The most expensive thing I ever sent was done registered post within Australia. 2x Thoughtseize and I took that postage cost out of my own pocket.
I'd rather be out of pocket the $4.50AUD than $46USD or whatever those cards were worth at the time.
That is the main problem with thinking in terms of each transaction. You are spending $4.50 every time you send a package like this. Over 100 transactions you are spending $450 in shipping. The average rate of failure to deliver or damage to the package is below 1%. Your idea for spending so much is that if this particular package gets lost I am out $46 so you pay an extra $3.25 per package like this for that thinking even though you were covered by pucatrade. The person who thinks with their wallet for the long term will think 'this is under $50. A stamp in a pwe packaged the way it states on the site is fine.' If they hit the 1% of the packages getting lost in mail in 100 they are down $125 in shipping and $46 (which would be more then likely covered by puca as long as they show they did everything correctly). This leaves a total of $171.
Now lets look at how much money you are down. You are down $450, but covered for the 1% failure from the postal service.
You: $450 for 100 packages of $46 (1 lost)
Me: $171 for 100 packages of $46 (1 lost)
Difference = $279 (This is the break point of a card to be worth shipping with tracking. This is why you see some expensive cards come without tracking.)
I know where I would want to be in this equation. How about you?
To be honest I ship cards under 5000 points without tracking because as per pucatrade 'Packages worth more than 5,000 PucaPoints must be sent with Mail Tracking in order to be eligible for our 100% Trade Guarantee.' That means anything under 5000 points is covered under the 100% trade guarantee as long as you follow the shipping guidelines. Those can be found here: https://pucatrade.com/shipping.
Also here is some information about international tracking. It's mainly to cover your butt under the trade guarantee. When the tracked package leaves the U.S. and enters another country it is on that country's postal service to add it into their tracking system. Some countries ignore the tracking information which means your package will stop being tracked as soon as it leaves the U.S. So this means you are paying for a service that isn't being utilized sometimes.
So what does this mean for shipping internationally? It means for cards under 5000 points you are covered and should just use a global forever stamp and follow the mailing instructions for pucatrade. In 200+ international packages I have sent without tracking on cards ranging from $5 to $49 I have had 0 issues. If I had used tracking for all of those cards it would have cost me an extra $1200 which is not worth it considering I was covered already.
Oh I move the little stuff all the time. Mostly it goes to Europe because a lot of those players say they aren't picky about language in their profile or are actively looking for Japanese cards. I am interested to see how pucatrade implements the foreign card market because it is a lot of work and cards should have a different value for the languages that are more sought after by players.
About 20% of the NM cards that I receive are not up to my local shops standards, but those cards are clearly OK by puca rules. So, I keep them I am mostly anal about the high end standard cards, finding Mint/NM versions is not difficult.
I can't wait till Japanese cards can be traded on Puca..
Cheers..
A lot of traders (such as myself) are willing to take Japanese cards at full PucaPoints value. Be sure to check profiles for that sort of info. Unfortunately, relatively few Japanese cards are opened over here, so if you are looking to receive them, it will probably be very difficult.
I think what he means is he can't wait to be able to send out Japanese cards at their corrected value and not have to haggle over prices. I know of tons of people who take Japanese cards at full English value because you can make $$ from doing that. For some things I am happy to do that (mostly edh non foil things). For other things like modern/legacy staples I am going to be looking for real market value on those Japanese cards. I agree with Midorimage about how picky they are about condition here. NM here is really Pristine Mint. I have had plenty of pack fresh cards get marked at a 30-50% discount on their buylists here in Japan.
I'd like to trade up towards a Judge Force of Will using Pucatrade, but I'm wondering whether that would ever happen. I'm afraid I'd just end up with a ton of points, and no one offering any.
The alternative is to sell on MKM, and just buy it at the end. In that case, you can clearly see how many are available, and cash out if needed. :/
Right now, it doesn't look like there is currently anyone on Pucatrade who has a promo FoW on their want list who actually has enough points. That means if you were to accrue 850k points today, yours would be the only want visible. The second part is to actually have someone part with one, since right now pucatrade there's only 25 of them on haves lists. I've gotten a timetwister and am currently in the talks about a mox pearl, so there's definitely people out there willing to part with high end cards.
I am curious to know how many of those high end cards have been traded outside of the US. It seems to me that being outside the US really hurts your chances of getting these cards.
