2. misc-audio
  3. 1195017790

Shipping Expensive Speakers? WATCH OUT

Be very careful if you have to ship expensive & heavy speakers these days.
BAX Global now only insures up to only for $500 for damage.
UPS freight will insure for up to $50K, but speakers must be new & crated & only with a "managers approval".
Moving companies will insure @ $10 per $1K value, but must be crated (if you put your trust in them).
Unless you have "your" speakers on your home owners policy (& you had better check with them first), it could get very hairy.
Just a heads up as I was about to ship 550 lbs. @ $25K value last week & ran into this situation.
Most companies will insure for full value if lost, but not for the damage (that they themselves do).
To be forewarned is to be forearmed.
All the best
Paladin
128x128paladin
chadnliz
3,736 posts
 
good point Mitch, my speakers came BAX but are over 600lbs so nobody would try to move that by hand!
semi
649 posts
 
I see new business opportunity for Audiogon, start a shipping company to ship high end speakers :)

If I have to pay double of UPS rate to get that peace of mind, I will be happy to spend the extra.
ckorody
643 posts
 
Yes Semi - I agree

Some kind of shipping service is a big opportunity, as is a third party insurance that sells riders to cover this kind of stuff.

I was the recipient of some destroyed speakers - I was lucky that the seller owned up to it and refunded me the money. While it is what's supposed to happen here, there is no obligation...

One reason that the speakers were so damaged was that the original manufacturers packing was so thoroughly inadequate.

Something to think about.
rja's avatar
rja
2,356 posts
 
Unfortunately, it's a crap shoot at best! How do dealers get their speakers? Surely they're not suffering the same poor percentages of Audiogon members. Seems like it would be tough to do business if 25% of your goods were received damaged.
More to discover