If you’ve been getting a negative balance recently on your Shopee orders recently, this may have been the consequence of a shipping fee overcharge.
What is a shipping fee overcharge and how can you avoid getting charged for this excess fee? All of that will be discussed as you scroll further down.
What Is The Shopee Shipping Fee Overcharge?
A shipping fee overcharge is an excess fee in the shipping of an item usually borne by the seller.
But what exactly is a shipping fee overcharge in the terms of Shopee? Let’s explain it this way:
When you list a product on Shopee, you are mandated to enter the weight and dimensions of the item but when the courier takes your product to the customer, sometimes there is a discrepancy between your entered dimensions and the one that the courier measured. Therefore, an additional charge is applied to the shipping fee to make up for the allowance of measurement.
Why Does This Happen?
On one hand, the discrepancy could have occurred because the seller did not really take the time to measure the item. Instead, he performed an educated guess on how much his item weighs.
On the other hand, it could be that the item weighed heavier on the courier’s end due to the additional weight of the bubble wrap and packaging of the item.
How Does Shopee Mitigate This Issue?
Due to the significant complaints about the negative balance that sellers receive upon the delivery of an order, Shopee’s course of action is to temporarily flag out orders with unusually high shipping fees.
Shopee will coordinate with the courier to validate how much the shipping fee for the particular order really is and then update the record on the Shopee API. In case, there is a need to adjust the shipping fee, Shopee will communicate with both parties involved (seller and buyer).
Due to this process, it will take three to five business days before the payout will reflect on the seller’s balance.
What You Can Do To Prevent Shipping Fee Overcharge
As a seller, it would be a good idea to bring home a weight measurement device so that you accurately determine the exact weight and dimension of your item. Upon doing so, you need to give allowance to that exact weight.
If your item weighs approximately 1kg, it might be a good idea to record it as weighing 1.3 kg on your product listing.
By doing so, you can avoid paying for shipping fee overcharge since what the courier will be weighing won’t be the item but the entire package along with the bubble wrap and box.
