BookFinder.com Journal

A number of bookseller-bloggers have been engaging in an interesting discussion on shipping charges, specifically on how customers react to being charged higher-than-expected shipping prices after being quoted a lower price during checkout.

Scott from Fine Books & Collections posted about the negative impression that he gets from being nickeled and dimed after checkout:

“We live in a world of one-click ordering online, and when book buyers place an order, they reasonably expect that they are going to get the book in the mail. They do not expect to get an email asking for more money. From the customer’s perspective, that feels like a bait-and-switch routine.”

A number of booksellers responded, discussing the complexities that might reasonably cause sellers to ask for extra charges after the user is quoted a price, and what sellers can do to address the issue. Respondents included Ian at Lux Mentis, Michael at Book Patrol, Jeff at Using Books, the unnamed blogger at Tech Ramblings from the Rare Book Trade, and Hugh at Hugh’s Books.

Scott followed up a few days later, reiterating his position.

I agree with Scott. The updating of shipping charges after checkout, as infrequent as it may be, is still a patently customer-unfriendly practice in a modern ecommerce environment. Independent bookseller groups like IOBA should be working hand-in-hand with marketplaces to reduce the need for the practice, possibly through establishing support for fragile or oversize flags on book records, adding a second shipping matrix for fragile or oversize books, offering improved integrated sales tax support, etc. Customers deserve better.