1st sale on eBay and I've cocked it up.
Listed an item with Simple Delivery (Royal Mail Tracked 48 Hour).
The item sold.
I then realised that I'd selected the incorrect package size/weight when I listed the item.
On the page from which labels are printed there's a little blue 'i' link regarding incorrect postage size/weight, clicking it displays a pop-up that claims (in words to the effect) 'Don't worry, we've arranged for you to be able to pay the shortfall', great, so I printed the label and packaged the item.
Took the package to a Post Office counter and was told, no, you can't pay the shortfall you'll need to purchase new postage at the normal price which will result in a new shipping label. Not wanting to disappoint the buyer that's what I did.
Came home expecting to be able to cancel the eBay postage label (as it hasn't been scanned by the post office), mark the item as having been posted and enter the new tracking information for the postage I purchased at the post office. Simple yeah?
Clicking Selling->Postage labels->Actions->Cancel takes me to a page that just states 'This postage label can't be cancelled' with no hint as to why not.
Opened a Chat with an 'Agent' who gave me 2 options -
1 For any unused label, the refund is issued back to buyer, so you can keep the buyer informed about this and charge them with additional postage cost by sending an invoice through paypal.
2 Alternatively you can purchase the new label and ship the item and ask buyer to refund through paypal/bank transfer once they receive the refund. The debit and credit both will reflect on seller's transactions summary so you will know when the label refund has been issued to the buyer.
Both of these options are pants; I don't want to hassle the buyer and It's a unused/never scanned label, why can't eBay just void it and refund my money!
I'm now in the position of having shipped the item at additional cost (not a problem, my bad, lesson learned), but the item will (presumably) never show as having being shipped as the original label will never be used and I'm unable to enter the tracking number for the new postage that I purchased so the buyer will think I've not posted the item.
Weirdly - on the 'Track and manage your packages' page, in the 'Dispatch details / Initial label cost' column it states 'Standard tracked delivery via Royal Mail. Prepaid by buyer' - is that right? Surely it should say 'Prepaid by seller'? In the eBay app it also says '... + free postage (free for buyer, you pay)' but seems to display correctly (i.e. buyer pays postage) when searching eBay via a web browser.
Anyone got any good suggestions?
