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Pet Peevisaurus
Pet Peevisaurus
Gads, some things in this world just don't make sense, just ask all the people who've been posting comments about continued issues with EA's "Download Manager"!
Anyhow, I'm introducing a new category specifically for griping about things in the world that simply don't make any sense!
Number One with a bullet is FeeBay, errrrr Ebay. Ok, actually, I have no right to call it "FeeBay", because I don't sell anything there, I still prefer the graceful, if under-visited elegance of Etsy.
However, I still like to use Ebay to fuel one of my favorite hobbies, which is collecting older video games. The way I see it, I'd much rather be playing "previous generation" Xbox and PS2 titles for $10 to $20, as opposed to paying $60 to $80 for new Xbox 360 and PS3 titles that will be $10 to $20 in a few years or whenever "next, next generation" systems make an appearance.
Heck, in a lot of cases, older titles are more fun than newer games, which always seem time need time to mature as a console generation matures.
Anyhow, living in the wilds of Canada, and with the exception of ransacking the same old piles of used titles at Electronics Boutique and Blockbuster in Sudbury, Ebay tends to be one of the better ways to find old and/or esoteric titles for a reasonable price.
However, there are certain issues with Ebay that are common to all Canadians and that's what I really want to gripe about.
First of all, I want to admit that I don't actually do auctions on Ebay, I stick with Buy-it-now sales only. Why? Well, they tend to always have odd end times, and everyone knows that nobody bids on auctions until the last few seconds, so if you want to actually win an auction, you have to be right there at the end.
Plus, most regular auctions don't have even consider shipping to Canada, in face, out of an average search, I'd say that only 1 out of every 6 Buy-it-nows will ship to Canada. Why's that? I don't really know, I guess we have a bad reputation because of customs fees, which for items over a certain price can lead to quite the case of "post office shock"!
However, any shipper worth his salt knows how to fill out that little green customs slip to avoid the gaze of our haphazard customs' naz… errrr… enforcement, just take a look at the label below, which brings me to my final and largest complaint: Massive overcharging for shipping to Canada for things like video games.
Exhibit "A" - This is a scan of an actual envelope that was used to ship me a standard console video game/DVD case. As you can see, it cost the shipper a whopping $2.38 to ship to Canada. Now, as a shipper myself, I can allow a little leeway for shipping costs, to cover time for taking things to the post office and the cost of a bubble mailer. So, I could see reasonably paying $4 to $5 for the shipping of in case game. However, I actually paid $8.50 for the shipping on this particular title, one of the best shipping rates to Canada that I have found to date!
(click for enlargement)
Exhibit "B" - Check out this search on Ebay for a title I was thinking about picking up today "Rogue Galaxy" for the PS2.
Not only do the prices for new copies range from $12 to nearly $37! But the lowest shipping to Canada starts at $9.95 and goes as high as a whopping $20.99!
What gives? At the very least these sellers are multiplying shipping costs by 4 times just for the privilege of sending something to Canada!??! And it's not like they're trying to recover fees, check the above link with the $20.99 shipping to Canada, if you check the USA shipping price, it's just over $5.00.
So anyhow, there you have it, my "Pet Peevisaurus" number one! To all the Ebay sellers out that that like to F-over Canadians, I would just like to say: "Sit on it and rotate, you bunch of pole-smoking jackasses!" Thank you very much and may you have a rotten day with many, many negative feedback comments from irate Canadians, you deserve it, you really do!
Posted by Dylon on June 14, 2008 1:04 PM | Permalink
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June 2010
