Need Advice on my next move here.

Hey CAG's,

I'm in need of some advice on what my next move should be on a transaction on eBay that I believe I was shorted on both the financial and service ends.

Here's the Story:

I bought a collectible hockey card with a jersey patch insert from the user "gamma4" (fake name) and paid for the card using PayPal on October 7th at ~ 10PM EDT. The final price of the card was $1.76 USD, with $4 USD shipping, for a total of $5.76 USD.

I wait for notification that my card has been shipped, and nothing. I send a message to the user using eBay's internal mail system on the 10th, and it's ignored. Finally I call the user on the 13th, and he explains that, due to large volume on eBay, he doesn't mark any items as being shipped because of the amount of time it would take. He also explains that, because his business is in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada and I live in Florida, that my card will take approximately 2-3 calendar weeks to arrive. The same night I receive a response to the message that I sent on the 10th mirroring what I was told over the phone.

I wait for my card to arrive, and it finally arrives on the 28th. I open the package, and find a card in great condition. However, I also find only a $1.80 CAD (roughly $1.37 USD at the time) postage stamp on the envelope, with no other evidence of additional postage. I do some research online and, at the most, the bubble mailer he used would've cost him $0.15 USD (from the manufacturer's website), and the clear plastic sleeve and hard plastic top loader would've cost him ~ $0.21, leaving me $2.23 USD short. and I doubt that he had to spend any extra money on transportation to the post office given his "high volume" statement from the call earlier.

That's the situation. Now, I'm considering 2-3 options to try to resolve this:

1. Leaving the seller a negative feedback, citing a lack of customer service and excessive shipping charge. (and possibly eBay policy violation for not marking my item as shipped, which I think is required)

2. Sending the seller a message requesting a prorated refund of $2.23 from the shipping charge.

3. Opening up a dispute in PayPal for the $2.23 USD difference (don't know if I can do this)

Now, given this information (plus the fact that the seller has not yet left my feedback) , I would like advice from the CAG community on what I can and should do.

Thanks,

TDE

P.S. Now I know $2.23 isn't a whole lot, but its 55.75% of the shipping charge. Also, I'm asking whether or not the sellers lack of communication and failure to mark my item as being shipped are grounds to warrant action as well.

Also, I notice that I may have posted this in a wrong section. If possible could a CAG Mod please move this to a more appropriate section.

Some sellers will charge higher shipping for no reason. I don't think there's any thing in ebay terms of service that says they have to have an accurate shipping fee. Persoanlly I think you're wasting your time with this. Unless you really need the two bucks I would just call it a learning experience and not deal with international sellers. Leave negative feedback if you must, but Persoanlly I would just let it go and move on. With all due respect you are coming across as kind of petty here.

$2.00 could end up being exchange rate differences and conversion fees... Let it go.

You do realize that handling is part of the S&H part, right?  Like he's allowed to charge for his time, gas, etc. at a reasonable rate.  If you were OK with the price you paid for it originally including shipping then you're just kind of being spiteful over buyer's remorse.  If you filed a claim you would probably win but don't be that guy.

This is exactly why I do my listings as free shipping now and factor the price into the cost of the item. Yeah they're not charging fees on shipping costs but in the long run its worth it not to have to deal in the long run with people complaining that I didn't spend enough on shipping.

EldritchOnRye basically summarized the gist of the situation perfectly. Don't be that guy because I already am.

Well, I guess the consensus is to let the $2.23 go. However, I still want feedback about the lack of communication by the seller.

I do thank you 4 for not scolding me for putting this in the gaming section though.

Leaving positive feedback but with less stars for the "seller communication" section is an option. Other than not replying fast enough, I don't feel like the seller did anything wrong.

That's a lot of typing over $2.23.

Yeah, what everybody else said.  You agreed to the shipping price.  It is what it is.  It's not supposed to be reflection of exactly what they spent on shipping when it comes to eBay or Amazon.  I think we're spoiled by big box retailers and websites who give us free shipping or take losses on it to move product.  

I think you could dock him some stars on communication, but otherwise seems like he delivered what you ordered in a reasonable time.