Does anyone have any insight on why international buyers can't request an invoice from me for combined shipping? I've been selling coins on eBay for years and years and this used to work fine. They'd add the items to their cart, request an invoice, and then I'd send them a new total. Now apparently they get a message saying I don't offer combined shipping. There's nothing on the listing page for me to check or uncheck. This leads to a lot of frustration and back and forth messages, often with people who don't speak English. I end up having them pay the full price and then having to refund the difference, and I suspect I end up paying more in fees to eBay because of this. Is there something I'm missing?
This might be a reason why: eBay recently implemented new international shipping hub locations. This allowed sellers to sell items internationally but ship them domestically so its cheaper and they aren't shipping directly to the customer. The eBay shipping hubs receive the item domestically and then send to the international buyer. Although I believe this increases buyer shipping costs.
Yeah I'm opted out of their international shipping program. Like most things they offer it seems oriented to people who sell traditional merchandise and I don't understand how to charge for it. My international orders are for low-value items and I ship them with stamps in an envelope. I try to stay away from big international orders because it's too risky.
I would check your settings again to see if eBay didn't enroll you again into one of those international shipping programs (which don't allow combined shipping). You might also need to create your own international shipping policy (if there isn't one, eBay might again default to their own).
I'm definitely opted out of their shipping program but I need to look more at the international automatic combined shipping discount options. I never had that before though and it worked.
