We sell postal history, specializing in Germany, Japan, Military Mail and a few European countries, but also have a nice worldwide stock of early to modern covers from all countries and all topics.
Thank you for taking your time to visit this page & say hello to me. Me, that's me, Götz Heermann, long-time resident of Japan, professional philatelist as well as interpreter for local law enforcement agencies. I am currently working out of my office in Sapporo, Japan's fifth largest city on the northern island of Hokkaido, about one flight hour north of Tokyo.
Postal History - Retail, Auctions, Buying
"The Cover Exchange", my trading name, is the only company in Japan specialising exclusively in postal history. Specialty areas are Japan, Germany, WW II and a few European countries, but you will also find interesting world wide covers in my stock.
Apart from auctions and retail sales by mail, I participate at many shows in Japan and a few outside Japan, and always have a decent stock of 40,000+ individually priced covers and cards. For my actual show schedule click here (Japanese language only).
My strict quality requirements result in a return quota of less than 0.1% (i.e. less than 1 lot per 1,000 lots sold) - and I take pride in the fact, that I offer no-quibble return privileges and unlimited guarantees for every single item I sell.
Please access my web site for details, or send an email.
My site is multilingual, and you can browse thru my material and see descriptions in a language of your choice!
You may contact me in English, Japanese, German, French and Russian (for Russian, use snail-mail only, please).
Below, you find extensive info on how to make payments to Japan, and how I conduct transactions.
I am a member in good standing in the following organisations: Japanese Philatelic Society, Japan (S-7993), Sapporo Chamber of Commerce and Industry (949226) and the Military Postal History Society.
How to pay & how our deals work
For more information about my eBay auctions, scroll down or click here to see my current listings.
And for more information about how to close transactions, or why my Terms of Sale are the way they are, just read on. Reading is essential anyway, if you're new at dealing across borders or across the Big Pond... ;-) Some folks just don't believe, how many problems can be avoided by asking questions before placing an order or a bid, and by reading instructions carefully instead of hitting "Reply" or "Pay Now" prematurely. Frankly, I hate getting mails asking me for my address three days after I sent out my invoice - my address is always at the bottom of my invoice... Asking for that address after receiving my invoice is like telling me "Hey, I don't care what you write in your mails, I don't read 'em anyway...". Not a good way to start a deal...
1) Shipping
I charge shipping as outlined in my terms of sale. The shipping I charge is not negociable. Japanese postage rates are among the highest of the world, surpassed only by rates charged in Germany and in Switzerland. And contrary to what it is like in the U.S., there are no free shipping supplies in Japan. I do pack securely and carefully, so about 1 oz. of gross weight already goes into shipping and packing materials. So I would very much appreciate, if you did not argue about shipping, unless you don't care about safe packing and are willing to wait two months for a surface shipment... ;-).
If you have a US FPO address, that is physically located in Japan, shipping charges for shipping to Japanese addresses apply.
2) Combined Shipping & Lay-Away
I am always happy to combine shipping and save you postage expenses. However, payment for the oldest lot should be mailed 20 days after closing at the latest. Ebay works on certain time frames, and I have to adjust. You can, of course, send a down payment right after the first lot closes. I am also happy to discuss installments, if you plan on buying for a substantial amount. This, however, must be arranged before bidding.
If you want to use an online payment method, there is an important condition for combined shipping of multiple wins - please read this.
