topic Re: Who is responsible for postage? in Seller Central

Who is responsible for postage?

hummingbird-curios — Sat, 14 Mar 2026 21:39:18 GMT

Who is responsible for postage when a label is purchased on eBay?

I only use Royal Mail as I will not, under any circumstances use Evri, and I have always been impressed with their service, always used tracked 48 and the vast majority arrive within 2 working days with the odd occasion of taking 3 days.

I recently sold a small thin paperback book and here is the exact sequence of events and please note that this was custom postage NOT simple delivery as it was £3.99, large letter and under 100 grms.

Sold the item and buyer paid immediately.

Packed and weighed the item in a padded envelope - 78 grms.

Went to 'awaiting dispatch, and clicked on 'get postage label.

Selected large letter and then selected' up to 100 grms

Printed the label and taped it to the envelope

Next morning, took it to the post office along with several other parcels and they were scanned into the system.

Happy days - job done or so I thought.

A week later, customer reports item not received so I checked the tracking, as follows

Item accepted at Parcelshop

2 days later 'Your item has reached Jubilee MC

It has never moved since.

I got the customer to check the tracking to confirm and refunded in full immediately.

I decided to put in a claim with Royal Mail so I filled in the online claim form and got confirmation of the claim.

3 weeks later heard nothing so I spent nearly 20 minutes on the phone to eventually get through to customer services

They looked up the claim and said that as I had purchased the label through eBay, it was eBays responsibility.

I explained that it was NOT simple delivery and they said if is says on the label 'Paid and printed from eBay' then it is eBays responsibility

eBay CS says it is Royal Mails responsibility, Royal Mail CS says it is eBay's responsibility.

Institutional robbery and corruption - almost as bad as the Government!

Needless to say, it was such a small amount, I wish I hadn't bothered but it begs the question.......

Who is responsible for the postage?

Re: Who is responsible for postage?

sml192 — Sun, 15 Mar 2026 00:12:55 GMT

This question has come up a few times recently. It always used to be that you needed to claim directly with Royal Mail for any labels purchased through eBay (Custom Postage as opposed to Simple Delivery) and as far as I am aware that is still the case. There is no facility to claim anything through eBay.

Re: Who is responsible for postage?

suelel1968 — Sun, 15 Mar 2026 00:30:37 GMT

Hi, custom postage is claimed from Royal Mail, not eBay, so you did the right thing. I'm a little confused as to whether you used 48 tracked or large letter, I assume tracked as you have tracking info. You may as well use SD if you use 48 tracked, you can deselect evri.

Either way, they tend to only send stamps as compo for low value items and it can take literally months to get a reply. Last one I did was not that long though. I have had a couple where they said they sent stamps, but I never got them...... Did they lose those as well?

Re: Who is responsible for postage?

papso22 — Sun, 15 Mar 2026 05:55:39 GMT

Moral of the story is don't buy RM postage through ebay.

It used to be that you only claimed 'through ebay' if you used Packlink, the ebay broker, and you couldn't get RM postage through Packlink. In fact you had to claim through Packlink and this mostly affected evri claims.

Although you could still buy RM postage through ebay, Packlink were not involved and any claims were direct to RM.

Someone's CS is clearly wrong.

kat@ebay

marco@ebay

Can you shed any light on this?

Re: Who is responsible for postage?

marco@ebay — Mon, 16 Mar 2026 09:42:54 GMT

Hi hummingbird-curios, thanks for your post.

If the label was not Simple Delivery, but you still got it through eBay, you should put your claim through Royal Mail the way you did, that's correct, and then they would need to take actions accordingly.

They are probably mixing up with Simple Delivery with normal labels? Not sure, but you should definitely contact them back and get them to action this from their end.

Thank you,

Marco

Re: Who is responsible for postage?

mus-755617 — Mon, 16 Mar 2026 10:03:40 GMT

It can be confusing, but generally if the label is purchased through eBay’s label system, the contract for that postage is handled through eBay’s platform.

That’s why Royal Mail sometimes directs sellers back to eBay for claims, even when the service itself is Royal Mail. In practice, many sellers find that claims need to be started through the eBay label purchase record rather than directly with Royal Mail.

Unfortunately with lower value items it can end up being more hassle than it’s worth, but normally the key factor is where the label was bought rather than which carrier delivered it.

Re: Who is responsible for postage?

papso22 — Mon, 16 Mar 2026 11:00:38 GMT

You are wrong. See the post above yours.

Re: Who is responsible for postage?

4_bathrooms — Mon, 16 Mar 2026 12:40:48 GMT

@mus-755617 wrote:
It can be confusing, but generally if the label is purchased through eBay’s label system, the contract for that postage is handled through eBay’s platform.

No, it isn't. Where non-Simple Delivery Royal Mail labels are concerned these are the applicable (Royal Mail) terms and conditions that apply. As per that agreement "This Agreement is between you and Royal Mail Group Limited".