taking loss on charity auction

[retire-early]

I donated a set of handmade pillowcases with dogs motif to an auction to benefit several animal rescues.

The person running the auction is in the USA.
I offered the items with free shipping.
I did not stipulate free shipping in the USA only.
It turns out the winning and only bid was by a woman in Canada.

I informed the auction that 11 ounces mailed to Canada is $19.71 (PirateShip's discounted rate).
The winning bid was $6.
The auction told me that they would reimburse me the $13.71.

I messaged the winning bidder that the shipping is $19.71
I offered to reimburse her the $6 and not mail the pillowcases.

It is silly to lose money when the purpose is to raise money for the animal rescues.

Did I do the right thing?

 

[Jerry1]

IMHO, yes, you did the right thing. Heck, if you were going to eat an almost $20 loss, you may have well just given it to the rescue. Fulfilling the auction under those circumstances wouldn’t have made sense.

I assume the bidder agreed?

 

[Aerides]

The auction site should have disclosed to you the potential for international customers.

11oz mailed first class parcel would cost you about $5 even in the US. So if the auction would reimburse you the extra it would work out roughly the same.

Or a better solution would have been to have the auction site take possession of the items and then they handle the customer and the shipping. Sounds like a disorganized auction really...

 

[OldShooter]

I see it as a simple integrity issue. OP agreed to do something and now does not wish to do it.

If it were me I would perform as I had promised, ship the item at whatever cost was involved. Twenty bucks wouldn't have a material effect on my retirement and my guess is that twenty bucks won't affect the OP's retirement either.

Life is like school except first you get the test, then you get the lesson. Lesson here has already been identified by the OP: specify USA only shipping. Life's school sometimes involves tuition payments, in this case $20.

 

[pb4uski]

Any idea what it would have cost to mail the item across the country? Or, say, to Alaska or Hawaii? What amount did you have in mind when you said that you would pay for shipping?

The relevant number is the excess of the $19 over what it would have cost you to mail it in US... which probably would have been ~$8... so the difference is $11.

I think if it were me I would just suck it up and pay the $19 and view any excess of $19 over what it would have cost to ship it in the USA as a lesson learned. It's not like the excess is a large amount.

However, your story does remind me of my first Ebay auction... I sold a CRT monitor that I no longer needed for $25 with terms that the buyer would pay the shipping. The buyer asked how much the shipping was going to be so he could pay me the $25 for the monitor plus the shipping. The monitor was heavy and I found out that shipping to the buyer, who happened to be in California (I was on the east coast) would be $75! I wrote to the buyer and explained the situation and told him that if he wanted out of the transaction that would be fine as I hadn't given any thought as to how much it would cost to ship the darn thing when I listed it for sale. He responded that he would accept my offer to get out of the transaction. Lesson learned... for both of us.

 

[euro]

I see it as a simple integrity issue. OP agreed to do something and now does not wish to do it.

If it were me I would perform as I had promised, ship the item at whatever cost was involved. Twenty bucks wouldn't have a material effect on my retirement and my guess is that twenty bucks won't affect the OP's retirement either.

Life is like school except first you get the test, then you get the lesson. Lesson here has already been identified by the OP: specify USA only shipping. Life's school sometimes involves tuition payments, in this case $20.

This!!!!!

 

[retire-early]

The other set of pillowcases also had a $6 winning bid with FREE shipping.
It costs me $4.17 to mail to the winning bidder. In essence, I am donating $4.17 so that the auction gets $6.
With the pillowcases to Canada, I am donating $19.71 so that the auction gets $6? ? ?
It never entered my mind that the auction was going outside the USA!

No, I haven't heard from the winning bidder in Canada yet.
She and I are not "friends" on Facebook, so I am not sure when she will see my PM since in this situation, the PM goes into her spam message folder in Facebook.

P.S. I know it is expensive to mail to Canada.
I don't think others realize this including the person running the auction.
.

 

[retire-early]

The auction site should have disclosed to you the potential for international customers.

THIS.

As I wrote elsewhere I am fully aware of the extra postage to Canada.
I would have stipulated that international shipping is TBD had I known that international bidders are involved.

 

[OldShooter]

THIS.

