Shipping not specified, and Trade Me's new Ping only payments

Hello Emily-Robyn Yes, an annoying problem. 

The secret is to ask the seller to add shipping costs BEFORE you buy the item. 

Otherwise all you can do is pay it via internet banking or get the seller to set up another separate auction just for the shipping costs so you can pay that with Ping. 

You can't. You need to ask them for the amount and make a manual bank deposit, or they could set up another auction for the shipping only

Hiya Callum, I'm having the same problem, but from the seller's end - I can no longer specify shipping costs beyond rural/urban. It means I can't offer regular post (I sell small items) or combined post. I want to buyers to use Ping but that's not possible when I can't specify postage. What's the solution to this please? 

Hello keripete. As Trade Me roll out the new listing process there are some things that are not yet available. 

If you are selling a number of items then all I can suggest in the meantime is that you look into My Products instead. 

This has a richer Shipping Templates section. While there is no free-text box to add your own wording, there is a far greater list of options to choose from, and combined shipping options are also available on there. 

Thanks Callum, I did try that, but found My Products even more prescriptive. In particular I couldn't get it to cater to regular postage or combined post, the two options my buyers use most. I'll just muddle along and get used to not using Ping in the meantime! 

Hello again keripete. Under the shipping templates on My Products there is a wide range of different wordings and times you can use. You might decide "Economy 4-7 days" is a good option for standard envelope postage example, but there are many more you can choose from.

Combined shipping option is also indeed available. I use it. 

Thanks Callum, I did find the combine shipping option after a better look, but using "economy" to describe regular letter post doesn't work, because that's the same term NZ Post uses for its cheapest Parcel Post rate. So you end up with multiple price options all called "economy". (For regular mail, for economy Parcel Post urban, and for economy Parcel Post rural). 
But it may not matter now, it appears combined post and flexible shipping options have returned for casual sellers, so that's great! 

You could be correct keripete, but it's more likely you have just managed to list some items in the old format. Trade Me roll out these changes piecemeal. Some sellers get them, some don't. Some categories are affected some aren't. 

It's their usual way of doing things. So they can test things. Frustrating when you don't know what you are gonna get every time you logon.