TCGPlayer Adds A Safeguard For A Shipping Problem eBay Addressed Years Ago
eBay-owned TCGPlayer is expanding Safeguard protections for US sellers who ship low-value orders without tracking, while the company works on a plain white envelope tracking solution for the marketplace.
Starting August 17, sellers with at least 1,000 lifetime orders will be eligible for coverage when a qualifying untracked order of $49.99 or less is reported missing by a buyer.
Carling Berkhout
The seller must first provide a full refund, then escalate the order message thread or contact TCGPlayer customer service to request reimbursement. If the claim qualifies, TCGPlayer will credit the seller for the missing order.
Coverage only applies to orders placed on or after August 17. Sellers who have not yet reached the 1,000 lifetime order threshold will become eligible on a rolling basis once they do, with no retroactive protection for earlier sales. Sellers below that threshold remain responsible for the same untracked shipping risk in the meantime.
TCGPlayer recommends tracking for orders over $20 and requires it for orders over $49.99. The company's shipping guidelines also make clear what happens when sellers choose to ship without it, saying they waive their ability to win a dispute if a buyer reports the package did not arrive and there is no delivery confirmation or tracking.
That can make for some difficult shipping math on a marketplace where many individual cards sell for only a few dollars. Adding regular package tracking to every low-value order may cost more than the item itself, leaving sellers to weigh that expense against the risk of sending cards by regular mail with no tracking at all.
Until now, those untracked shipments generally left sellers carrying the risk if a buyer reported an order had not arrived. The new policy shifts some of that risk to TCGPlayer for qualifying sellers, but only temporarily.
"We’re also working on a solution to support plain white envelope tracking," the company told sellers, adding that the expanded coverage will remain in place until it can roll out an improved tracking solution for all sellers.
TCGPlayer had also said in May that it was separately expanding use of tracked envelopes within Direct, announcing that select orders over $50 would begin shipping in tracked envelopes instead of bubble mailers. The company acknowledged at the time that the capability was not yet available to Marketplace sellers and said it was working to make it accessible to them in the future.
Parent company eBay has had a solution for that particular shipping problem for more than five years.
eBay announced Standard Envelope for trading cards in December 2020 and rolled it out in January 2021, giving sellers a low-cost eBay Labels option for shipping inexpensive cards in regular envelopes with integrated tracking and shipping protection.
At launch, the program was specifically aimed at single ungraded trading cards priced at $20 or less, with eBay touting savings of up to 70% compared to USPS First Class Package Service at the time.
Current Standard Envelope shipments can weigh up to three ounces, with eBay's July USPS update listing rates of $0.78 for one ounce, $1.07 for two ounces and $1.36 for three ounces. The service includes up to $20 in shipping protection for a single order and up to $50 for combined orders.
eBay says Standard Envelope does not require an acceptance scan and acknowledges that some shipments may not show delivery events all the way to the buyer. If an envelope goes missing, sellers may still need to refund the buyer and file a claim under the included shipping protection to recover the loss.
eBay Standard Envelope hasn't been without its own problems, including sometimes dodgy tracking updates and difficult claim processes.
Liz Morton
But the service gives eBay sellers a platform-generated label with integrated tracking and protection at a price much closer to ordinary letter mail. TCGPlayer Marketplace sellers still don't have anything comparable.
eBay completed its acquisition of TCGPlayer on October 31, 2022 in a deal valued at up to approximately $295 million. The company said the deal would combine eBay's 26 years of experience in trading cards with TCGPlayer's ecommerce platform, fulfillment and other capabilities to "enhance the overall collecting experience for customers."
Almost four years after the acquisition, some TCGPlayer sellers are asking why similar shipping tools and protections have been so slow to make their way over.
Brandon of the Ice Age Vault YouTube channel said the risk involved in shipping untracked orders on TCGPlayer was one factor in his decision to move his Pokémon inventory to eBay. He said eBay's expanded seller protections have also made him more comfortable listing additional inventory there.
eBay's August seller update said eligible delivery delays will not hurt seller ratings when items are shipped on time with an eBay label, while a separate Seller Hub message told sellers eBay would also handle refund requests for qualifying delayed deliveries.
That appears to build on protections launched last year that reimburse sellers who purchase labels through eBay when an Item Not Received case is refunded and tracking subsequently shows the package was delivered.
Liz Morton
As Value Added Resource reported last week, eBay and TCGPlayer held a ribbon cutting August 12 celebrating expanded operations at the companies' Louisville, Kentucky Authentication Center.
Liz Morton
The 145,000-square-foot facility houses eBay sneaker authentication alongside TCGPlayer Direct verification, sorting and fulfillment operations, following last year's decision to close TCGPlayer's Syracuse Authentication Center and consolidate that work in Louisville.
So far, that integration has not extended to low-cost envelope shipping.
TCGPlayer did not provide a timeline for its planned plain white envelope tracking solution or say whether it will make use of eBay's existing Standard Envelope infrastructure.
