Include Insurance in Shipping Costs

Always include insurance as part of the shipping cost; a lost item will ultimately cost the seller, not the buyer.

I´m So Lonesome I Could Cry

You just might feel like singing this song after your tenth visit to the post office in a week. Fortunately, there are several ways to avoid this. First, schedule your shipping days once or twice a week, depending upon your volume, and include your shipping day s in your auction descriptions. Opening an account at MYUPS.com is also a great idea. My home is now a designated stop on the UPS route!

Free Shipping Supplies

You can save yourself a lot of time at the Post Office by ordering free shipping supplies online through the U.S. Postal Service. It's fast and it's easy.

*http://supplies.usps.gov

Delivery Confirmation Option

If you ship via UPS, always take advantage of their Delivery Confirmation option. With this option, UPS sends you a confirmation of your packages's delivery as soon as it arrives.

Delivery Confirmation Program

You can significantly reduce the risk of a buyer saying you never sent an item by using the US Postal Service´s Delivery Confirmation Program. It only costs well under a dollar for Priority Mail or Parcel Post, and you can include this fee in the buyer's shipping cost.

Personal Postage Providers

Once you start selling a fair amount of items each month, you'll probably want to set up an account with Stamps.com or Simply Postage. Personal postage providers offer software programs that are installed on your computer, so that you can print out postage right off of your computer.