bit higher than mine, and now that most people are starting to move over to automatic shipping, I'm increasingly aware that I have to charge competitively for shipping, without losing money on the deal.

Here's my stuff (sorted in decreasing price order, so I can show off the cool stuff and hide the crap!) - https://www.discogs.com/seller/miketd/profile?sort=price%2Cdesc&limit=250&page=1

Very nice keeping the 100% rating on over 3000 reviews!

Thanks! I've been selling for almost exactly four years, and I've yet to have my first negative feedback, but it's bound to happen sooner or later...

Discogs have now released their updated Automatic Shipping Policy editor, which does give more flexibility (although it's still an almighty pain to configure, if you want to set accurate and competitive rates).

Dire warning! Every seller HAS to set up Automatic Shipping Policies by 1st October, otherwise their items will be blocked from sale. What's more, these policies HAVE to cover ALL orders of unlimited size/quantity (literally up to someone trying to order your entire inventory in one fell swoop), or else ALL your items will be blocked from sale.

Please note that your Shipping Policies will need to cover all potential orders of all formats, up to unlimited weight or quantity.

https://blog.discogs.com/en/shipping-policy-editor-changes/

https://blog.discogs.com/en/complete-shipping-policies-set-up-guide/

This is ridiculous.

I agree, and there's already been a lot of opposition to it - but it's also seemingly unstoppable, and if you're selling a lot of items across multiple formats with postal classification systems like we have in the UK, then adapting to it is very time-consuming.

For instance, a purely weight-based policy system, cutting across all formats regardless, just doesn't work here. Example: an order of three 7" singles weighs 240g and ships as "large letter" for £1.40 (excluding packaging), whereas an order of one lightweight 12" single weighs 170g and ships as "small parcel" for £2.95 (with totally different packaging). So you can't calculate shipping based purely on weight, without significantly under-charging (hence losing money) or over-charging (hence losing sales).

Here's another piece of stupidity. If a buyer orders a mixture of formats together (eg. 7", LP, CD in the same package), and if your shipping policies are separated by format, then the buyer will be automatically invoiced for an aggregate of all the different by-format rates, leading to gross over-charging. As I get a lot of multi-format orders, for decent money, this is going to hit hard. All I can do is add a message to my seller terms, saying something along the lines of "if you order multiple formats, message me for a shipping rate recalculation before paying". Trouble is, half the buyers will never click through/scroll down to the seller terms.

In the meantime, I've weighed all my CDs and am currently weighing all my LPs and 12"s. I have about 3500 items for sale. This is a massive pain!

I was contemplating increasing my prices to be inclusive of appropriate UK shipping, setting “free shipping” as default shipping option then blocking buyers outside the UK but it (a) restricts my potential sales (I do seem to send a lot of my orders overseas) and results in overcharging on multiple item orders.

There are some benefits to the new ASP editor. One is that you can set some format-based policies by quantity (e.g. 7"s and cassettes, whose weights don't vary much), and others by weight (e.g. 12"/LP and CDs). Another is that you can construct more complex pricing bands, based on wider selection criteria.

Another is that you can rename each pricing category using free text, so I can add the words "no tracking" to all my Standard shipping categories - this will help to manage the expectations of overseas buyers, who tend to assume that all classes of shipping include tracking by default.

Also, now that UK to US shipping charges have sky-rocketed - the US is now the most expensive country in the world for UK citizens to ship to - I'm going get the slower "International Economy" rates properly set up; thankfully the new editor helps you make it crystal clear to buyers that Economy delivery times can take as long as 12 weeks.

I would just set a flat freight rate of say $1000 for quantities of records above a normal amount you will ever likely sell. Gets you over the line of being setup and will probably never be seen by buyers unless they add that amount of items to their basket.