not many people are aware but you can go to an acution where there are owners unclaimed goods being sold by Australia Post. This post will be continuously updated with the unclaimed goods from Australia Post auctions as I become aware of them.
Australia Post receives a mountain of male and in Queensland alone over 200,000 items per year are dealt with that have been returned or incorrectly addressed. A lot of these acutions have up to 500 lots being sold as described below.
What are Postal Service unclaimed goods options about?Media attention has dropped away somewhat for these type of auctions. The Sydney morning Herald wrote about Australia Post acutions back in 2009. In the particular article there was featured in Queens land approximately 460 items for sale being unclaimed mail.
The Brisbane option company pickles auction house was handling those pieces and it was reported that the amount of unclaimed mail due to incorrect dressing and return addressing in Queensland numbers over 200,000 pieces - so there is plenty of opportunity to attend one of these auctions. Generally around Christmas time there is a larger number of unclaimed and return goods mostly due to incorrect dressing by the sender. Australia Post staff have no other option other than to open the undelivered mail in order to check for names and addresses that may be inside. In Queensland items without any identification information are kept for three months and auction to charity it is unclaimed. Some of these charities include kids under cover, Cancer Council of Australia, cerebral palsy league's land etc.
Generally the sales are held at an auction house similar to the lease options of seized and unclaimed goods in each state a firm is appointed to sell the goods by auction.
Below I have listed the firms and this list will be updated.
There is generally a buyer's premium say 10% which is applied on the goods. The 10% premium is added to the successful bid price and is usually shown separately on any invoice you are given.
Payments for goods generally have to be made within a 24-hour period. On a lot of cases there is no inspection on auction day.
The goods are generally sold for unclaimed goods auctions from Australia Post are automotive parts, electronic items such as digital cameras, iPods and docs for iPods and phones. Clothing items are generally quite popular as our books, toys, stationery and cosmetics. There are also options featuring kitchenware, jewellery and even IT equipment as well as home theatre equipment.
Western Australia - In Western Australia there are Ross auctions. You can see the catalogue of a previous auction conducted by Ross aucions in Western Australia back in 2013 to gauge the type of goods that were being sold than and are likely to be sold in any upcoming auctions.
New South Wales - in New South Wales generally the most active holder of these type of auctions is Theodore Bruce auctions. As a suggestion I would get onto Theodore Bruce's mailing list.
As far as I'm aware they have had a number of auctions in 2015 as well as 2016 their was one update.
The first step is to check the schedule of auctions. There are number booked in for this year.
There is also an ability to check the previous sale prices of Lot items that were placed for sale.
Victoria-
Victoria can check out Abby's auctions. These are long established option here and valuation company trading since 1969. The company has live bidding and has an assortment of unclaimed parcels from Australia Post. Any proceeds from the sale are donated to charity. The options are available to online it is in there is a catalogue which you can bid 10 days prior to final billing. Final billing will take place two hours each lot from one upwards open and will close 10 seconds after the final has been placed. There is no in-person viewing inspection of the items for these goods. You can read more about the Victorian auctions in an article from the Age newspaper.
Queensland - try Pickles auctions. You will have to ring their Geebung branch in Brisbane on (07) 3632 9400 because at the time of writing they weren't holding any auctions for Australia Post.