Baskets and Request an Invoice

Post here any issues you experience when trying to buy items on SellMyRetro.com

Baskets and Request an Invoice

Postby rwap_software » Wed Apr 11, 2018 10:18 am

I find that new users on the site are sometimes puzzled by the current checkout arrangement. At present it works as follows (for fixed price items):

a) You click on Buy Now and then have to Confirm your purchase
b) Once you confirm your purchase, the item is taken out of stock and the seller notified that it has been sold.
c) You can make payment at this point, or continue shopping.
d) Once you have finished finding all of the items you want, you can go to Items I've Won and either pay or 'Request an Invoice' from each seller.
e) After Requesting an Invoice, the payment options disappear, because the system has to wait for the seller to calculate the correct shipping charges and issue an invoice with the total amount due.

The problem comes if buyers want to cancel an order after point (a). They cannot remove the item from Items I've Bought - although just contact the seller who can do so and take a view as to whether you are genuinely interested in the items, or possibly do not quite understand what you need. The item then gets returned to stock so someone else can buy it.

So why not use a "basket" system?

The problem with shopping baskets is they do not help where items are in short supply.

At least the current system removes the item from stock immediately and you can later pay for it after deciding if you want to buy other things from the same seller at the same time (and save on postage)

With a shopping basket, others would be able to add the item to their basket and pay for it before you had chance - at which point it would no longer be available.

The other problem with shopping baskets is postage - SellMyRetro does not impose postage rates on the sellers, and unlike certain other marketplaces, we encourage sellers to combine postage on multiple items in order to save buyers money.

A shopping basket is ideally suited for situations where postage is fixed (or determined by the size of the order), but if, for example, you are buying a disk drive and a keyboard membrane - those items need to be sent separately, for safety, but if you bought 6 different membranes, they could possibly all be sent in one packet. Only the seller can know that depending on the combination of items purchased.

We are open (as always) to suggestions as to how to improve the system!
rwap_software
 
Posts: 160
Joined: Wed Mar 24, 2010 1:34 pm
Location: Oswestry, UK

Return to Issues with Buying

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 1 guest

cron