Potential startup - shipping issues

[Dan5324]

Hi,

I am looking into a potential start-up in electronic repair. I plan to advertise the service online and have customers send the electronics to me to be repaired. The issue I have is with parcel receiving. I plan to start from home and ideally want to keep my address private. There are companies out there which offer courier points and then forward the parcel onto you (at a price) but the problem with this is that if the customers electronics cannot be repaired or I cannot do anything with them (such as cannot identify the fault etc), I would of already paid the parcel forwarding fee meaning a loss for me (as the customer would not be charged if the electronics were not repaired).

What I am wondering is, if a website offering electronics repairs had a residential address listed, would this put people off? Also, are there any other possible solutions to my problem? Ideally I would like to receive the parcel, so I can inspect the electronics within, without any initial / or a very small cost to me.

Thanks in advance for any advice on this matter. It seems to be the one thing which is currently holding me back.

Dan

 

[Mr D]

Well good luck advertising and keeping your address secret. Website has to give a business address.


Most people probably won't ever google the address so won't know its residential. Just get the stuff delivered to your home.
Not sure how you would send item back to customer without a cost to you.

Setting a website up is one thing. Marketing it is another. Expect to spend money to get noticed.

 

[Tim Coulter]

Maybe you could look at the issue from a different perspective?

Any item that you're unable to repair will inevitably have a cost (your inspection time and the cost of returning it to the sender) so your business model is only likely to be viable if the percentage of these cases is very low. If so, the additional cost of parcel forwarding for these items will be minimal and should be simply treated as part of your marketing cost.

If this issue is significant enough to worry you, it's probably an indication that your business model doesn't allow enough margin.

 

[EnhanceAccountancy]

Take a look into the virtual offices that are around your area. The scope of their services differ wildly. Some allow you to use their address as your business and registered office address and receive unlimited post (or at least an unspecified amount of post) as part of the low fixed fee. You could then go and pick up the parcels at a time to suit you.

The virtual offices that are part of an actual serviced office business are likely to have the offering that you require.

Good luck!