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 Replies: 22 / Views: 3,114 |
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New Member
United States
5 Posts |
Hello. Maybe someone can help me with this. I had a US gold coin up for auction and the winner turned out to be person from Poland. I have shipped internationally in the past on many occasions, but of course it depends upon what it is. Now I have never had to ship a gold coin overseas since I have been on ebay for approx. 10 years. I have not received payment yet for the coin. I checked on the USPS website and I found out that Poland has restrictions on certain items and coins are one of them. Listing below. Prohibitions (130)
Arms and ammunition.
Articles, printed matter, written documents or other articles contrary to interests of Poland.
Coins; bank notes; currency notes (paper money) including currency in circulation in the Polish Republic; traveler's checks; platinum, gold, or silver (manufactured or not); precious stones; jewelry; and other valuable items.
Perishable infectious biological substances
Perishable noninfectious biological substances
Radioactive materials. Previous posts to this question (not on this forum) claim that the USPS website is outdated and I should not worry since they are part of the EU. Spain being part of the EU has similar restrictions, however Germany does not which lends me to believe each country in Europe still controls the flow of goods differently from each other - what is and what is not allowed. Should I just email the winner and tell them straight up I am unable to ship this coin to him and offer it to the next highest bidder or what. I am not really sure what to do at this point. One thing for sure is I really don't want to send it taking a chance it is opened at customs and then confiscated and then ebay would demand a refund be sent to the buyer. Edited by Karl99
09/10/2011 02:34 am
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
19935 Posts |
Welcome to CC!
Personally, there's absolutely no way I would ship something that valuable out of the USA. What is the value of the transaction? Typically, something like gold I would only ship using Registered mail. Using any lesser method is just asking to get burned. You definately don't want to end up with no coin and no money in the end.
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New Member
 United States
5 Posts |
Thanks for the reply. It is a $5.00 1880 Liberty Head Gold Coin which sold for $475.00.
I already emailed the winner that "I am not allowed to ship the coin to Poland due to restrictions that are currently in place". Since it wasn't paid for yet I don't have to be concerned with a refund. I am not going to take any chances that this transaction could go bad.
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Pillar of the Community
Poland
3201 Posts |
Managed to find only the following. Quote:
- Broni I amunicji
- Monet, banknotów, papierowych pieniędzy, czeków podróżnych; platyny, złota albo srebra; kosztownych kamieni I wartościowej biżuterii
- Waluty polskiej
- Zakaźnych biologicznie substancji I innych czynnych biologicznie substancji
- Materiałów radioaktywnych It's basically a the list you posted, with some minor changes. Unfortunately, it's not from the postal service's site, or from any official source. Also, the list was bearing a 2004 date. Edited by DL20K
09/10/2011 06:05 am
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Pillar of the Community
United States
2335 Posts |
My wife sells on ebay & since we got burned on an item we sent internationally we don't ship out of the states. We were able to track our item to customs but had no evidence it went any further. We ended up refunding the money & taking the loss. Since then I've heard stories(unverified) that this happens a lot, either through poor customs procedure or outright fraud. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
651 Posts |
what does ebay have to say on this matter or do they care? |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4867 Posts |
When you list your auction you can state that you only ship to US addresses. Shipping worldwide on certain items opens up a can of worms. I will no longer ship internationally period.
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
19935 Posts |
Quote:
When you list your auction you can state that you only ship to US addresses. Shipping worldwide on certain items opens up a can of worms. I will no longer ship internationally period. I hear you there. I've been burned before so lesson learned. I've made a couple exceptions when the buyer was begging me to ship to them. The conditions: 1) They leave positive feedback as soon as I provide proof the item was shipped. 2) They accept all risk and responsibility, no refunds if the item does not arrive or is damaged. Now, with ebays new policies, I absolutely refuse to ship. ebay guarantees I will get burned if the buyer has a problem or decides to lie and say it never arrived. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
2189 Posts |
If you don't want to sale outside of the US you do know you can selectivly block certain countrys or all of them.I've heard too many big horror storys.As for your delima.I would not ship either
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New Member
United States
5 Posts |
Thanks for all the replies here. I went ahead and emailed the buyer stating I could not ship the coin and also canceled the transaction. Received an email back from the buyer stating that they understood the problem with this and they were fine with canceling the transaction. When it is re-listed I will make sure to state in the description that the coin will be shipped within the United States only. No exceptions to this whatsoever.
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Forum Mom
 United States
5877 Posts |
In addition to stating it in the description, be sure to select the option that you ship to the US only. If you do not actually change the settings on the auction, you could be expected to complete a transaction outside the US, even though your description states that you don't ship overseas. This could leave you open to negative feedback and sanctions from ebay. When you select the option to not ship worldwide, bids from people outside of the US will be blocked. |
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Rest in Peace
United States
5375 Posts |
You're lucky the buyer was so cooperative and I'm glad for that, but I agree not to ship things that valuable out of the country except for maybe Canada and the UK. If you must, you can just label it 'numismatic items' on the customs form. The prohibitions on coins probably weren't intended to include collectibles, but they fall under the blanket umbrella (the purpose of the rules was probably to prohibit exporting modern money or money laundering or something). I've shipped several times to Australia and had no problems when I put that on the customs form.
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Valued Member
Australia
278 Posts |
As an over seas person this does make me sade to read these replies.
I am in Aistralia and I want to expand my world wide coins, but just hearing this I dont know what to think.
The only people sell to us will be selling fakes while you guys want to sell real coins and wont sell to us?
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Pillar of the Community
United States
2335 Posts |
It is sad that the actions of a few people ruin things for everyone. As a seller it only takes one loss to make the decision that shipping internationally is not worth the effort. For those of you who haven't been burned or haven't heard about this here's how it works.
Items shipped internationally leave the US & go into customs at the destination country at which point there is no longer any way to track the item. The buyer subsequently makes the claim that the item was not received. It's immaterial as to whether or not customs lost the item or the buyer is commiting fraud as the end result is the same.....the seller loses money.
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Pillar of the Community
Luxembourg
588 Posts |
As already declared by Gecko, I do also get sad when reading here how reckless it is to dare and accept shipping overseas. I have bought myself a large part of my collection in the US, including some high priced single coins and also several lots. Both from ebay and from professional dealers. I have never had any problems receiving my items, except for a 5 buck item I doubt it has been sent - I have been too late to launch the "buyer protection" and got never refunded. I understand that when you are dealing with US coins, there is no real interest to sell overseas as most buyers live in the US or maybe Canada. But when trading with (better) world coins, you are definitely loosing money. I am regularly getting tears into the eyes  when seeing the final price of French coins that are not being sent overseas - sometimes not even half of what I would have bid.  I am far from paying cat price. I have seen silver lots go for around spot price where one single coin was worth much more than the lot. I would have bid accordingly. I am also aware that the postal service of some countries are all but reliable and sending coins over there is like gambling. Maybe one final word. I am selling my doubles on ebay. The only mail so far that has been lost in the mail went to the US...  |
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
652 Posts |
I have never had any problems sending or receiving coins from overseas. I've sent to Turkey, USA, Canada, England and many others. I have done this through my contacts within the CCF. It appears that many in the CCF don't have a high opinion of other CCF members. Or were you just talking about your problems with ebay and people you don't know? |
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Replies: 22 / Views: 3,114 |
Posted 09/10/2011 03:57 am
