Simple Delivery more expensive for letters & large letters

[williaugus]

With custom postage being rolled out and eventually the only option, I am a little confused and trying to clarify something please.

If I am posting something of large letter size, less than 100 grams and low value - a DVD in it's case for example, I can post this 2nd class large letter with Royal Mail. With the current Royal Mail prices, this'll cost me £1.55. When I'm listing an item and look at simple delivery prices, the same classification of large letter shows a minimum cost of £2.74.

What if I happen to posting something that may fit in a standard letter size? This currently costs just under £0.90, but when settings this up on the item listing page it still comes up as £2.74? Why is that?

I can either take up this difference in cost myself or pass it onto the buyer. It feels like that I'm likely to lose money either way as the latter might discourage buyers from buying - due to a higher price point?

I just wanted to make sure that I am understanding this correctly and not missing any steps in the simple delivery set up. Is it really the case that it'll now cost more money to send smaller items? Thanks. 

[xyz307xyz]

Large letter - my understanding is the same as yours.

In theory, letter sized (including thickness), under £10 and in listed categories mentioned here:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/selling/posting-items/setting-postage-options/simple-delivery?id=5575#Op... you should be able to Opt out of Simple Delivery and use your own postage method. If you choose Simple Delivery for such items, it'll cost you £2.74 or whatever.

I'm no expert - just a small time buyer and occasional seller. SD isn't yet mandatory for me, so I can't put the above to the test.

[suelel1968]

I haven't seen a single post yet from anyone who has been able to actually test the large letter under 100g SD rules. Everyone still seems to be able to opt out and send stuff £1.55. 

[xyz307xyz]

I don't think there is a large letter 100g SD option.
When SD is mandatory for everyone - then according to what ebay have said, only (some) letters, not large letters can be opted out.

But we will see when we get there - and they are already planning some tweaks...

[vinylscot]

eBay is certainly not going to to extend the exemption for items to ALL large letters. The most they could possibly do would be to extend the low cost / low weight exemption, although they would first need to work out a way to counter the enormous number of people who would dishonestly declare their weights/dimensions to take advantage of this exemption.

Although it's a factor, price is not the only reason for this. As part of its contract with RM/PO, eBay will have agreed to a maximum average weight of parcel. This won't be as simple as the Royal Mail bands, so it won't be 2kg, or 5kg, or something like that.

It's more likely to be something like 1.177kg, a figure which will have been arrived at with large letters included in SD in the calculations. eBay needs large letters to be subject to SD in order to keep the average weight down.

They are making enormous profits through SD, so they have headroom to do something. It may make more sense for them to cut prices across the board to bring them slightly under RM prices. A cut of, say 30p, across the board, would still leave them with huge profits, and would give them a little much-needed good publicity.