Rev Posted December 30, 2011 Share Posted December 30, 2011 Cmart has a 'secret weapon' to battle these USA only auctions! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pimpmaul69 Posted December 30, 2011 Share Posted December 30, 2011 Cmart has a 'secret weapon' to battle these USA only auctions! You are neither secret nor a weapon. but he uses you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+cmart604 Posted December 30, 2011 Share Posted December 30, 2011 Cmart has a 'secret weapon' to battle these USA only auctions! You are neither secret nor a weapon. but he uses you. Rev has been awesome, allowing me to participate in these exclusive US auctions. As I like to say, he is in charge of all Cmart US operations. Seriously though, it is frustrating to not be able to bid on some of this stuff. I generally find that most sellers will say yes when you ask, but often I end up missing out on great deals while waiting for a response, like last weeks $60 Spiker! As a result I've been spending a lot of time on other eBay sites around the world and have found lots of sellers very willing to ship to North America. In 2011 I've bought from Australia, Italy, France, Germany, England, Spain, the Netherlands, Japan, China, Venezuela, and Brazil. There are deals out there to be had. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edintv Posted December 30, 2011 Share Posted December 30, 2011 Just ask a friend in the Us to receive the game for you. and Why do you need his address? I've considered using one of those services where you hire a company to forward stuff to you, for those that insist on shipping to US addresses only. Ive never gone through with it, because I'm not sure how I would go about having that address verified by Paypal since it doesn't match the address on my credit card billing statement. I suppose it's something I would have to look in to. Don´t worry about that. Ebay accept any ship address you insert and paypal takes that address automatically. Just pay from Ebay not directly in Paypal and you are set. 99% of the stuff I bought on Ebay ships to US only and with my US address inserted I can bid in these auctions Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rev Posted December 30, 2011 Share Posted December 30, 2011 What 60.00 spiker? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pimpmaul69 Posted December 30, 2011 Share Posted December 30, 2011 What 60.00 spiker? There was a lot that was bin with a spiker in it. Cmart tried to get it Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+thegoldenband Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 So the copy of Stonix mentioned in this thread is now in my hands. Here's the deal: I bid on the Stonix auction as a lark, since out of all the "old homebrews" it's by far the one I wanted the most (and two of the others, Space Patrol and SG&R, are going to be reissued). Anyway, I wasn't surprised to lose, though I was only outbid by about $5-6 (I think there was another bidder who outbid me, who was then apparently outbid by ghsqb), so I felt foolish for not bidding more (little did I know!). I was surprised, actually, that the copy of Minehunter I bid on (and didn't win) went for a little more than Stonix. Obviously my bid of $74.33 reflected the high shipping costs. I don't like to ever spend more than $100 for a game -- in fact I don't think I ever have. The following day at around noon, I received a second chance offer from bigbadserpent to buy his copy of Stonix for the price of my top bid. His note said that the item had been won by a Canadian bidder but that he didn't ship to Canada, so he was offering the item to the other high bidders. I thought of cmart604, but figured it wouldn't be him since he had one or more copies already. So I jumped on the second chance offer immediately. I think at least one other bidder probably received the offer as well, but didn't reply in time (I think I accepted about 2 hours after it was sent, since that's when I checked my email). bigbadserpent was super-responsive, I paid immediately, and we literally finished the transaction within 10 minutes. The price was $74.33 (my high bid) + $23.47 shipping. He said he'd ship the next day, and also mentioned he'd be away in January, so that he wanted to get things wrapped up ASAP. Then, that night at around midnight -- about ten hours later, in other words -- I saw ghsqb's thread. At first I was gravely concerned, and had that "Oh shit" feeling in my stomach when I saw the title...but when I saw that the two stories seemed to match up, I thought I'd wait and see. I also had a 14-hour drive to make the next day (I was just finishing up a weeklong stay at my sister's house in Indiana), so I didn't have time to get into anything. Today, I got the game via UPS. It looks great, though I haven't tried it out yet. The item was very well-packed with bubble wrap and peanuts in a sturdy box, which makes sense if he has UPS handle the shipping and packing. So that's my story. I thought it worth mentioning, since whatever happened, I can say that bigbadserpent didn't cancel the sale in order to make more money -- my bid (and cost) was less than ghsqb's winning bid, and was literally less than half of his top bid amount. It doesn't seem to have been about the money; otherwise, why sell to me for less than half of what the last auction went for? But I don't understand what on earth was going on with the $152.94 invoice. I feel bad that ghsqb kind of got screwed here. I don't know if it helps that the game went to a fellow AA member and Intellivision fan at a relatively cheap price, rather than ending up in the hands of a reseller who'll mark it up 250%, but... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rev Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 I think the problem is that he didnt want to send anything out of the country and it be because of the customs forms. But he was WAY OVERCHARGING for the shipping costs to Canada. It realisticlt should cost no more than 12.00 to send it to Canada. Even if UPS charged 20.00 to box it up. Why was he charging 75 to ship it? It doesnt add up. Anyway, im glad it went to a collector and not a re-seller. