New eBay tracking for sports and trading cards works efficiently and safely

The sports card industry is booming and everyone knows that eBay that offers a forum for trading and selling all types of sports items. For sports and trading card collectors, eBay has created a new postage option with tracking. It currently is only available in the sports and trading cards category, but eBay plans to also offer it in the stamps category.

It's called “eBay standard envelope” and it's now available to customers who buy or sell lightweight items such as ungraded trading cards.

In announcing the service in December, eBay said that it allows sellers in the United States “to print labels and ship trading cards priced $20 and under and up to 3 oz., in an envelope with tracking included, for less than $1.”

I decided to try it out and order a few items.

The label includes a tracking number and barcode that allows the shipment to be tracked as it travels through the mail.

The advantage to eBay customers is obvious.

“Ship and track trading cards for less than $1,” says an eBay flyer.

The new service is cheaper than mailing such an item with tracking and postage purchased directly from the United States Postal Service.

“We’re always looking for ways to improve the buyer and seller experience, especially for lightweight, low cost inventory,” Evelyn Kha, a senior manager at eBay, told the media.

For this service, tracking is not available via the Postal Service’s tracking program. It is only reachable via eBay’s purchase history and thus is restricted to the buyers and sellers of the item. Before I bid on or bought an item, I asked the seller if they were using this new shipping method.

“We’ve created this service to support transactions from our marketplace only so tracking from partner sites is not currently something that is supported,” Kha said.

She said sellers are offered a PDF label in either a 4-inch-by-6-inch or an 8.5-inch-by-11-inch format.

Sellers can use a standard home or office printer or a thermal label printer to print the labels and apply them to their envelopes or to print them directly on the envelopes.

It appears currently the labels can be printed for 1-, 2- and 3-ounce shipments for .51, .71 or .91, respectively.

Stamps should not be used on the envelopes for additional postage, Kha said, adding that shippers should choose one of the three cited rates to be printed on the envelope and have those printed as part of the labels.

Kha also stated that the service is “only supporting machinable envelopes at this time.”

She also told of another benefit of the service: “eBay standard envelope is not only a great, trackable solution for lightweight, low-cost inventory,