I'm poised to win an eBay auction for a small (very small) piece of video equipment. I foolishly didn't check the shipping rates first, and it appears that it would cost nearly $80 to ship via UPS. This is a $7 item! Anybody know a cheaper way to ship something like this? It's basically a piece of plastic the size of your thumb. Sorry if this is the wrong place to post this. I couldn't think of a more appropriate forum.

Marco,

What you describe should cost at most a few pounds through the official Great Brittain postal service, Royal Mail. That's for airmail, which will take about a week. Surface (boat) mail is also available for cheaper than that, but can take weeks.

Josh

That's good to hear, thanks. I wonder what's up with UPS?

I also got a nice surprise last week when I had to ship a video camera to a pretty nearby country by UPS and the little 4 kg box costed about 190-200 dollars. It simply is an expensive service and never use it for items cheaper than 100 dollars, my suggestion!

The only reason I had to take UPS was that none of the other shipping methods allowed me to insure the parcel for the high price.