Here's one you may not have considered - if you are a regular online seller did you know you can give your profit margin a boost by buying your postage in advance?
It's possible to buy unused stamps for a massive discount - I tend to aim to pay about 60% of face value, which is a little more work but if you aim for 70-75% you will find this very easy. If you spend £100 a month in posting ebay items you could easily save yourself upwards of £300 a year!
There's levels to this game so we will start out with the easiest and most basic method; although this won't save you as much money as other tricks!
Easiest thing to do is use a website like philatelink, for example:
https://www.philatelink.co.uk/100-x-1st-class-67p-discounted-picture-stamps-1816-p.asp - 100 x 1st Class stamps for £58, representing a 13.5% discount.
https://www.philatelink.co.uk/30425-face-value-bag-of-stamps-20p-to-68p-26-off-2327-p.asp £304 of stamps 20p to 68p for £225 - a 26% discount
The next step up is to find listings for mint unused stamps on ebay. Search for terms like "mint" "unused "MNH" -aka "Mint Never Hinged'. Presentation packs, and presitge booklets can also sell for well under face value.
Look for lots which either give the face value of the collection or which have clear enough pictures you can tot up the total; then divide by the saving you want to achieve and take off any postage - eg. £100 worth of stamps with £1 P&P - you want to pay 70% face value max so £100 * 70% - £1 postage = max bid of £69.
Some lots I've bought with this method:
Book with stamps - I still use the stamp book and it also contains a few pages of pre-decimal stamps I haven't got round to selling yet - Face value of the decimal £95; I paid £67 so a 30% discount plus a free stamp book and pre-decimal stamps to sell!
50 x 76p stamps - they were a bit crumpled but were all fine to use, Face value £38 I paid £20.50 so discount of 46%!
A lot listed as "over £60 face value" - paid £40 when i totted up the FV when I got home it was £71,85! Get in! Discount of 44%!
Maybe you're looking to buy a really large amount of stamps, or like me you're hell bent on getting the biggest discount possible and keep getting outbid on ebay by people happy with a 25% discount! You need to look at some specialist stamp auctions!!
I've bought a few lots now from Somerset Stamp Auctions - they're a very reputable business but in a sense it's a little riskier; you'll not see the stamps you are bidding on and have to calculate for the auctioneers premium and postage in your bids. Bids can be submitted in advance via email. I tend to look at the text catalogue and search for the words "face value". I've paid about 60% of face value whenever I have used Somerset Stamp Auctions - I've had a couple better results on ebay but it's a bigger time commitment on ebay when i consider all the lots i've manually added up and not won.
Common pitfalls:
Being flooded with very low value stamps - I've got quite a bit of low value stamps now! Aim for newer issues where possible and avoid buying lots which are exclusively 1970s issues as you won't get any stamp values higher than about 14p! Also try to use one or two low value stamps each time you post to avoid building up too big a collection!
Don't buy any pre-decimal lots! Usually pre-decimal lots won't list a face value; and they are in old money so 4d, 1'9 etc instead of 4p, £1.12 etc.
Don't buy any dodgy overseas territories! I'm talking about Channel Islands, IoM, etc. The discounts on these can be huuuge but unless you plan on going to Guernsey every time you sell something on ebay then you're wasting your money as they won't be accepted at a UK post office. General rule is if it has the queens head and is in £ and p it is a British stamp UNLESS it has the name of another state on the stamp.
Posting:
The best thing to do is work out how much you need before hand, find that amount in stamps and affix on package before you go to the PO. They will weigh at the counter, sometimes double check your counting, sometimes not, postmark the stamps and off it goes! It's helpful to know when you get to the counter how much postage/what class of postage each item is, sometimes i jot it on the front of the package.
If you're feeling lazy you can always overpay slightly rather than working it out exactly eg you affix 5 x 30p stamps (£1.50) to a letter with £1.40 to pay - you lose the 10p you overpaid.
The other option is to underpay, you will then need to make up the payment at the PO counter - eg affixing 4 x 30p stamps would leave you with 20p to pay at the PO - obviously you buy this at 100% face value so both of these shortcuts will cut into your profit margin.
The only other thing I can think of right now is NVIs (non value indicators, eg 1st, 2nd and E) - I tend to save them as long as possible using other stamps first, I'll tend to buy more stamps if I'm flush rather than use my NVIs. Reason for this is NVIs go up in value! Take the first link I posted a 13.5% discount on 100 1st class stamps - in March the price of 1st class will go up again, probably by 2p, meaning those stamps which were worth £67 are now worth £69 and the discount you achieve is effectively gone up to 16%.
