As stated, if you are using eBay Standard Letter, there is insurance and a procedure for claiming it. You have to wait 30 days before you can file, so you'll have to refund the customer long before you file the insurance claim. eBay Standard Letter is a special service provided by USPS to eBay. I'm pretty sure USPS is not backing the insurance payouts - that's coming direct from eBay. So the only way to get better tracking is to hold eBay accountable for EVERY Standard Letter package that is not marked Delivered. If the cost, to eBay, for the service rises due to USPS not confirming delivery (however they do that if not via scanning), you can be sure eBay will put pressure on USPS to either improve their confirmation process or improve their confirmation process. Which could be as simple as scanning at delivery.
File for these losses. eBay has stated that they have a working group that interfaces with USPS to determine areas of the country with 'issues'. If sellers don't report these issues, eBay will never know and USPS will never be held accountable. Sometimes filing things like Missing Mail Search Requests is not totally about finding the mail - it's also about informing USPS about issues they are not seeing thru internal metrics.
-Bob.
@bullhead* wrote:I can scan the package at the Post Office.. If you can not then take it to the counter and have it scanned. I had two late postage a month till I started doing it myself. Get the receipt and the problem will go away.
I ship several hundred packages a week at work - there is no way I'm going to spend an hour in line at the post office every day, and then have to argue about why this or that package is NOT oversized so please put the dimensions in your computer and you will see... and the postage rate is discounted, as stated on the label itself, and not counter rate.
No thanks. I want USPS to provide the service I pay for, month after month after month after month.
My postmaster, who I've gotten to know pretty well while dealing with these USPS issues, has said that he has too few employees and too many trainees. I believe him, but I don't think it has anything to do with Covid anymore. I believe it's the "cost cutting measures" put in place by the current Postmaster General. Higher rates, lower service.
One disturbing new trend here in Memphis is simply not scanning anything locally, or at least not showing the scans on the website. Once the package is scanned by the destination Distro Center, all the rest of the tracking magically shows up... like some kind of switch was thrown and now they can be shown. I've lost track of how many inquiries and INR cases I've had to deal with because of this.
One thing eBay is missing in all this.... the more time sellers have to spend tracking down USPS issues, the less time we have to get new inventory posted. And with less new inventory, eBay attracts less new customers and generates less new income. That's not good for the bottom line... and is something ALL the major USPS customers, like eBay and other online venues, should really be pressing USPS to get resolved, and quickly. Slow down online purchase deliveries via USPS enough and people will simply quit shopping online for as much as they do today. Then we all lose... but the Postmaster General gets what he wanted - lower labor costs and fewer packages to handle.
But, maybe I'm just a cynic with an eye for patterns over time. Could be. Or there could be all kinds of other "reasons" that we're not being informed of that are gutting USPS services.
-Bob.
