"Never Too Old To Learn A Lesson"

There's two lessons in life that I occasionally forget:

1) If something's too good to be true, it usually is.

2) You don't get sum'thin' fer nuttin'.

But, like I said , I occasionally forget those rules and do something stupid...like bidding on "one cent" on-line auctions. This was the case of a few weeks past when I thought I'd try to get together most of the issues of The Demon V2 series from DC, and place a one cent bid on several listings from this one particular dealer.

The issue numbers over-lapped from one listing to the other; there'd be like a #2 listed on two different listings along with other issues, or just one different issue I needed in different listings, so I knew ahead of time that I'd have duplicates if I won the lots, but also figured that maybe I could put the dup's together in a set as well, re-sell them on auction and actually maybe make a little from it. So total I won 8 different auctions at one cent each, a total of eight cents for 51 books, 14 of which were duplication leaving me with 27 different issues (which was about half of the run).

The seller had stated $6.00 per listing as postage, but---said he'd combine postage costs on multiple wins. Now here's where I goofed up. I SHOULD have asked him before I even bidded what the total cost would be on say, 5-6 auctions, instead of waiting until I won them all. I figured he might say, $10.00 postage total, and mail it first class or priority.

Silly me.

He stated that my postage rate would be an outrageous $32.00!

I wasn't the happiest of campers because of this, but went ahead and paid it anyway simply because I've never NOT paid for any auction I've bidded on and won. Sent him the payment...and waited just to see what the exact postage costs would be. Two weeks later the package arrived, one (fortunately duplicate) book torn, and the cost on the package?

$2.68! The SOB didn't even have the courtesy to mail it either First Class or Priority, but Media Mail.

Out-right price gouging on postage to try to make up his loss on the books. The books I thought I'd get cheap ended up costing me more than $1. each for the ones I actually needed; books that, to me, weren't worth over fifty cents each.

I should blame only myself in this matter, but I've bidded on other one cent auctions before and always those dealers stated a reasonable amount for postage. This one did not. Needless to say I won't be leaving him feedback; I don't know that many four-letter words (okay; so I DO know that many, but...), and I'll mark this down to a costly experience, one of the few I've ever had buying from on-line auctions. But from now on, you better know that I'll know how much that postage will be ahead of time.