Hope you guys enjoy this post and it helps you make even more money!
Happy to answer any questions
It's possible to buy unused stamps for a massive discount - I tend to aim to pay about 60% of face value, which is a little more work but if you aim for 70-75% you will find this very easy. If you spend £100 a month in posting ebay items you could easily save yourself upwards of £300 a year!
There's levels to this game so we will start out with the easiest and most basic method; although this won't save you as much money as other tricks!
Easiest thing to do is use a website like philatelink, for example:
https://www.philatelink.co.uk/100-x-1st-class-67p-discounted-picture-stamps-1816-p.asp - 100 x 1st Class stamps for £58, representing a 13.5% discount.
https://www.philatelink.co.uk/30425-face-value-bag-of-stamps-20p-to-68p-26-off-2327-p.asp £304 of stamps 20p to 68p for £225 - a 26% discount
The next step up is to find listings for mint unused stamps on ebay. Search for terms like "mint" "unused "MNH" -aka "Mint Never Hinged'. Presentation packs, and presitge booklets can also sell for well under face value.
Look for lots which either give the face value of the collection or which have clear enough pictures you can tot up the total; then divide by the saving you want to achieve and take off any postage - eg. £100 worth of stamps with £1 P&P - you want to pay 70% face value max so £100 * 70% - £1 postage = max bid of £69.
Some lots I've bought with this method:
Book with stamps - I still use the stamp book and it also contains a few pages of pre-decimal stamps I haven't got round to selling yet - Face value of the decimal £95; I paid £67 so a 30% discount plus a free stamp book and pre-decimal stamps to sell!
50 x 76p stamps - they were a bit crumpled but were all fine to use, Face value £38 I paid £20.50 so discount of 46%!
A lot listed as "over £60 face value" - paid £40 when i totted up the FV when I got home it was £71,85! Get in! Discount of 44%!
Maybe you're looking to buy a really large amount of stamps, or like me you're hell bent on getting the biggest discount possible and keep getting outbid on ebay by people happy with a 25% discount! You need to look at some specialist stamp auctions!!
I've bought a few lots now from Somerset Stamp Auctions - they're a very reputable business but in a sense it's a little riskier; you'll not see the stamps you are bidding on and have to calculate for the auctioneers premium and postage in your bids. Bids can be submitted in advance via email. I tend to look at the text catalogue and search for the words "face value". I've paid about 60% of face value whenever I have used Somerset Stamp Auctions - I've had a couple better results on ebay but it's a bigger time commitment on ebay when i consider all the lots i've manually added up and not won.
Common pitfalls:
Being flooded with very low value stamps - I've got quite a bit of low value stamps now! Aim for newer issues where possible and avoid buying lots which are exclusively 1970s issues as you won't get any stamp values higher than about 14p! Also try to use one or two low value stamps each time you post to avoid building up too big a collection!
Don't buy any pre-decimal lots! Usually pre-decimal lots won't list a face value; and they are in old money so 4d, 1'9 etc instead of 4p, £1.12 etc.
Don't buy any dodgy overseas territories! I'm talking about Channel Islands, IoM, etc. The discounts on these can be huuuge but unless you plan on going to Guernsey every time you sell something on ebay then you're wasting your money as they won't be accepted at a UK post office. General rule is if it has the queens head and is in £ and p it is a British stamp UNLESS it has the name of another state on the stamp.
Posting:
The best thing to do is work out how much you need before hand, find that amount in stamps and affix on package before you go to the PO. They will weigh at the counter, sometimes double check your counting, sometimes not, postmark the stamps and off it goes! It's helpful to know when you get to the counter how much postage/what class of postage each item is, sometimes i jot it on the front of the package.
If you're feeling lazy you can always overpay slightly rather than working it out exactly eg you affix 5 x 30p stamps (£1.50) to a letter with £1.40 to pay - you lose the 10p you overpaid.
The other option is to underpay, you will then need to make up the payment at the PO counter - eg affixing 4 x 30p stamps would leave you with 20p to pay at the PO - obviously you buy this at 100% face value so both of these shortcuts will cut into your profit margin.
The only other thing I can think of right now is NVIs (non value indicators, eg 1st, 2nd and E) - I tend to save them as long as possible using other stamps first, I'll tend to buy more stamps if I'm flush rather than use my NVIs. Reason for this is NVIs go up in value! Take the first link I posted a 13.5% discount on 100 1st class stamps - in March the price of 1st class will go up again, probably by 2p, meaning those stamps which were worth £67 are now worth £69 and the discount you achieve is effectively gone up to 16%.
Hope you guys enjoy this post and it helps you make even more money!
Happy to answer any questions