RS New Handling Charge

[McMurdo]

In case anyone hasn't noticed - (I didn't).

RS have introduced a farnell-style handling charge for any order under £30 including long-time account holders.

Previously this was just for non accounts and is now for everyone, apparently.

I have only noticed this today.

[Cruisin Marine]

For "handling" what? It is quite ridiculous. What was not "handled" last week can't have changed.
Thanks for the heads up- much appreciated.

[emeritus]

At the firm I worked for before I retired some 10 years ago, we wrote off client bills of less than £30 as it was reckoned to cost that much to raise the paperwork initially and process the payment subsequently. Business customers are charged for paying in cash and cheques and processing credit card payments.

[Craig Sawyers]

Well, it is even more onerous than Farnell's. It is not a handling charge as such - they call it a "delivery charge".

Alas a retrograde step.

RS used to get the lion's share of my business because of the zero delivery. It has lost that USP, so I will shop wherever has the best prices and best stock of what I need. RS, Farnell, Mouser etc.

However, back in the day, Radiospares as-was only sold to trade customers, which was quite formally defined, and not to riff raff public.

Craig

[Keith956]

It's only £3.95 for orders under £30. More if you do not register an account with them I believe. And for that you get next day DHL delivery, something you don't get with the others.

Farnell didn't want to give me a trade account for some reason despite giving them a company number - and so their rate is £9.95 under £20 and £6.95 under £40 - quite a bit more. And if it's from the US thay slap on a large extra (think something like £15.95). So I avoid them, and go with DigiKey if RS don't have what I need.

Even Cricklewood charge £3.50 for under £30.

[murphyv310]

Let's remind ourselves about the cost of delivery, energy and other rising costs. So either the products, components etc have to rise considerably to cover costs or you pay a delivery charge, handling charge or fuel supplement, or whatever you want to call it rather than moan I think we have to get used to it and pay up. If business didn't pass on costs then they will fail and then what will we do?
Personally I always lump my orders together to get the free or cheaper delivery. If you have a customer in a hurry just remind them that a job rushed out will be more expensive quoting the reasons. Order once a week not every day if your doing external repairs and explain to them the situation so they are aware of the extra charge, hobbyists have no reason to complain as I've said wait till you have a bigger order.

[kalee20]

£3.95 isn't bad - I remember Home Radio's 40p back in 1970's!

Farnell's £15 (or more) for parts from America bites a bit harder though, I avoid that even in the Day Job at work if at all possible.

[TonyDuell]

I don't think I've ever had an RS order under £50. This new charge is unlikely to affect me, therefore.

I dislike waiting around for parcels so I would rather put in one large order than several small ones. I keep a list here of things I need for current and future proects, every so often I order some of all of it.

I dislike paying such charges though so if I need something from a different supplier (say Digikey) I make up the order to the no-handling-charge limit with other items I can always use. With Digikey it's normally UNC nuts and bolts, hard to find in the UK and useful to me as I work on a lot of American computer hardware. If I needed something urgently from RS I'd probably add a couple of cans of propan-2-ol cleaning solvent, or a reel of connecting wire, or... Something I am sure to need in the future.

[fetteler]

The surprising thing is that they've delayed so long before bringing it in.

Yes, it will affect me but it is not unreasonable and as has been said, orders above £30 are free. In a commercial context covering the overheads of small orders makes perfect sense.

Steve.

[McMurdo]

The only problem I have is that, as the rep was always keen to explain, RS's prices for general components are considerably higher than the bulk franchised suppliers such as Arrow, Future, Avnet, Glynn etc as their 'business model' is (was) to build the cost of small-order handling and carriage into the component price.

A carriage/handling charge is understandable if the component prices are at genuine wholesale costs, but soon becomes uneconomic if that's in addition to the inflated component prices.

I wonder if they've realised they no longer have to compete with direct-ship from the US with the exchange rates being what they are and have decided to jump on a gravy train.

I've shopped around for some time with my day-job small orders, spreading them between mouser, digikey, cpc, rapid, cricklewood, langrex, and certain trusted ebay sellers. Either way it's the client that must bear the cost after I've done all I can.

[dodgy-dxer]

https://www.westfieldfasteners.co.uk/UNC.html

Originally Posted by TonyDuell

I dislike paying such charges though so if I need something from a different supplier (say Digikey) I make up the order to the no-handling-charge limit with other items I can always use. With Digikey it's normally UNC nuts and bolts, hard to find in the UK and useful to me as I work on a lot of American computer hardware. If I needed something urgently from RS I'd probably add a couple of cans of propan-2-ol cleaning solvent, or a reel of connecting wire, or... Something I am sure to need in the future.

[TonyDuell]

I did say 'hard to find', not 'impossible'

My point is that I needed some other bits that I could only get from Digikey. The order was about £8 below their free-handling limit. It made more sense to me to order a few packs of UNC nuts and bolts (something that I will find a use for) than to pay a handling charge and effectively get nothing back.

Same with RS. I am not in the habit of ordering one pack of resistors or whatever. If I need a few parts that add up to £20 or so then I'll buy a couple of cans of cleaning solvent, or reels of connecting wire, or IC sockets or something else that I use a lot of. It seems more sense to get something for the money.

And yes, I can understand why RS is doing this. There are costs involved in picking out the items that have been ordered, putting them into the shipping box/jiffybag, printing the address label, getting it on the van and so on.

[Craig Sawyers]

Then why since Adam was a lad have they charged nowt for this process?

[Welsh Anorak]

I was always surprised by the lack of the small order charge, especially as the VAT invoice arrived by first-class post a few days later.
My last order included some PCB cleaning solvent - you know the one- which came with 27 A4 pages of H&S information! Kept me in scrap paper for a while...

[dglcomp]

Originally Posted by Welsh Anorak

I was always surprised by the lack of the small order charge, especially as the VAT invoice arrived by first-class post a few days later.
My last order included some PCB cleaning solvent - you know the one- which came with 27 A4 pages of H&S information! Kept me in scrap paper for a while...

Me too, had a need for a german/french plug once and they were the cheapest, only needed the one and it couldn't have come to much more than £1 if not less, still free 24hr delivery and an invoice in the post, madness, and as such I can understand the new handling fee.

[Uncle Bulgaria]

RS parcels came so quickly it was a standing joke in the household that when the Parcelforce man appeared early in the morning, the first question to me was 'what are you about to order?' Their expedited delivery, postage, invoices and everything else for even a single capacitor couldn't last. Hey ho, at least we were on the gravy train for a short time.

[Cobaltblue]

I think in the past they have taken a view and there were sufficient big orders to mask the costs of the smaller orders.

I know that due to orginisational changes in purchasing in particular the buisness I work for tends to allow individual departments to place many smaller orders rather than colate into larger orders. If this common amongst other companies there are far fewer of these large orders to subsidise small orders.

Even if you charge £1 for a 1p resistor if you sell 1 you one you have lost money by the time you process and ship it.

I hate to think how much our site spends with RS in a typical year but I bet it's 6 figures.

Cheers

Mike T

[Phil__G]

I'm not surprised, how on earth they profit from my £20 orders when they pack a few PIC chips in a massive box and send it by next-day courier at no cost to me... and pay again for the courier when temporarily-out-of-stock items arrive...
Given the current economic situation if this keeps RS alive then well & good - we need RS.
Cheers
Phil

[RocketMBA]

This has been a long time coming considering how everything's been going for a while, but still feels like a surprise. Thanks for the heads up.

[Terry_VK5TM]

RS in Australia started this last year from memory - I know it's been a while.