3) Payment a) If you live in Japan:
Please use one of the domestic payment methods available to you - Yen cash, or postal giro remittance ("yuubin-furikae" in Japanese). If you feel you must use bank transfer, I'm happy to oblige, but I don't encourage this method because of the exorbitant fees for the buyer. Your purchase price in US$ can be converted to Yen using the Universal Currency Converter. Sending Yen is much better than spending time and money on getting dollar cash, or being hit with Japanese credit card companies' bad exchange rates. I will not accept online payments from residents of Japan, so please don't ask. b) If you live in Germany:
Please either send Euro cash, or pay via bank transfer to my German "Postbank" account. I will not accept online card payments from residents of Germany, so please don't ask. I can access my German account online and check payments any time. Please use the Universal Currency Converter to convert the US$ total due to Euros. I recommend against sending dollar cash from Germany - Euros will be in your wallet, US$ must be bought at a bank... c) If you live in the USA:
Please use either one of the following: cash, check, money order, BidPay, or PayPal. Frankly speaking, I prefer offline payments. d) If you live in a Euro-Zone country outside Germany:
You can make a Euro remittance to our German Postbank account using the IBAN number. According to EU regulations, this is the same like making a bank transfer within your country. Otherwise, please use cash. I will not accept online card payments from bidders in the Euro-Zone, so please don't ask. e) If you live in another than the above-mentioned countries:
Please use either one of the following: cash, US$ money order, BidPay, or PayPal.
4) Payment methods in detail: a) Online payments:
I accept (in the order of preference) BidPay, PayPal. If you use PayPal, the following rules apply without any exception whatsoever!
PayPal charges me an extra 1% for being "international" on top of already high fees, even though my PayPal account is backed by a US-issued VISA card and a US bank account! So even though a payment from a buyer in the US won't cross a single border until I pull the cash out of a Japanese ATM, PayPal insists that a payment from a buyer in California crosses the Big Pond even before it hits my US bank account (probably because it'll cross the borders of Oregon and Washington...). PayPal's fee structure and the constant threat of sudden chargebacks and / or account limitations make accepting PayPal very unattractive for sellers. I used to impose a minimum transaction total to compensate for the fees on small transactions, but as of Aug. 19, 2005 eBay doesn't allow this any more.
Here's the new set of terms:
1) Using PayPal requires residence in one of the PayPal-approved countries outside the Euro-zone and outside Japan.
2) Using PayPal requires the buyer to be "Verified", and merchandise will only be shipped to a "Confirmed address"
3) Only the successful buyer may use PayPal, and only, if the account is in his name. Plain text: "A friend will pay for me" won't do! Sorry folks, but that's PayPal's rules, not ours... ;-)
4) We reserve the right to decline PayPal and ask for payment by alternative payment methods, if the buyer's feedback indicates chargeback problems.
5) Buyer's feedback must be at least 100!
6) If all these terms are met, PayPal payment must be received within 72 hours of invoicing - I think if we pay the exorbitant fees, asking for fast payment isn't too much out of line, is it? Serious, make it 73 hours, and it's either cash or wire transfer, no exception, no deviation, no discussion.
7) Last but not least - in the very unlikely case that you're not satisfied with the merchandise, or that you claim "non-receipt", you will need to deal with us. Any attempt to go thru PayPal will cost us $10, and you'll owe that unnecessary expense to us.
To protect yourself against non-receipt, I suggest you use "Registered air mail", as this will be the only shipment method for which we will take responsibility. However, a formal claim thru the post office will take up to two months to produce results, and we expect you to wait as long. All documents will be scanned and mailed to you in case you want to cross-check at your end.
Claims for non-receipt of non-registered mail will not be considered, so any attempt to make a chargeback thru PayPal will be considered malicious and be dealt with accordingly.
As for dissatisfaction with the merchandise - once we'll have it back within 30 days of the auction, you'll have your refund. And the refund will be issued from this end, not from your card-issuer... Any attempt to go thru PayPal and / or your card-issuer without our consent, without returning the merchandise, and / or without giving us the chance to refund as per our TOS will be considered malicious and will be dealt with accordingly.
This may sound quite unfriendly, especially to the 99.9% of our buyers with whom things go smooth - but it's the remaining 0.1% who take up 80% of our time needed for trouble-shooting. Even though experience shows they never care to read anything, I feel compelled to add a few notes here... ;-).
Winners of multiple lots paying online must combine payment!
