December was not a very successful month for the collection. The copy of Argosy Magazine mentioned in November has failed to arrive after 2 months. The seller claims it was posted, and I have commenced the dispute procedure with eBay to hopefully get a refund.
The copy of Motoren also mentioned in November was not delivered either. The seller would accept only international bank transfer as payment, so I arranged to transfer 5.99 euros to his Deutche Bank account. My bank charged a ridiculous A$24 for the transfer, so the book was now costing about A$38. The seller replied that only 0.49 euros had arrived in his account, since his bank charged 5.50 euros to receive the money - he wanted me to send him 5.50 euros to cover his bank charges!! He would not budge, and I was not going to send any more money - an impasse. At that point I contacted eBay who wiped their hands of the arrangement, and unfortunately I was unable to get any satisfaction. The only winners from that debacle were the banks - as usual.
The only success of the month was the purchase of a copy of "Great Trains of the World" published in Great Britain by Purnell in 1964. It arrived very promptly and restored some of my faith in eBay.