How Much Does Your LGS Charge For a Transfer?

$15

 

Depending on which LGS and your membership status...$25-$50.

There's one that will do $25 for multiple firearms from the same shipment, and on the other extreme one that charges $50 per even if it's say three stripped lowers shipped together that's $150.

Pays to shop around

 

$25.00 for the transfer + $18.00 for the nics check = $43.00.

 

I addressed some of your talking points in my first post.

Time is money. Maybe some full time FFLs have "nothing else to do but sit around", but I sometimes drop in on my main competitor who is the counties only brick and mortar gun store. He rarely has an empty store, and usually has multiple customers at any given time. But he greets everyone, by name if he knows you...and any time he spends with you is time that he could have spent with another person at his counter. When things do get slow there, he is doing his gunsmithing stuff that makes as much of his income as his gun and accessory sales do. So there is little "sitting around" that I can see.

I don't know where this idea came from that all an FFL does on a transfer is "a little paperwork".
I currently have a couple wanting to buy their son a shotgun; they haven't even ordered anything and I probably have at least an hour invested in talks with them on the phone, internet searches at my suppliers for them to get prices, etc.

I mentioned earlier that I often have to run to the various postal or FedEx/ UPS hubs to get incoming boxes; they're all around a 20 mile round trip from where I do my transfers. If I was claiming just the IRS mileage rate, at that point I've got more cost invested in that transfer than what I'm ultimately making on the transfer.

Like I said, time is money. Many people who have a gun or part waiting for them can't seem to make it here on time. They might say they'll be by at 10 AM and they show up at Noon, or don't show up at all and don't call to say they can't make it as planned. Meanwhile I've spent that amount of time waiting for them. I might have another transfer done in that time since I try to schedule multiple transfers on days when I have a lot of stuff waiting in the safe, but then again, many times I do not and could have been doing other things in my life than sitting there surfing the net waiting for someone to show up at the agreed upon time.

Like I said, time is money.

Oh, and the other claim I often see, that the guys coming in for transfers will buy other stuff? Some of them, maybe. Most, not at all. It is what it is.

 

Too much--$50 for each gun esp considering they take the USPS package they're *handed*, open it, log it in, then sits it on a shelf *where it sits*. They don't bother calling & they won't do outgoing transfers--"too much work" they say. I need to find somebody else for FFL transfers in town Atlanta--esp one willing to do *outgoing* transfers....

 

Our small town LGS charges $20 for a transfer, plus the $10 state registration fee.
As I have done a lot of favors for him (good will) I only pay the $10.
Ah, small town living.

 

No NICS ($15) in NV if you have a CCW.

 

I use South County Guns in Schererville IN. Nice guys and they charge $30. I used to have my firearms shipped to the Cabelas in Hammond until they raised the fee to $80 (not a missprint).

 

It depends on the store, of course, but I usually pay $16 - $20 in Colorado Springs. Lots of walk-in stores here tend to drive the prices down, which is a good thing.

 

Like I said: I don't know what to think of it. However, they have to print and process paperwork. There is time involved in this. Also shipping processing and storage until the NICS comes back. I don't know what the man-hours adds up for the process from start to finish but you also have to factor in the cost of overhead to run the shop: for the 15-30 minutes it takes to process everything: assuming you have one employee. I guess if you were setup for volume it would be minimal overhead, but the LGS taking .5 man hour from the day of 8 hours is significant. I'm not saying it's reasonable that it costs so much to process a transfer, or the fact that it's debatable that we should have a NICS int he first place.. However, I know what it's like to charge by the minute and you have to stay in the green or you will be out on the street.. I know the LGS pays at least $12 an hour, that means they are investing at least $17 per hour per employee minimal with health insurance/and other employee fees. That's $8.50 for 30 minutes of time, not including revenue lost from the transfer. A LGS with one employee or two may be losing $100-200+ an hour of gunsmithing or sales. This doesn't factor the cost of daily insurance. So like I said, I don't know what to think, but I don't think it's okay to say a $25-30 transfer fee is unreasonable. Don't hate the player hate the game.. The folks who just do transfers on the side with minimal overhead are really the solution to the problem as far as I can see, as long as they charge a fair price for their time.

 

I recently turned in my license after having it for six years. I was what you called a table top dealer. I charged 15 dollars per gun, 10 dollars if you had an CCW permit. No charge for close friends and family.

 

In South Florida it runs for $25 to $35.

 

Twenty dollars!!!

 

$10 for one, $15 for three here at my local kitchen table FFL

 

My gunsmith charges 25 plus tax so 27.50 here ... some charge more .... 35 is more the norm than 25.

 

It varies from FFL to FFL. The going rate in my area is between $20 - $30.

 

Here in South Texas there is one LGS whose store-front is painted as a giant Texas state flag who has a notice that they do NOT transfer guns bought on-line, so don't even ask. Their attitude is snooty, their gun prices are over the top, and their shop is mostly empty of customers or even of lookers. I have an acquaintance who charges $25, which is $10 less than most other LGS charge. He's 30 miles away, but I use him because he's friendly, accommodating, and an all-round nice guy who shoots Cowboy Action on weekends, so what's not to like?

 

With the increase in internet sales, I’ve seen the lg stores go up to, on average, 50 bucks. I refuse to pay that for a simple transfer. Luckily, there are other FFL dealers in town that do it for 20. These are the dealers that operate from home and do the occasional show. Their “storefront” is their website.

 

$15

 

That's just the cost of the Federal FFL. I need a state dealers license that expires every two years. The electronic prints for the state dealer license renewal costs over $100 just for the prints. I have to remain compliant with local codes or the ATF can yank my FFL. I get inspected by both ATF and the NYSP, who are the ones who oversee dealers here. There are many aspects of just maintaining the licenses and open/ keep the doors open that you aren't considering.