I ship from Japan all over the world. I have only ever had 1 package get lost and it was on it's way to me at my family's home when I was on a long holiday in America visiting family. It was lost by the USPS. I find I have more issues with the USPS then with other services world wide. When I track packages (often) I notice a very real pattern. Packages sent to the US generally get "stuck" in a major US hub for 4-10 days for no apparent reason and finally make it to the receiver after 8-14 days with the average being 10 days. When I send to Europe cards get to the intended destination in 4-8 days with the average being 5 days. When I receive cards it takes the longest to receive from the US as well. Needless to say the USPS sucks compared to most other world wide postal services except for 2 places, South America and Italy. I understand your fear of shipping overseas though because you are afraid the USPS might screw things up or take forever (they do often). That is mainly the reason you see high end cards come from outside the US. People in other countries don't fear their postal service as much as Americans do because their services work much better.
Pile B: 280$'s worth of KTK fetches and RTR shocks (SCG's prices)
I'm looking to pick up as many Modern lands as possible while the KTK fetches and RTR shocks are at their lowest point.
I doubt WotC will keep reprinting the duals and fetches often enough that they retain their price, so those Modern lands are bound to go up some. But while Volcanic Island is currently stable, I figure it too can only go up. Without a time machine, those changesare unquantifiable, so the best we can do it trade at current value. That is my reasoning for thinking this Pile A for Pile B is fair. What do you guys think? Should I ask more for my revised dual, or am I asking for too much?
I don't think you are asking for too much in this trade. Also depends on which fetches and shocks you are getting. If you are getting mostly bloodstained mires and blood crypts then I would say no, but if the majority is steam vents, polluted delta,and flooded strand then I say you are ok.
Long term you are better off with the foil JP Dack Fayden. It has a lower chance of being reprinted since Wizards is working on trying to reduce the cost of Modern Goyf's are being printed each MM set so far.
I send Japanese cards all the time if people accept the languages as stated in their profile. If you don't mind a language please type it in your profile and people will send you cards in that language more often. Also if you are a premium member turn on the ability to accept cards from countries where the native language is a language you would accept your cards in. It will take more time to receive, but you will get premium language cards from those countries occasionally.
Cards I have sent in Japanese include: Akroma's Memorial, Gavony Township, Maelstrom Archangel, Foil Kruphix, God of Horizons, Dust Bowl, Treasure Cruise, foil Bedlam(7th), and various tokens.
Can you limit the countries you ship cards to (and the reverse, ship from)?
Yes, I'm currently limited to the US only, and am fine with that.
Or are shipping destinations factored in to points?
No
Currently I'm also finding it annoying that I can't use my Google voice number, and that you can't mark that you don't care about which version of a card you get. I'm kind of getting the sense that lots of people work around problems like these by leaving messages on their profiles and working outside the system. Same for things like SP instead of NM cards and such? Is this correct?
Correct.
Lastly, anything on your want list can be deducted and shipped from your points at any random time (IE you can't budget for massive price swings, etc. Something soars and you don't remove it from your list in time and you're out a bunch of points)?
Yup. Only put things on your want list that you know aren't going to fluctuate, or only at a time when you can try and control what may be snapped up when.
Duals, reserve list and old foils take forever to fill. I only have old foils and stuff on my list, like foil MM brainstorms and the like. I have had 30000+ points for 2 weeks and nothing filled. I put in some smaller legacy wants like Kor and stuff and it filled fast. Cards that are in demand like LoV and in demand foils take a long time.
That's not how I have experienced it. I got all of my red duals within 3 days of getting the points.
This is the difference between using pucatrade from America and other countries. I have also had duals on my list for months with the points for them. 3 days to fill must be nice. I even mention I will take FWB duals. Doesn't matter to me what language they are in, but it seems lots of people block anything not US related so a large chunk of the market is not seen.
Truly can't blame anyone. I'm about to open my third and fourth issue with the admins.
DONT TRADE OUTSIDE THE US
Again, I don't believe it's people ripping me off, I just think other countries have really, REALLY *****ty mail systems
There are definitely countries I won't send to, but I don't make a blanket of not trading outside the US. I generally do not send cards to South America, Italy, and a few countries in Europe. Everywhere else I have had 0 issues with. I have actually had more issues with the American mail service then any of the other countries I have sent to.
Can you limit the countries you ship cards to (and the reverse, ship from)?
Yes, I'm currently limited to the US only, and am fine with that.
Or are shipping destinations factored in to points?
No
Currently I'm also finding it annoying that I can't use my Google voice number, and that you can't mark that you don't care about which version of a card you get. I'm kind of getting the sense that lots of people work around problems like these by leaving messages on their profiles and working outside the system. Same for things like SP instead of NM cards and such? Is this correct?
Correct.
Lastly, anything on your want list can be deducted and shipped from your points at any random time (IE you can't budget for massive price swings, etc. Something soars and you don't remove it from your list in time and you're out a bunch of points)?
Yup. Only put things on your want list that you know aren't going to fluctuate, or only at a time when you can try and control what may be snapped up when.
