Substandard Seller Due to Not Shipping in Time Frame (3 Days)
So I live in a small town, roughly 12,000 people so not a huge transit hub by any means. The local USPS Office does not scan in mail; you drop it off and then it is picked up the next day (early hours of the AM) when the mail is delivered from the regional hub, St. Louis.
Hypothetically, if a buyer purchases an item from me, at say 7:45 PM, on Wednesday, I print the label and then drop off at the post office the next day (Thursday) on my way to work. That item will not be picked up until Friday morning. Mind you, that this item has not been scanned in to the USPS, it has to get to the hub in St Louis for that to happen. At this time, I am on day 3 of "Handling", correct? If the item is not scanned in on Friday, I am now in violation of the handling time requirement? Or do I get a grace period since it originated somewhere else and USPS doesn't scan in those items when delivered to USPS Office?
Lets throw that same scenario out, but use the information from Office of Inspector General Audit for that same hub, that was released in August of 2025. 52% of letter sized packages were not meeting the clearance time at the St Louis hub. So I was already at day 3, maybe 4, with everything going as expected, now 52% of packages aren't meeting clearance goals, so they haven't been scanned, probably closed to day 5 or 6 before scanned. I am now way outside of handling guidelines, right? Or does Ebay know about these specific issues at particular locations?
Thanks for the help.
tobaccocardyahoo
·6 months agoYou appear to be a low volume seller.
Your items are not needs but are wants. No sane person is going to be deterred by a longer stated handling time on your items, and if the crazies go somewhere else, you are ahead of the game.
I have a 5 day handling time, usually ship the same or next day, and do not care a rat's patootie when USPS scans my package.
It is not like the old days when Ebay put a scarlet letter on your listing if your handling time is that long.
If you wanted agita, you could sell on Amazon and let them generate your handling time based on your past performance.
12345jamesstamps
·6 months agoTo get the best results a seller waiting in line to scan a package would be the best.
Considering the problems of just dropping off a package or having it picked up by the carrier doesn't always work.
Have we become too complacent where we complain having to wait in line for a scan on a package(s)?
Would one not want to wait in line for gas, for that coffee, for that fast food, for paying groceries...
cereal_shopper
·6 months agoIncrease your handling times.
kibble-net
·6 months agoIf I drop off a package in the parcel bin or counter in some locations, it won't get a scan until it reaches the hub. But I can still go to the counter and ask them to scan it. Sounds like you might want to consider this option, OP.
tsme35
·6 months agoMine go through st. louis too and they only scan about 2/3 of my packages, lucky my mail lady scans all for me. My fishing rods don't even get scan in St louis, they get scan in Chicago 2-3 days later. If your local PO doesn't scan, best to extend your handling time to 5 days. Rates keep going up up up and service is getting worse.
fern*wood
·6 months agoI'm not sure what you mean by substandard. I know above standard and below standard exist, but the shipping metrics do not show any substandard grading. If you are over the allowable late shipping percentage, it will take you out of top rated seller status until it improves.
greatstuff80
·6 months agoI'm in a very small town with a part time PO. When I drop items off they scan it as accepted right there and I get a receipt. You should insist they scan it accepted and get a receipt that shows the tracking number. You do not have to wait and just hope it's scanned at a major hub. I write receipts out in advance to help save our local postmaster time. He can then just sign and stamp it. I worked for the PO. There's no real reason for them not to do that for you. I know people do it, but I would never just drop packages off even at a large PO. You have no insurance if the item goes missing without that acceptance scan.
pickapaper
·6 months ago@camoli-42 wrote: "Hypothetically, if a buyer purchases an item from me, at say 7:45 PM, on Wednesday, I print the label and then drop off at the post office the next day (Thursday) on my way to work. That item will not be picked up until Friday morning. Mind you, that this item has not been scanned in to the USPS, it has to get to the hub in St Louis for that to happen."