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+thegoldenband Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 I don't know -- when I had UPS pack and ship a wedding present for a friend of mine across the country (in Oregon), it was more than $50. I was totally flabbergasted, but it was too late to back out. And, whoa, holy crap: I just priced the cost of sending a 1 lb. package to cmart in Canada using UPS. The quote is -- brace yourself -- $87.08!! I don't know if that quote includes the price of having them pack it for you. I just priced bigbadseaserpent's shipment to me, and it would be around $11-12. If UPS charges $10 to pack it, and a bit more goes to taxes, then we're in the ballpark of the $23.47 I paid. I think there's plenty of room for thinking that UPS isn't the ideal shipping method from the buyer's cost perspective, but I don't think bigbadseaserpent is pocketing a big chunk of the shipping costs here -- it's looking legit to me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pimpmaul69 Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 i have a intellivision with 39 games and got a quote for 42 dollars to ship insured to canada through us mail. 1 game for 75 dollars is effin crazy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+thegoldenband Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Hmmm, I have to make a correction -- I think I misunderstood the UPS website, and inadvertently used the overnight rates. Now it's quoting me about $18 to ship a one-pound package to Canada. Dunno what's going on, so I think I'll step out of that part of the discussion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ghsqb Posted January 5, 2012 Author Share Posted January 5, 2012 @thegoldenband - i am actually very glad to see it went to a fellow AAer. I exchanged a lot of messages with bigbadserpent over this whole mess. His explanation of the high shipping costs is that he uses UPS not just as a shipping service, but as a logistics service. In other words, he just kind of brings in what he needs to ship, and where to, and they box it up, label it, take care of forms etc... I agree that bigbadserpent may not have been trying to personally profit off of the shipping, the cost quoted may be a reflection of what UPS charges for that service. As I explained to Eric (bigbadserpent) the issue that he has though is whether that's really the best choice for him going forward. His higher shipping costs are resulting in lower bids on his games, and for a reseller, that's the last thing you would want. A really messed up situation overall for everyone involved I think....but in the end a fellow AAer got a great deal on Stonix...so it could have ended much worse. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+thegoldenband Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Thanks for your post, and I'm very glad to know my having bought the game makes the situation more palatable. I hope you're able to get a copy for a comparable price in the near future, because I'm very impressed with the game so far. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rev Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 I guess what we can learn from this then is that the bigbadserpeant guy is too lazy to box up a game and drive to the post office. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kefka15 Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 @thegoldenband - i am actually very glad to see it went to a fellow AAer. I exchanged a lot of messages with bigbadserpent over this whole mess. His explanation of the high shipping costs is that he uses UPS not just as a shipping service, but as a logistics service. In other words, he just kind of brings in what he needs to ship, and where to, and they box it up, label it, take care of forms etc... I agree that bigbadserpent may not have been trying to personally profit off of the shipping, the cost quoted may be a reflection of what UPS charges for that service. As I explained to Eric (bigbadserpent) the issue that he has though is whether that's really the best choice for him going forward. His higher shipping costs are resulting in lower bids on his games, and for a reseller, that's the last thing you would want. A really messed up situation overall for everyone involved I think....but in the end a fellow AAer got a great deal on Stonix...so it could have ended much worse. I was looking at a copy of Stadium Mud Buggies he had available and noticed the shipping was outrageous. I contacted him asking why and got a very similar response actually. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mendon Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 It came up $42.77 to 33525 for me. Sorry, but there is no way in hell that I believe USPS charges $43 to box and deliver one game from Pennsylvania to Florida. And even if they did, I'd never pay Mr. BigBad that kind of money to ship me one game (unless a naked Angelina Jolie hand delivered it) Mendon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pimpmaul69 Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 It came up $42.77 to 33525 for me. Sorry, but there is no way in hell that I believe USPS charges $43 to box and deliver one game from Pennsylvania to Florida. And even if they did, I'd never pay Mr. BigBad that kind of money to ship me one game (unless a naked Angelina Jolie hand delivered it) Mendon naked angelina jolie hand delivered it, she was delivered naked in the box, what evs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+thegoldenband Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 naked angelina jolie hand delivered it, she was delivered naked in the box, what evs. At one point she was hand-delivered naked, yes, and it was via a box -- but I think that was some time ago. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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