Duals, reserve list and old foils take forever to fill. I only have old foils and stuff on my list, like foil MM brainstorms and the like. I have had 30000+ points for 2 weeks and nothing filled. I put in some smaller legacy wants like Kor and stuff and it filled fast. Cards that are in demand like LoV and in demand foils take a long time.
That's not how I have experienced it. I got all of my red duals within 3 days of getting the points.
This is the difference between using pucatrade from America and other countries. I have also had duals on my list for months with the points for them. 3 days to fill must be nice. I even mention I will take FWB duals. Doesn't matter to me what language they are in, but it seems lots of people block anything not US related so a large chunk of the market is not seen.
Argentina is killing me. I have just past a month on one of trades going there and over 3 weeks on a few others. How long is it correct to wait before opening a case? I have been in contact to I don't think there is foul play but at some point something has to give.
I think we're trading with the same guy on the over a month one. He said he has about 52k points of cards from about 300 cards that haven't come in.
Are we all talking about Martin Penas? I also have an Argentinean trade that is now a month long. Can't cancel the trade because there's the chance he'll get free cards. Wonder what can happen if an admin. comes into to mediate.
At the risk of calling someone out, I am trading with a user named Nicolas Barazzutti. Sounds like Argentina is just having a heck of a time with mail. I might remove them from the countries I trade with.
Any other countries I should avoid sending to?
Yup, same poop, different diaper. Also going to avoid Argentina. When I talked w/ my roommate about international shipping, he told me to avoid countries that are not part of the EU, OPEC, or that do not have strong ties to the U.S. (if you're U.S. based, that is).
The only other country that is taking a while to confirm is Australia; and that one has me baffled, since I imagine that they have a lot of mail going to and from Australia to the U.S. - might just be the holidays to blame.
I just had a trade take over a month. Stuff sent to the same region recently has taken only 1 week though. I am betting if you shipped in December it was the holidays. Things were severely backed up. Trades that normally take 1-2 weeks from Japan were taking up to 3 weeks during the holiday season. I also don't ship to Argentina and have recently starting testing the waters on Italy (heard bad things from multiple friends about Italian mail "losing" stuff).
Also Japan is generally safe to send to. 7 days a week mail service makes my life easy.
What have your experiences been with listing commons and uncommons? Seems like a lot of work for maybe not so much gain, but I'd be interested to hear personal experiences with it.
I only list commons and uncommons with a value over 50 points and this is only to get a way to look at some other people's lists to see if there is anything else on there that I can send. They might want a 50 point card and 8 17 point cards which would then make it worth it for me to send. So far this method has worked pretty well for me since I ship out of Japan.
It looks ok to me for what you would get. The only thing I am on the fence about is the Jace, but the rest of the stuff seems fine to trade away if you are looking to get out of standard. Personally I wouldn't go too much deeper then this.
The thing is though is that the pile that I posted was only $800 at TCGMid value, and that's not even including the price reductions on the standard cards and what have not, while the Goyf and Bob pile is around $810 TCGMid.
Yea when trading with a shop you are always going to lose value. If you were to ebay/tcg those cards for cash you would lose about 15-20% with shipping and fees alone not to mention competing with others on the market and then you would turn around and use the cash for the cards. You are in the same boat as this trade then. Try and keep the loss to a minimum on the non standard cards and you should be ok.
Your other option which is much much slower is to take the cards listed and start working your way up the ladder with trades. You could get the cards you want in a month or in a year, but you have to factor in time and travel money. Is it worth it to try and save $40-$100 in value? Your best bet is probably to work on this deal since 70% value is pretty good for a store to give you on standard cards. If you were working on this trade with another player then it might be a different story.
That is the main problem with thinking in terms of each transaction. You are spending $4.50 every time you send a package like this. Over 100 transactions you are spending $450 in shipping. The average rate of failure to deliver or damage to the package is below 1%. Your idea for spending so much is that if this particular package gets lost I am out $46 so you pay an extra $3.25 per package like this for that thinking even though you were covered by pucatrade. The person who thinks with their wallet for the long term will think 'this is under $50. A stamp in a pwe packaged the way it states on the site is fine.' If they hit the 1% of the packages getting lost in mail in 100 they are down $125 in shipping and $46 (which would be more then likely covered by puca as long as they show they did everything correctly). This leaves a total of $171.
Now lets look at how much money you are down. You are down $450, but covered for the 1% failure from the postal service.
You: $450 for 100 packages of $46 (1 lost)
Me: $171 for 100 packages of $46 (1 lost)
Difference = $279 (This is the break point of a card to be worth shipping with tracking. This is why you see some expensive cards come without tracking.)
I know where I would want to be in this equation. How about you?
