Estimated delivery dates shown to buyer are extremely misleading.
Today, Sunday April 6th, I received a message from a buyer asking why their order hasn't shipped yet. The order was placed on Thursday April 3rd. I have a 4-business day handling time policy not including Saturday or Sunday. Shipping method is USPS Priority mail, 3 days for shipping from me to the buyer's address. Historically, my actual handling time has always been at least 2 business days.
My 'Manage All Orders' page shows "Ship by April 9th" for this order. That is correct April 3 plus 4 business days is April 9th.
I'm trying to understand why the buyer expected it to have been shipped already. This is the first time I've run into this.
I see on the order detail page for this item it shows: "Estimated delivery date shown to buyer: Apr 7, 2025 - Apr 12, 2025". Where do they get April 7th from???? That is impossible. It would have to have been shipped on the day the order was placed to be received by April 7th.
Taking my actual historic best handling time into account, the earliest I would ship this item would be Monday April 7th. Adding 3 days for USPS priority would be a delivery on April 10th at the earliest. By any logic the estimated delivery date shown to the buyer should be April 10 to April 12.
valkseller
OP1 year agoIf I had the patience I think I would call ebay customer service and ask them to look at the order in question and then explain to me why they post on my seller order summary page "ship by April 9th" but then post on the order details page that the buyer looks at "Expected Delivery April 7th".
Who runs a business that way? Tell your customer they will receive their order as early as April 7th, and then tell your shipper they have until April 9th to ship it?
If Ebay want's to be like Amazon they need to invest in a fleet of their own vehicles to pickup orders and deliver them.
wastingtime101
·1 year agoDon't call CS. They won't give you a real answer. It's a waste of your time and theirs.
Better option: click the ? icon on the lower right of most any eBay page and select the submit feedback link. eBay product teams read those reports.
valkseller
OP1 year agoThanks for the tip on ? icon. I reported this issue.
"Don't call CS. They won't give you a real answer. It's a waste of your time and theirs." Sad but true. I might feel bad about wasting their time if I thought I was interrupting them from fixing this, but we all know that they're not.
The sad thing is this isn't complicated. The expected delivery date window calculation has only 2 components; my handling time and USPS Priority shipping time. Even based on my actual historic lead time/ship time data there's no way anyone could come up with the dates ebay does.
carlmarxx
·1 year agoSeller's can setup Shipping & handling time frame 1 to 30 days to get it to the carriers . Ebay will never be like Amazon because they don't have funds for shipping center Wearhouse's and fleet of trucks .
valkseller
OP1 year agoEbay is being unfair to the seller here on 3 issues.
First, ebay is ignoring the sellers stated handling time in calculating the estimated earliest delivery date. No matter how many handling days the seller states, the best estimated delivery date is based on shipping within 1 day of the order. It has been concluded that ebay uses the seller's actual historic handling time. That can't be an average of all my shipments because ebay is obviously using 1 day for me. I've been selling for over 20 years. Before I got forced into managed payments several years ago I would ship within 1 day. But I haven't done that in several years, is ebay going back that far and using my actual all time shortest handling time ever? They must be, that's the only way they could come up with 1 day in the estimated best delivery dates
USPS Priority Shipping times? Ebay states that they use what USPS claims they do (2 to 3 days), not what they actually do. It is extremely rare for USPS Priority to accomplish 2 day delivery. If ebay used actual historic data, which they do have access to, the actual average for USPS Priority would be between 3 and 4 days. But it's obvious ebay is using the best 2 day stated by USPS which is a myth and 1 day handling if the seller ever did that once. So ebay is ignoring what the seller says his handling time is and uses their all time best historic performance, and ebay ignores USPS actual delivery performance and uses their mythical 2 days instead.
And last but not least, you can't give yourself a cushion over USPS poor delivery performance. You can add handling days all you want, but as soon as you upload a USPS tracking number, ebay adjusts the delivery estimate to the mythical number that USPS publishes.
12345jamesstamps
·1 year agoSome buyers think we are 'Amazon-like' and ship the next day.
The timeframe is so unrealistic for us...like it's always sunny and warm where we ship from.
I predict a problem when the item does arrive to this buyer as well...a 'drama buyer'.
Good luck.
simba6
·1 year agoeBay should just stop giving those. Even fortune tellers won't predict when packages will arrive.
If eBay makes the time longer, might scare off buyers but too short and they are unhappy it's late. Can't win that one.
wastingtime101
·1 year agoThey have to provide an estimate. The entire system of non-receipt claims is dependent on those dates.
Edit: As is the returns system because there's not always tracking or a delivery scan and in those situations the system looks at estimated delivery to start the claim window.
valkseller
OP1 year agoIf they have to provide an estimate why not correct the algorithm to give realistic estimates instead of impossible to achieve estimates?
wastingtime101
·1 year agoI don't know - to generate more sales because buyers think they will get their stuff sooner?
I guess they don't care about all the bad buyer/seller experiences by providing unrealistic estimates?
Anybody can guess at the "why" of it. I don't know any buyer or seller that's happy with the way the system is generating those ultra-short estimates, particularly from Thurs afternoon through Sat morning where they always shorten things even more.
I started a discussion about this in the Fall if you want to see some of the other pain points surrounding this topic:
https://community.ebay.com/t5/Shipping/Frustrated-with-EDDs/td-p/34793498
nobody*s_perfect
·1 year agoThe listing clearly states 4 business days handling. Perhaps the buyer didn't see it, or forgot, or doesn't understand what handling time is. Or they're just impatient.
There's not much you can do but reassure the buyer that you will do your best to have the item in their hands on or before the last estimated delivery date (April 12). Since you offered Priority Mail (rather than Ground Advantage), that does seem realistic.
eBay has explained that the estimated delivery date is based not only on the seller's handling time and the carrier's estimates, but also factors-in the seller's past performance and actual delivery times. So if you have been shipping in 2 days via Priority, then perhaps that might account for the April 7 early end of the estimated delivery range. File that under "No good deed goes unpunished."
valkseller
OP1 year agoMy point is that even using my best historical handling time of 2 business days on an order placed Thursday April 3rd would be shipped on April 7th (Thursday April 3rd, plus 2 not counting Saturday and Sunday would be shipped on April 7th). How could an item shipped USPS Priority on April 7th go from New York to Tennessee arrive on the same day? Impossible. The best I've ever had anything going Priority Mail to the southeast is 3 days. USPS says 2 to 3 days, but I've never seen one make it in 2.
For an order to be delivered to Tennessee from NY on April 7th by USPS Priority it would have to be shipped no later than April 3rd; same day the order was placed. However, it was placed in the evening of April 3rd after USPS close of business for Priority mail. No matter how you look at it, a delivery of April 7th was impossible.
I've seen other sellers raise this issue, I wonder if anyone from ebay looks at these posts?
wastingtime101
·1 year agoIt's an ongoing problem for orders placed Thurs evening through Sat morning. eBay shows impossible EDDs for the front end of the window.
Right now I'm looking at orders on my account that came in on Friday. I have 1 biz day handling and historically ship in 1 biz day, so those items will ship tomorrow, Monday April 7th.
eBay is telling those buyers the EDD is April 7-April 10 with Ground Adv shipping. 🤦