Microdrive + if1
Hello,
I live in Turkey and I am searching for a working if1 with working microdrive for a reasonable price. Some of you may know me, I'm more or less regular wos user, and a speccy fan for 25 years.
I'm always checking ebay and sometimes bid on items I wish (many of the sellers will only ship to UK), but I had always been outbid in last couple of minutes of auction. the postage is pricy to turkey, I just cannot afford high prices for my wishlist (because with postage, price gets higher and I had to mess with people at customs office).
ok, here is my offer, I can pay ~?8 for each item (~?16 total),ofcourse I will pay for postage too. if you got spare microdrive and/or if1, I will be very grateful.
I live in Turkey and I am searching for a working if1 with working microdrive for a reasonable price. Some of you may know me, I'm more or less regular wos user, and a speccy fan for 25 years.
I'm always checking ebay and sometimes bid on items I wish (many of the sellers will only ship to UK), but I had always been outbid in last couple of minutes of auction. the postage is pricy to turkey, I just cannot afford high prices for my wishlist (because with postage, price gets higher and I had to mess with people at customs office).
ok, here is my offer, I can pay ~?8 for each item (~?16 total),ofcourse I will pay for postage too. if you got spare microdrive and/or if1, I will be very grateful.
Post edited by Arda on
Comments
I would consider a good price (if not too cheap again) around ~£25-30.
I agree with you, UK must have the most expensive postage in the world EVER, nomatter if you're in EU or not.
But then again 99% of UK sellers on ebay are lame overchargers (on postage cost that is).
One of the main issues over postage, is that people forget to include money for the price of the envelope and bubble wrap etc, the ever increasing distances to a local post office, paypal fees on the postage amount. A few people have commented on how much I charge for p&p on the large QL and Spectrum+ keyboard membranes - the envelopes alone cost ?1 each and the UK has now introduced the worst pricing system ever - the cost of sending an item is based not only on weight, but also size!!
www.rwapsoftware.co.uk
www.sellmyretro.com
Most of the times (i'm not reffering on you) the difference is not justified neither by the envelope cost nor any "driving to the post office" cost (unless a limo drives you there).
Forgive me but i find it VERY hard to believe that a plain paper or even a bubbly envelope costs £1, and considering that one is a regular seller he oughts to find a cheaper source for envelopes (if they really cost 1£).
Anyway, i meant no offence towards you but since i have bought items from UK sellers many many times, and i'm not retarded, my point of view on this matter still stands.
About 5 years ago before The AA stopped being an Association of Members and became a Shareholder driven mean selling machine - rant rant.
They used to have a tool on their site which told you how much per mile to drive your car.
At the time I had a Cavalier Classic 1.8L the hard fact was 66p per mile. If it is a 5 mile round trip to your nearest post office, and assuming there is ample free parking, the direct cost would have been £6.60
That was 5 years ago. Petrol and diesel are now well over £1 per litre and servicing a car now costs at least £75 per hour.
And now postage...
Remember postage prices are usually Shipping and Handling. If you are a business you have to pay someone to wrap your parcels and take your parcels to the PO stand in a queue etc., or you have to do it all yourself which means you are into non-productive time.
So long as the Shipping and Handling are clearly stated you can't complain, and if they aren't clearly stated and you get stung, you have only yourself to blame.
It is common knowledge that some ebay sellers make profit out of postage.
Royal mail prices can be checked from here :
http://www.royalmail.com/portal/rm/jump2;jsessionid=PXDEKNKOIKMSSFB2IGVUUBQUHRA0UQ2K?catId=400023&mediaId=11200122
Ha, sending 2 glossy magazines to Turkey (if it falls in the European Zone) by Airmail would cost £8.56 or Airsure would cost £9.30 now that is an "ouch". 0.89Kilo in weight
BTW, I've never sold anything, but I have sent a few parcels in my time and the reinforced envelopes like the replacement 128 membranes one aren't cheap. :)
I got 3 megadrive cartidges a year ago and the p&p was 4.45 pounds and this is just one example.
Lets face it here, MOST of the UK sellers do make a profit out of p&p and i am very sad to say that this is something i personally have encountered only in UK sellers.
Many postal authorities charge by size as well as weight, the USPS certainly does and did so years before Royal Mail introduced pricing in proportion. (I know, I wrote the mailing/weighing/rating engine for their cash register system for the USPS back in 1995). For Royal Mail, pricing in proportion was actually cost neutral too overall when it was brought in - some people lose out from it, but also some people gained. Still, if I were in charge I would not have introduced it (and I told the directors here that [0] - but they wouldn't listen, they said that Royal Mail is doing it so we have to do it too given that most of our traffic is with them) - it added an extra layer of complexity to the pricing model (which is already complex enough - if you take all postal services it's something like ~500,000 possible product lines... however, it can be modelled quite nicely with set theory and boolean logic in a very robust algorithm...but I digress!)
[0] Isle of Man Post Office
Vote with your wallet. I consider the ENTIRE price for an ebay purchase. It's only a good deal if the item price PLUS the postage price is a fair price. I simply don't bid on stuff which looks like it has overpriced postage. (I also tend to stick to 'Buy it now', I can't be bothered with bidding).
Ofcourse, thats what i do. But this has nothing to do with the postage overpricing fact that we're discussing.
Unfortunately some stuff can only be found by UK sellers (speccy stuff) and that leaves you with no choice if you really want something.
yes, I'm being optimistic here, but I feel like I'm with friends, and I know there are so many people with large hardware archive. even sometimes they are trying to get rid of some part of it.
