Understanding the 7 Shipping Tiers

AICV auto-picks one of seven shipping tiers for every listing based on the card's price. Here's what each tier does, who pays for what, and why we built it this way.

Last updated May 11, 2026

Every time AICV publishes a listing, it picks ONE of seven shipping policy tiers based on the card's asking price. The buyer pays calculated shipping + a flat handling fee at checkout. The handling fee is sized to break even on USPS extra insurance + packaging materials — we don't make money on shipping.

This page is the full breakdown. If you just want the quick reference for what to do at label-print time, see Label-Print Workflow.

The ladder at a glance

Tier	Price range	Service	Total declared value	Sig Conf?	Handling fee
PWE	Raw <$20	eBay Standard Envelope	$20 eBay claim	—	$0.30
Basic	$20–$100	USPS Ground Advantage	$100 built-in	—	$1.00
Mid	$100–$300	USPS Ground Advantage	$300 (+$4.45)	—	$5.45
Higher	$300–$750	USPS Priority Mail	$750 (+$10.45)	—	$11.45
Premium	$750–$2,000	USPS Priority Mail	$2,000 (+$28.45)	$3.50	$32.95
Vault	$2,000–$5,000	USPS Priority Mail Express	$5,000 (+$73.45)	$3.50	$77.95
Grail	$5,000+	USPS Priority Mail Express	manual	$3.50	$30 default

How the auto-pick works

When AICV publishes a card, it reads the asking price, checks isGraded, and looks up the matching tier. The decision is deterministic — same card, same price, same tier every time. You can preview which tier will apply on the card detail page under "Listing readiness" → "Shipping tier."

Asking price $38 (graded slab) → Basic tier ($1.00 handling)
Asking price $250 (raw card)   → Mid tier ($5.45 handling)
Asking price $1,500 (slab)     → Premium tier ($32.95 handling)

Why these specific breakpoints?

Each tier corresponds to a USPS insurance bracket. Insurance pricing isn't linear — it jumps at $100, $200, $300, $500, $1,000, etc. We picked tier boundaries that match USPS's brackets so the handling fee can cover the next bracket cleanly without wasting buyer money.

Example: a $90 card and a $99 card both ship under the Basic tier with built-in $100 insurance. There's no benefit to bumping them to Mid (which would charge an extra $4.45 the buyer doesn't need). A $110 card jumps to Mid because USPS Ground Advantage's built-in $100 isn't enough.

What the handling fee actually covers

The fee is sized to break even on real shipping costs:

Basic  ($1.00) = $1.00 materials + $0   insurance
Mid    ($5.45) = $1.00 materials + $4.45 insurance
Higher ($11.45) = $1.00 materials + $10.45 insurance
Premium ($32.95) = $1.00 materials + $28.45 insurance + $3.50 sig
Vault  ($77.95) = $1.00 materials + $73.45 insurance + $3.50 sig
Grail  ($30.00) = $1.00 materials + variable insurance/sig at label time

Materials breakdown ($1.00 per shipment):

Penny sleeve: $0.02
Top loader: $0.12
Card Saver / semi-rigid: $0.10
Bubble mailer: $0.35
Small box: $0.40

If you buy materials in bulk (eBay vendors, Amazon wholesale), your real cost is probably $0.60-$0.80. We round to $1.00 to leave headroom for the occasional bigger box or tape upgrade.

What about signature confirmation?

eBay's seller-protection policy requires Signature Confirmation on shipments $750 and above for Item Not Received claims to be ruled in your favor. So:

Tiers below Premium → no Sig Conf, tracking alone covers you.
Premium / Vault / Grail → plain USPS Signature Confirmation ($3.50). We do NOT recommend Adult Signature Required ($8.50) — it costs more, restricts delivery to 21+ recipients with ID, and provides zero additional seller protection over plain Sig Conf.

What about the buyer experience?

eBay shows the buyer one combined shipping cost at checkout: calculated postage by their zip + the flat handling fee. They never see a separate "insurance" line item — and they can't. eBay prohibits charging buyers for insurance as a standalone line item. It must be folded into a flat handling fee that's the same for all buyers.

A buyer in San Francisco buying a $250 card from your Pennsylvania ZIP might see:

Calculated postage (USPS Ground Advantage, ~8 oz, PA to CA): $8.50
Handling fee: $5.45
Total shipping: $13.95

That total covers your postage label + extra USPS insurance to $300 declared value + your packaging materials. You break even.

What you HAVE to do at label-print time

The handling fee bakes in the cost of extra insurance, but USPS doesn't automatically add it. You buy it manually when printing the label.

For Mid through Vault: set the declared-value field to the sold price. For Premium and above: also check the Signature Confirmation box. For Grail: pick Registered Mail or upgrade Priority Express's insurance via UPS Capital or third-party (Shipsurance).

The Label-Print Workflow article has the full cheat sheet — print it and tape it to your packing station.

When AICV gets it wrong

Edge cases we've seen:

A $200 card in a one-touch is too thick for PWE. Correct — that card would be Mid tier anyway since it's over $20, so PWE doesn't apply. But if you had a $15 card you wanted to ship in a one-touch (e.g. for a high-value buyer who insisted on extra protection), AICV auto-picks PWE and you'd want to manually override to Basic. Today this requires changing the asking price OR editing the eBay listing's policy directly. A per-card tier override is on the roadmap.

You shipped a $250 card under the Basic tier by mistake. This happens when the asking price was set after AICV picked the policy at publish time. The listing on eBay is locked to Basic-tier shipping with only $100 insurance. If the card gets lost in transit, eBay refunds the buyer $250 and USPS pays you $100 — you eat $150. Solution: end the listing, fix the price, re-list. Always confirm the shipping tier badge on the readiness panel matches the price BEFORE clicking Push to eBay.

What's next

Tier overrides at the card level, batch-level tier locks, and Pirate Ship integration (for cheaper shipsurance + faster labels) are all on the post-beta roadmap. For now, the auto-pick covers 95%+ of realistic listings; the manual fallbacks (skip a tier, hand-print on eBay) cover the rest.