As I wrote elsewhere I am fully aware of the extra postage to Canada.
I would have stipulated that international shipping is TBD had I known that international bidders are involved.

To me the reasons that you made this mistake are irrelevant. Sorry to be harsh, but you made a promise that you now don't want to keep. In your heart you know this; that's why you asked "Did I do the right thing?" No.

 

[Sunset]

The Auction should have restricted shipping to USA.

What if someone in Igarka Russia had won, the shipping would be around $40, plus insurance.

I agree with OP, the deal is not available. The buyer is not suffering a loss, so no harm.

Stores do this quite often, a mis-price shows up on the internet and a few 100 people buy the thing, then the store cancels the deal.

 

[retire-early]

To me the reasons that you made this mistake are irrelevant. Sorry to be harsh, but you made a promise that you now don't want to keep. In your heart you know this; that's why you asked "Did I do the right thing?" No.

No, I made a promise for free shipping in USA. Shipping to Canada was not what I in my mind promised. It was promised for me.

 

[Sunset]

An aside to this issue, is who was running the auction ?

Sometimes a firm does fund raising for a charity, and keeps a huge percentage of the money raised as their fee. In these cases the donor never realizes that 50->95% of their donation does not go to the charity

 

[euro]

To me the reasons that you made this mistake are irrelevant. Sorry to be harsh, but you made a promise that you now don't want to keep. In your heart you know this; that's why you asked "Did I do the right thing?" No.

Agree 100% - its a very small amount of money. Is it really worth looking petty because of it?

My suspicion is that the OP is probably disappointed that their crafts went for such a low price since the amount of work in them is likely way more valuable. If the pieces had auctioned for $200, then there would be no discussion about the shipping cost.
However, those are the risks of auctions (unless they are run with minimum bids) - you never know what something will sell for.

 

[retire-early]

An aside to this issue, is who was running the auction ?

Sometimes a firm does fund raising for a charity, and keeps a huge percentage of the money raised as their fee. In these cases the donor never realizes that 50->95% of their donation does not go to the charity

This is a private individual.
She is doing a kind deed.
People do "auctions" on Facebook all the time to help animal rescues both home-based and 501c3.
They put up a photo album.
People comment on a photo of an item with their bids.
Payment is usually done with Paypal under Friends and Family.

 

[tulak]

I’d pay the $20 and be happy someone is enjoying my pillowcases.

It’s for a charity auction after all, right?

 

[retire-early]

Agree 100% - its a very small amount of money. Is it really worth looking petty because of it?

My suspicion is that the OP is probably disappointed that their crafts went for such a low price since the amount of work in them is likely way more valuable. If the pieces had auctioned for $200, then there would be no discussion about the shipping cost.
However, those are the risks of auctions (unless they are run with minimum bids) - you never know what something will sell for.

No. I did not make these pillowcases.
I won them in another auction last year.

I was hoping someone would want them and have the $ go to an animal rescue.

The minimum bid was made obvious, but that is was for USA shipping was not.

.

 

[pb4uski]

... I did not stipulate free shipping in the USA only. ..

No, I made a promise for free shipping in USA. ...

I'm sorry to be cruel, but which is it? You made two contradictory claims.

I think you mean that when you promised free shipping you had free shipping to the USA in mind, but you were not specific about it being limited to the USA in your communications with the charity and they didn't warn you that the buyer might be outside the US.

Lesson learned... cost about $15... or alternatively take the charity up on its offer to reimburse you for $13 of the $19 shipping cost... they seem willing to do the right thing even though it will end up costing them $7.

Basically, everyone acted in good faith... you did, the charity did and the buyer did. As a result of the miscommunication there is a $15 difference... you could propose that the buyer pay $6 + $5 shipping, that you pay $10 shipping and that the charity pay $5 for the shipping... IOW all share the cost of the miscommunication.. but I'll be honest if it were me I'd just suck it up an pay the extra $15.

 

[CRLLS]

I informed the auction that 11 ounces mailed to Canada is $19.71 (PirateShip's discounted rate).
The winning bid was $6.
The auction told me that they would reimburse me the $13.71.