I can pay for more ofcourse, 25-30 pounds is a reasonable price also, but shipping those items to turkey costs about 10 to 20 pounds (as sellers says-really varies that much). so, if1+microdrive will cost to me almost 50. (I'm not complaining about postage cost however)
I guess you are right, ~16 quid is not much. Thanks for discussing tho. I'll keep looking at ebay.
I'm searching for a zx printer too :) for 8 quid. no, ok kidding now.
Supply and demand... What winston said.
When I'm buying and insurance isn't offered (even though by accepting paypal I believe the seller has to have postal insurance) I always ask, the answer should come back at 70p for Recorded Delivery because that's what it generally costs up to about ?30 item value. Once this came back as ?5 end of discussion with that seller.
You could go for a PlusD you know, much better option than MD, or even a DivIDE if you don't mind losing the retro feelgood factor but gaining masses of instant storage. (The PlusD has a printer interface). Or even a Disciple, I saw one of those up for auction the other day.
I had an IF1 and couple of MDs before getting an opus 1. My overriding memory is of cartridges endlesly looping.
I bought a bunch of Integral Splash (Flash) Drives on eBay as "Buy Now".
They were ?4.50 + ?4.50 P&P but:
a) They wouldn't allow consolidation of P&P
b) They wouldn't allow collection.
Their argument is that it was to do with the way eBay charge for items that make it more cost effective that way.
?9 per item including delivery was a reasonable price however for 1Gb Splash drives so I ordered 4 anyway.
As Winston says, consider the total price and ask if you are happy with it,
Then you find out of ten counters, only one is open.
Then you have to queue, usually behind some pleb sending 40 Ebay parcels, some local business owner bringing his his day's takings in 2p's and 1p's and an assortment of coffin dodgers who either reek of urine or are still wearing their carpet slippers.
With all this in mind I think everyone is justified to put extra on their postal costs for having to put up with that.
Cartridges are pretty robust and could be packed with materials/boxes just found laying around the house. Things like the membrane requires more care and the special reinforced envelope. 1 quid seems pretty reasonable (I just bought 3 jiffy bags yesterday for $3.12)
I used to do a lot of selling on Ebay and didn't make money on the shipping but I did add some for packaging material and time going to the PO...which was basically 30-45 mins of my lunch hour consumed..
Most shipping is reasonable if you look closely at whats involved...its unrealistic to assume the price on the box is all that is involved...if I charged for my time to go post it and gas and packaging..that would always amount to more than the stamps on the box (well most times).
I never understand why people complain about shipping when generally the shipping is posted upfront...if you dont like what you see don't buy the item!
Someone also mentioned that some sellers don't combine shipping. Well I used to have the stuff I was selling already boxed up and ready to go when I listed the auctions and If I was listing a lot I'm not going to waste my time re-boxing items (and finding a bigger box) to save you 2 quid.
I just wanna print out the invoice/shipping label..stick it on and go.
EDIT: oh fyi, I was very happy with the reasonable shipping to USA from rwap for my Divide+...I don't think rich is ripping people off on shipping.
just coz I didn't say hello, there's no need to insult me!
Anyway the Doc says it's not my fault.
I think the upshot is:
Find out the total price and judge for yourself whether it is within your budget.
...and get a PlusD because they are much better.
Ofcourse i don't expect that the money someone pays for postage would be exactly what is printed on the parcel by the post office but then again i have the intelligence to judge if an extra 10 quid is a reasonable extra justifing packing and driving to the post office.
What also makes me wonder is that this phenomenon is something i personally have experienced only with UK sellers and nobody else. I've bought from USA, Hong Kong, Germany, Australia, you name it.... should i believe that only in UK the packaging materials are expensive or that post offices are on the other side of the country? Oh please...
Ofcourse its my choice you might say, ok but that does not stop me from judging the rippoff.
Well I'm in the US and its considerably cheaper for me to send stuff to UK than it is for UK to me...example...
I sent a roll of 50 DVDs (with movies on) to my parents...box was about 8x8x8 and 3lbs or so...cost to me...$16.
My mother sent me a box 12x10x8 2lbs......cost...24 quid. ($48 ).
Edit: as for the distance to the PO...for me its about 3miles from work, then anything from 15-45mins in the line....how much do you value your time?
he just sells rubbish and until he gives me a DivIDE to play with I'm gonna keep saying it :)
We're not joking, you'd be surprised/appalled.
http://www.postoffice.co.uk/portal/po/jump2?catId=63400714&mediaId=57600693
2500 or about 5% of the postoffices.
Like our pits, this will be the first round or is it the second?
It will take the supermarket model. Only where a large town can support a super post office will there be a service, everyone else can go fuck themselves.
That may be a bit extreme :)
I always marvel at how cheap postage from the US to the UK is compared with 2-4 x in the opposite direction.
I'm reffering to the extra thats been asked by UK sellers for postage (what you payed minus whats been printed on the parcel by the post office).
This extra most of the times is so high that does not justify package or driving to the post office thus overcharge.
Once again the UK leads the way!
Postage + packing + handling
Remember if it is a firm selling they probably have to whack VAT on the last at 17.5%
Anyway as already said take your own view on the total price against the value of the object and the reputation of the seller.
The colonies will catch up eventually :)
LOL
Let the 51st state of the US lead the way!!!
Worked out though as the card was a $200 card at the time and its still in my computer pumpin away.
Alaska...? :???:
(Too slow with the edit, there) :p