Also here is some information about international tracking. It's mainly to cover your butt under the trade guarantee. When the tracked package leaves the U.S. and enters another country it is on that country's postal service to add it into their tracking system. Some countries ignore the tracking information which means your package will stop being tracked as soon as it leaves the U.S. So this means you are paying for a service that isn't being utilized sometimes.
So what does this mean for shipping internationally? It means for cards under 5000 points you are covered and should just use a global forever stamp and follow the mailing instructions for pucatrade. In 200+ international packages I have sent without tracking on cards ranging from $5 to $49 I have had 0 issues. If I had used tracking for all of those cards it would have cost me an extra $1200 which is not worth it considering I was covered already.
I think what he means is he can't wait to be able to send out Japanese cards at their corrected value and not have to haggle over prices. I know of tons of people who take Japanese cards at full English value because you can make $$ from doing that. For some things I am happy to do that (mostly edh non foil things). For other things like modern/legacy staples I am going to be looking for real market value on those Japanese cards. I agree with Midorimage about how picky they are about condition here. NM here is really Pristine Mint. I have had plenty of pack fresh cards get marked at a 30-50% discount on their buylists here in Japan.
I ship from Japan all over the world. I have only ever had 1 package get lost and it was on it's way to me at my family's home when I was on a long holiday in America visiting family. It was lost by the USPS. I find I have more issues with the USPS then with other services world wide. When I track packages (often) I notice a very real pattern. Packages sent to the US generally get "stuck" in a major US hub for 4-10 days for no apparent reason and finally make it to the receiver after 8-14 days with the average being 10 days. When I send to Europe cards get to the intended destination in 4-8 days with the average being 5 days. When I receive cards it takes the longest to receive from the US as well. Needless to say the USPS sucks compared to most other world wide postal services except for 2 places, South America and Italy. I understand your fear of shipping overseas though because you are afraid the USPS might screw things up or take forever (they do often). That is mainly the reason you see high end cards come from outside the US. People in other countries don't fear their postal service as much as Americans do because their services work much better.
I don't think you are asking for too much in this trade. Also depends on which fetches and shocks you are getting. If you are getting mostly bloodstained mires and blood crypts then I would say no, but if the majority is steam vents, polluted delta,and flooded strand then I say you are ok.
Long term you are better off with the foil JP Dack Fayden. It has a lower chance of being reprinted since Wizards is working on trying to reduce the cost of Modern Goyf's are being printed each MM set so far.
Cards I have sent in Japanese include: Akroma's Memorial, Gavony Township, Maelstrom Archangel, Foil Kruphix, God of Horizons, Dust Bowl, Treasure Cruise, foil Bedlam(7th), and various tokens.
There are definitely countries I won't send to, but I don't make a blanket of not trading outside the US. I generally do not send cards to South America, Italy, and a few countries in Europe. Everywhere else I have had 0 issues with. I have actually had more issues with the American mail service then any of the other countries I have sent to.
This is the difference between using pucatrade from America and other countries. I have also had duals on my list for months with the points for them. 3 days to fill must be nice. I even mention I will take FWB duals. Doesn't matter to me what language they are in, but it seems lots of people block anything not US related so a large chunk of the market is not seen.
I just had a trade take over a month. Stuff sent to the same region recently has taken only 1 week though. I am betting if you shipped in December it was the holidays. Things were severely backed up. Trades that normally take 1-2 weeks from Japan were taking up to 3 weeks during the holiday season. I also don't ship to Argentina and have recently starting testing the waters on Italy (heard bad things from multiple friends about Italian mail "losing" stuff).
Also Japan is generally safe to send to. 7 days a week mail service makes my life easy.
What was said above is true. Also someone who sends from Japan. There are no import duties on trading cards. Here is a website to help you out. http://www.dutycalculator.com/popular-import-items/import-duty-and-taxes-for-trading-cards/
I only list commons and uncommons with a value over 50 points and this is only to get a way to look at some other people's lists to see if there is anything else on there that I can send. They might want a 50 point card and 8 17 point cards which would then make it worth it for me to send. So far this method has worked pretty well for me since I ship out of Japan.
Yea when trading with a shop you are always going to lose value. If you were to ebay/tcg those cards for cash you would lose about 15-20% with shipping and fees alone not to mention competing with others on the market and then you would turn around and use the cash for the cards. You are in the same boat as this trade then. Try and keep the loss to a minimum on the non standard cards and you should be ok.
Your other option which is much much slower is to take the cards listed and start working your way up the ladder with trades. You could get the cards you want in a month or in a year, but you have to factor in time and travel money. Is it worth it to try and save $40-$100 in value? Your best bet is probably to work on this deal since 70% value is pretty good for a store to give you on standard cards. If you were working on this trade with another player then it might be a different story.