I’ve seen a lot of price gouging with respect to shipping. Since I buy paper-sized items (usually no larger than a sheet of paper), the costs shouldn’t be high. I give them some leeway of wanting to add a buck or two (and I understand adding perhaps 50c per lot, since PayPal and eBay add on the listing fees), but I remember 5 years ago a guy charged $6 to ship a single sheet of paper. When I got the item, it had obviously cost about 75c or so to mail (the item itself only was a buck or two, but I’d have paid $10 for it excluding shipping) and I left “neutral” feedback, saying he shipped cheap and charged high. He went ape$hit and insulted me in email. What bugged him was that he had already left me positive feedback before I had and he couldn’t retaliate.
Fortunately the ones that engage in funny business like that don’t last long on eBay at all. I had one guy sign up to sell a letter I wanted. He was probably expecting it would sell for $50 or more. I won it for a few bucks (you take a risk on buying from somebody with a zero feedback, but, as they say, you have to start somewhere, and you’re not taking much of a risk on something under $5) and after repeated attempts to contact him, he never answered back and soon deregistered from eBay.
Several years ago I bought eight small ashtrays for the minimum eight bids and sent a check. The check cleared but he never shipped and would not return my messages. One day I emailed him and told him I was filing a Mail Fraud charge with the USPS and tax evasion charges with the IRS. I had a reply in 3 minutes asking for my address. Got the ashtrays 4 days later.
Every time I posted a negative on him he reciprocated. My only negatives I ever had...