If I understand correctly, You have held the item on behalf of the auction and offered you would ship the item to the winning bidder free of charge. The auction received $6 from the bidder, their only income. They are offering you $13.71. I'm not sure how that math was determined. This seems to be a net loss of $7.71 to the auction/animal rescues. You would be out the unreimbursed $6 and they are out $7.71? Does that seem fair?

If it were me, I would belly up and ship the item as promised regardless of the cost. That way the auction gets what was intended by my donation and my offer to ship for free. The extra dollars out of my pocket might be what, an extra 5-10 dollars over what it would have cost to ship across the US?

 

[JRon]

I would ship the pillow cases and pay the shipping because that is what I said I would do.

 

[Out-to-Lunch]

I think the "suck it up" responses are a bit harsh. Consider the facts in the first post:

The winning bid was $6.
The auction told me that they would reimburse me the $13.71.

I messaged the winning bidder that the shipping is $19.71
I offered to reimburse her the $6 and not mail the pillowcases.

The OP is trying to help the charity. I wouldn't be surprised if the winning bidder ALSO intended to help the charity. The OP and the winning bidder may recognize that, if the charity eats a lot of the shipping cost, as they have apparently agreed to, the charity would be harmed. So the OP offered another remedy to the winning bidder, which would involve no harm to anyone. Let's wait and see if the winning bidder accepts this alternate remedy.

 

[Aerides]

The whole setup was badly handled. This is not what most of us think of as a "charity auction" but, rather, some sort of facebook page auction, run by someone as a private individual? I've never seen one of those, nor would I bother.

The person running probably didn't even think about the location of the bidders (and neither did the OP). It doesn't sound like there was any discussion of that possibility beforehand. Nor was this managed by a company with any real experience in running auctions, as I figured would be the case initially.

So, now that all those details are out, what I'd do is ship the darn things, eat the cost, and find a licensed established charity that benefits animals, and write them a check for the same amount, and wash my hands of this specific type of setup in the future.

 

[Sunset]

The other factor in this entire thing is, some private individual doing this may/may not be actually donating to a charity... Might be filling their pockets.

There is no oversight to confirm the charity gets the money, and also who gets the tax deduction ?

 

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

A 12 oz large envelope shipped to Canada costs $5.03 via first class mail international surely pillowcases can't be heavier than that?

First-Class Mail International
Retail Large Envelopes (Flats)
Weight Not Over
(oz.) Price Groups
1 Canada 2 Mexico 3–5 6–9
1 $2.40 $2.40 $2.40 $2.40
2 2.63 3.12 3.39 3.34
3 2.85 3.82 4.37 4.26
4 3.06 4.54 5.36 5.19
5 3.28 5.25 6.34 6.12
6 3.50 5.95 7.32 7.05
7 3.72 6.67 8.31 7.98
8 3.94 7.38 9.29 8.90
12 5.03 8.90 11.26 10.83
15.994 6.12 10.44 13.23 12.74

 

[retire-early]

A 12 oz large envelope shipped to Canada costs $5.03 via first class mail international surely pillowcases can't be heavier than that?

First-Class Mail International
Retail Large Envelopes (Flats)
Weight Not Over
(oz.) Price Groups
1 Canada 2 Mexico 3–5 6–9
1 $2.40 $2.40 $2.40 $2.40
2 2.63 3.12 3.39 3.34
3 2.85 3.82 4.37 4.26
4 3.06 4.54 5.36 5.19
5 3.28 5.25 6.34 6.12
6 3.50 5.95 7.32 7.05
7 3.72 6.67 8.31 7.98
8 3.94 7.38 9.29 8.90
12 5.03 8.90 11.26 10.83
15.994 6.12 10.44 13.23 12.74

It is 11 ounces using a Tyvek envelope to postal code V2V 1Z1.
$20.75 without discount.
I have to "code" it as a package since it most definitely thicker than 3/4".

I am not sure where you are getting those rates since the choices I have are
a.) postcard
b.) Flat Rate Envelopes
c.) Flat Rate Boxes
d.) Calculate Price based on shape and size.

EDIT:
The postal clerk is not going to let me mail it as "letter".

.

 

[Aerides]

5.03 is the international first class letter.
19.71 is the first class package

Those are both the discounted online rates. You will pay far more if you go to the USPS counter to purchase the shipping.