Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I will mention no names to honor the TOS, but I wanted to get feedback on a situation and let the people involved in this situation know what the general concensus is - if anyone wants to offer some feedback.

someone I know is being charged $85 for shipping a young boa (less than a year old) via UPS next day - we'll just say that the boa is being shipped from Boston to California.

the shipper/seller in this case seems to think that the buyer should pay the 85 even though the buyer and seller agreed to a price for shipping (30 to 40 I believe).

sorry if this sounds petty, but I just wanted to let this be way to help resolve an issue.

thanks

Patrick-

Shipping is usually no more than $50.00 for anything that is under 5lbs and is not oversized. It sounds like he is just trying to make an extra $50.00 on the animal. I shipped 2 16lb animals together a while back and it was only $92.00 in an oversized box. So I would say that is not fair. Maybe he should suggest sending it C.O.D. and that way he pays the exact amount due.

Take Care,
Brandon Weik
Summit Reptiles
summitreptiles.com

I personally shipped out a box yesterday (UPS)for overnight morning delivery and was charge 38 dollars for my package. This was a newborn baby boa and they total package weight was like 4lbs... Sooo i think that 85 is a little extreme. The seller should provide an invoice to state the extra amounts if this is something more than was agreed upon and the buyer should honer the original agreement if it was to pay for shipping and the Seller can fax proof that it cost the seller 85 dollars to ship then the buyer should pay and be happy the snake arived happy and healthy... Honer the agreement that was made on both sides and produce proof of the expense... Thats what steve and I do and i think its fair... Good luck with this problem..

Sincerely,
Rose Hipskind
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www.srsnakes.com

My $.02...if the two of you agreed on a shipped price, the seller eats the overcost. It's not your responsibility to determine the cost of shipping.
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There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Rom 8:1

At retail counters here ( such as Office Depot, et al) it would be about $85 to ship Overnight any box over about a pound, maybe more depending upon the zip codes, before 10:00am or whatever bells and whistles you put on it. And what about box charges?

Of course you can take the box to your local UPS office and try to sneak one under their rules about shipping snakes, that's about 1/2 the cost of using one of those retail outlets. But the UPS guys ask more questions and you might then have to lie on the affidavit of contents and that makes some people uncomfortable!

The issue of shipping against policy and regulation, mislabeling interstate goods and all of that is a serious one that may bite some people in the backside before too long.

Good luck with that!

Gus

I always wonder how people advertise shipping for 30 bucks, I have sent alot of packages out, and have never had one under $40.

I have used all overnight places to ship. Range form 35.00 to 50.00 for a single box 5lbs or less. These is also by 10:30 - 11:00 next morn. So 80.00 for single baby boa is over priced. Unless like stated before you went to a place that is not staffed with ups,fedex etc. I went to a shipping place that was just a drop off point they were going to charge me 90.00 to ship the same thing as my local fedex would charge 40.00 for.
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MWSC

FOR SHIPPING AIRBORNE, FED EX, UPS, ETC. IT ALSO DEPENDS ON THE SIZE OF THE BOX. DELTA DASH IS $78 FOR UP TO 50 LBS. I THINK $85 FOR SHIPPING A BABY SNAKE IS INSANE!

The issue has been resolved. the buyer in this case received a very nice and healthy boa and he believes the seller did not intend to do anything less than ethical. The price for shipping was miscalculated by the UPS office so the shipper did not have to absorb any extra cost as well.

Patrick

I recently charged $35 for shipping babies, when I went to Fedex, the shipping actually came to $61 (I covered the rest). It turned out that they opened my package, and had me come back to get them. So I'm still looking for a way to ship them. Thankyou to those who emailed me on my post, nobody wants to discuss this topic openly. Too bad this has to be so sneaky.