I live in a small town of a little less than 10,000 in the middle of Kansas, certainly not a huge transit hub. However, we have a post office with counter people (no kiosks) and I always take my packages in and have them scanned for acceptance, never "just drop them off". They go out the same day. I would be really upset if I had a package scanned in one day and it did not leave the post office until the next day. That does not even make sense.
greatstuff80
·6 months ago" I would be really upset if I had a package scanned in one day and it did not leave the post office until the next day. That does not even make sense. " Most POs have done away with mid day and end of day pickups. Most mail does not go out until the next morning drop off/pickup. That change was started last year. Many still are not aware of it.
pickapaper
·6 months ago@greatstuff80 wrote: " Most POs have done away with mid day and end of day pickups. Most mail does not go out until the next morning drop off/pickup. That change was started last year. Many still are not aware of it."
Including me. But to be honest, this is something that I would not have particularly paid attention to. I would only have paid attention if it affected my PO and so far it does not.
jewelbiz
·6 months agoTalk about my Substandard post office….in New York City…
Last year I had an eBay package to send out. It was pouring rain that day so I left early to get on line for when it opened up at 9 AM. I was there at 8:40 AM. I was maybe already the 8th or 9th person on line that awful rainy day. By 9 A.M. there were about 20 people on line.
Can you believe this lousy nasty NYC post office did not open their doors this particular day? We were all there outside on line in the rain! Finally after my waiting an hour, I left to go home all soaking wet with my package unmailed and now maybe countless more folks still waiting in the rain for the doors to open.
I went back to mail out my package 📦 and inquired about yesterday why the U.S. Department of Post Office was closed for the day.
Could you believe that I was told “Everyone called in sick 🤢 yesterday!â€
How many people work there? 5 or 10 or 15? They all called in sick while normal people were standing outside in the rain, me for 1 hour. No supervisors?
roccotacodad54
·6 months agoI believe that. A relative of mine works delivering for USPS in Tennessee. He told me they get together on social media to unofficially go on strike by calling in sick if the weather is bad regardless of what's expected or scheduled.
When I told him him that he and all of the ones that did that should be fired, he got mad and expressed that they shouldn't have to go to work in bad weather...........................
frecklesfinery88
·6 months agoWe have the same issue here. You can drop off something and it may not be scanned until it gets to Greensborough NC. Which recently happened to me. You can drop it off at USPS and it not be scanned for a couple days. Not everyone understands this. But, it has become a real issue in 2026 shipping.
eBay needs to recognize this as well.
Have a great day.
Frecklesfinery88
jasoheat_0
·6 months agoI live in the atlanta area ( one of the worst in the country ) have had similar issues , i began scheduling package pick ups thru the USPS ( that's all i do now ) and if they did not pick up and scan i file a complaint ( that evening ) , which a local supervisor has to call me within 2-3 days to resolve the issue , i spoke with my postal carrier and we figured out a system so he knows when i have packages to pick up( that i put request in for ) , even if he didn't get the notice form ( was part of the problem ) ... plus i give a nice Xmas card with a thank you every year .. Im sitting at 100% now , FYI , i do 5 business day handling , this has helped as well , sort of a buffer just incase
flp
·6 months agoI do the same thing. My carrier gets a notice to pick up, she comes into the garage to get the packages and scans them right there. If a sub doesn't do that, (because I check online), I call the post office and they'll do a scan there. I do live in a very small town (1300 people) but find the staff very willing to help out especially when I explain why scanning is so important. And, like you, I give my carrier a small Christmas gift with homemade goodies and veggies in the summer.
wastingtime101
·6 months agoPurchased Wednesday, scanned in Friday is the 2nd business day, not the 3rd.
Purchased Wednesday, scanned in by Monday is the 3rd business day. (Edit: Except for this week - since Monday is a holiday you need a scan by Tuesday to meet 3 day handling.)
Does your PO have a self-service kiosk? You can scan your packages yourself if it does.
You can also print a SCAN form and ask the clerk to scan that when you drop off your packages.
Both the SSK scan and the SCAN form provisional scans will count on eBay for on-time shipping, even though USPS doesn't consider either an official acceptance scan.
christworks
·6 months agoAre you sure about this? I generally trust what you say - but on this one I have to disagree with you. Neither the SSK nor the SCAN form generate an "acceptance" of the package. Tracking will show that an acceptace scan is pending. There is no proof I dropped off a specific package, just a group of packages. That is why USPS does not count that scan for insurance purposes.
My post office will not hand scan more than ten packages at a time. No problem, I thought, and I switched to using the SCAN form instead. I quickly ended up with 3 late shipment dings that eBay would not remove when I appealed them. I was definitley within my handling time.