PayPal charges sellers not only a commission, but also a transaction fee. So, if a bidders wins ten lots and makes ten payments, the seller is charged the transaction fee ten times. Now, do you as a bidder want to pay the full $2.50 s/h for each lot, if you win ten lots? Guess not! And sellers, for the same reason, prefer one single payment instead of ten. So, if you don't combine those online payments, I won't combine shipment, plain and simple. It's give and take... ;-). If you are unsure how to combine payment, mail me before you hit the "Pay Now" button... b) Postal giro payments:
The numbers for my Japanese postal giro account and my German "Postbank" account are in my "End of Auction" mail. If you live outside Japan and Germany, but in a country with a postal giro system (most European countries have one), please feel free to make a postal giro transfer. Neither account will be charged for incoming postal giro payments. Customers with accounts in the Eurozone can now make payments in Euro to my German postal giro account without extra fees, by EU regulations. c) Check payments:
Only US$ personal checks drawn on banks located in the USA will be accepted. Checks must be made payable to "Goetz Heermann", and your feedback record must be at least 100. Checks must also be mailed within three days of closing. The reason for this is simple - I have to collect those checks and mail them back to my US bank, so just transit back and forth across the Big Pond may take up to 20 days, plus a few more until I see the money in my account. That's why I want the checks to reach me within a narrow time frame. If you can't make it in three days, please use another form of payment. And while I reserve the right to hold lots pending clearance of check, I usually mail the merchandise right away, if the feedback record shows no negs for check problems. d) Money order payments:
Except the feedback requirement, terms are the same for money orders. They also must be in US$, drawn on a bank located in the US or bought at the post office, and must be made payable to "Goetz Heermann". From time to time, I receive money orders and drafts in Yen - please never send me Yen denominated instruments!! For one thing, they're not even part of the payment methods listed as acceptable (!!), and they cost at least US$12 to cash, and I would have to wait five to six weeks to get cash - both the $12+ fee and the waiting time would have to be passed on to the buyer in cold blood... e) Cash payments:
If you live outside the US, there is, in many cases, no need to run to the bank and get dollar cash. I can accept Euros, Canadian $, Australian $, Pounds Sterling (English notes), Swiss Franks, and - of course!! - Japanese Yen without any limit. Also acceptable, but only up to the equivaleny of US$50, are Hong Kong $, Singapore $, Taiwan $, New Zealand $, Korean Won, Danish, Norwegian and Swedish Kroner, and non-English Sterling notes (i.e. Scottish or Northern Ireland notes). How to pay odd amounts?
If, for example, you owe US$17.53, and the Universal Currency Converter returns EUR 17.71 at a rate of EUR 1.01 per US$1, you can send payment the following ways:
Send a US$20 bill and get $2 cash and 47c. in mint US postage change.
Send a EUR 20 bill (=US$19.80 in this case) and get $2 cash and 27c. in mint US postage back.
Send US$17 cash and 53c. in mint US postage.
Combine Euros and US$ like EUR 15 in Euro bills (=US$14.85 in our case), $2 in US$ bills and 68c. in US postage
For remaining US cents, I accept mint postage of the following countries: USA, Canada, Germany, Japan, France, Great Britain, Austria and Switzerland. Any postage sent must have gum, and must be less than US$1 total face value. If you have larger quantities of mint Japanese postage that you want to use in lieu of cash, please contact me (you guessed it:) before bidding.
You may even dump any of your remaining banknotes from other countries on me - I have accepted Euros from Canada, Aussie dollars from Ireland and Swiss Franks from a Japanese stamp show customer... (another one paid with a bag full of DM coins, but that's yet another story...) How to send cash:
Never send coins thru the mail!
Coins obstruct mechanical mail sorting devices. In the process, your coins will rip open the envelope and cause the payment to disappear. The same will happen if you encase bills in baseball card holders.
Don't send wads of bills!
If you owe $9, don't send nine $1s - rather opt for one $10 bill and get $1 change in return.
Don't tape the bills to any kind of paper!
More often than not, the tape sticks, and trying to remove it causes damage to the bills. Believe it or not, but Japanese banks pass every US$ bill thru a fake bill detector, even the $1s. Damaged bills get rejected, and Japanese bank employees fear nothing more than being stuck with and being held responsible for a fake $1 bill accepted from a sleazy foreigner... :-).
