THIS WHOLE THREAD IS VERY AMUSING TO ME.

First, I went through a lot of time typing, with figures and all, to suggest a way for buyers to save on postage. It is a very practical amd novel idea that can be used over and over. And no one replies to it either pro or con. I guess that is par for the course.

Then I make a small peripheral comment about the possibility of a seller self-insuring a parcel, and it gets jumped on. This should be of no concern to the buyer.
Why should it make any difference to the buyer if the post office or the seller insures it? To make the seller walk to the post office and wait in line for half an hour to insure a $10 item? Good Grief! What a bunch of characters. It is a fact of life on eBay that the seller pays the commissions and fees to eBay, and the buyer pays the postage and insurance and maybe handling. Just about every mail order seller charges for postage-insurance. In my original post I said IF THE BUYER WANTS INSURANCE, I'D CHARGE THE 85 CENTS FOR IT. So if I sell something on eBay for $10 and tack on $1.50, say, for postage-insurance because the buyer requested insurance, no right-minded person should object
to me saving an hour's effort (going to post office and waiting in line, etc.) to get it insured by the post office. I am trusting the buyer. If it does not arrive, I would send another chip (insured by the post office this time). It is outrageous and selfish to want the seller to self-insure it for free. And it is kind of sadistic to expect the seller to waste an hour insuring a $10 item if there were a way to easily avoid this (like self-insuring the parcel).