Wrap your bills in a sheet of newspaper or carbon paper and use sturdy envelopes
It goes without saying that unwrapped bills in a lightweight envelope can be detected if held against the light.
Don't register unless you can't live without it
The mail in Japan is safe. Very safe. Unless you mess up the address, it will reach me once it reaches Japan. Outside Japan, "Registered" is often a synonym for "Steal me!". Whether you register your payment or not, depends on how much you trust your countrie's mail service...
5) Shipping times:
Once I receive your payment, I will process your lots the same or the next day. Air mail from Japan takes between three days and two weeks, depending on where you live and how good your postal services are. There may be times when I'm out of town - this will be announced in my End-of-Auction emails, whenever possible. I won't send out a confirmation email that shipment is on the way, but leave feedback instead. Checking feedback daily is good practice anyway... ;-).
6) Feedback:
I'm not one of those sellers who wait until they get feedback first. I feel that if I receive payment within reasonable time, you have fulfilled your part of the deal, and I will leave positive feedback for you. However, if I sense trouble in the making (buyer tries to argue about shipping, payment methods, terms of sale etc. after closing), I will hold back feedback until I get mine.
I do file Non-Paying Bidder Warnings with eBay if and when appropriate, and I do leave negative feedback for Non-Paying Bidders. And I do have a sixth sense for excuses after 20 years in the trade and more than 5,000 transactions on eBay... The most plausible one is "I forgot to send payment", because it really happens... :-). Dead grandmas aren't always plausible - a normal person usually runs out of grannies after two failures to pay...
If you are satisfied, please leave me positive feedback. If for any reason you are not satisfied, please notify me, so we can work something out - I stand behind my merchandise and do my best to describe it correctly and take good scans. However, sometimes eyes slip @ 2 a.m., and mistakes do occur, and if they do, I will correct them.
Ready to send payment? Before you do, please just let me know your snail mail addie, and watch a few points:
Always include your full address and all lot numbers with your payment. It helps getting your stuff packed and sent out faster.
If you write by hand - don't scribble, please print! Japanese postmen sometimes have a hard time decyphering foreign handwriting - you'd face the same problems with Japanese characters... And since I don't work for the CIA either, please make decyphering your handwriting easy for me, o.k.? ;-).
Mark your envelope "AIR MAIL", unless you want it thrown in the surface mail bag, which may take up to two months. Not all USPS employees know that Japan is not a US territory...
Put exact postage on the envelope. At the time of writing, it's 80c. from the US, €1.55 from Germany and C$1.40 from Canada. Less postage will divert your envelope to surface (see above). Excess postage doesn't make it faster. I sometimes have to chuckle when folks complain about my s/h charges, but put three first class stamps on their envelope (31c. excess postage). I have had as many as six first class stamps on a 1/2 oz. envelope... ;-).
Still have a question? Click krautinjapan( 5611) or go to my listings here and access any of my lots to ask me a question.
If you're in Japan, call 011-854-3623 during regular office hours.
I hope you are happy with what you buy from me... :-)
And this is important! Please take a few minutes and help finding a missing child - thank you!
Stamps on eBay
I have recently also started offering stamps on eBay. Please note, that I don't deal with stamps, but only with postal history. If I buy a collection or an estate and am after the covers, I have to dispose of the stamps somehow... ;)
I can thus afford to offer them at low start prices, but you won't find any in my regular stock or mail-bid sales.
This is what other users say about the 165 lbs. of prime German beef that call themselves krautinjapan( 5611)
To see all feedback for this member, go to the Member Profile page.
And here's what I have on eBay right now. Please bid with confidence.
If you have any questions whatsoever, please don't hesitate to ask. A minor technical problem should not keep you from buying a wanted item... ;-)
To protect bidder privacy, when the price or highest bid on an item reaches or exceeds a certain level, User IDs will be displayed as anonymous names. For auction items, a bold price means at least one bid has been received.
Note: Anonymous names may appear more than once and may represent different bidders.
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