When my appeals were denied, I talked to an American CSR and she told me eBay does not count SCAN form scans as meeting handling time because they have no way to verify if a particular package was dropped off at that time. She used the example that I might have left an eBay package in the trunk of my car, and handed the clerk a personal package going to my parents by mistake.
That happened in 2023. There is a lot of mixed information on the subject, including experiences. Before I hit reply on this post, I looked through eBay's policies and I do not see any place where they definitively state a SCAN form scan counts as "accepted" in eBay's book. What I do see stressed is that you must have an "acceptance" scan. I wonder if this is one of those areas eBay treats as subjective. If a seller is shipping 50 orders, they may be treated more leanient verses someone who is shipping a dozen orders.
wastingtime101
·6 months agoYes, I am sure. This has always been the case (today, in 2023, and for many years before than that). I can't speak to your specific situation in 2023 and it's too late now to dig in to it. But we can tag in eBay to give an official answer and eliminate any questions. With the Monday holiday I don't expect a reply before Tuesday at the earliest.
Hi @elizabeth@ebay @kyle@ebay @devon@ebay .
Will you please confirm whether eBay counts the scan of a USPS SCAN sheet when calculating a seller's on time shipping rating?
Edit: In addition to advising on SCAN sheets for @christworks , please also advise re: SSK (self service kiosk) scans for @tealt as you can see the discussion progressed further. Thanks!
For example, if I'm required to ship a batch of packages on Tuesday and a SCAN form is scanned by Tuesday, then say there are no other scans on one of the packages until it reaches the buyer's state a week later, and the item arrives after eBay's estimated delivery window - that transaction will not be considered late on a seller's performance rating, right? The SCAN form scan counts it as on time?
kyle@ebay
Hey @wastingtime101 that is correct! The scan sheet's purpose is to scan multiple items in all at the same time. So USPS can have an acceptance scan on several packages with one single scan.
robbie31415
·6 months agoI don't agree.
I use scan forms everyday and not once have I recieved any late shipments.
Wastingtime is completely correct.
tealt
·6 months ago@wastingtime101
"Both the SSK scan and the SCAN form provisional scans will count on eBay for on-time shipping, even though USPS doesn't consider either an official acceptance scan."
If this is true, this is bad news for buyers--because a SSK scan is not proof that the package entered the USPS system when it was scanned.
1) A seller who hasn't got the package ready yet, but knows the weight it will be (e.g sells new consumable items), can print the label, take the label to the SSK for scanning with similar packages, and actually ship the item whenever they get the package ready. [On this board I actually saw this suggested as a method for meeting the on-time-shipping metric without actually shipping].
2) A well intentioned seller could use the SSK after hours, find the drop chute jammed, and have no choice but to take the package back home. The package (with the buyer's gramma's birthday gift for next week) won't enter the USPS system until the seller next has a chance to visit the PO during hours (or try the chute again next day after hours)
wastingtime101
·6 months agoIt's the system that's been in place for many years @tealt and you're not regularly reading about problems on the buyer's end, which means the "could happen" outlier cases you referenced are few and far between. Millions of sellers rely on SCAN forms every day. It would be illogical to not accept the SCAN form scan just because of a small, negligible number of sellers looking to game the system.
tealt
·6 months ago@wastingtime101
My post you replied to did not mention scan forms. I’ve used those myself, A postal employee must actually do the scanning.
My post was only about SSKs which have nothing to do with scan forms. SSKs merely provide a receipt. There is no proof that an SSK receipted package has entered the USPS system and fulfilled a seller’s on time shipping promise.
i’d like to know whether eBay accepts SSK receipts as proof of on-time shipping. If eBay considers Those receipts to be equivalent to an acceptance scan by a clerk at the counter then I don’t have to stand in line at the post office anymore.
wastingtime101
·6 months ago@tealt SSK scan and SCAN form scan are exactly the same: a provisional scan by USPS saying they are awaiting the item. My above replies stand.
tealt
·6 months ago@wastingtime101
I don't mean to be a paranoid pest about this, but can I read somewhere (help page/policy statement/moderator reply) a statement that eBay will accept scan forms or SSK receipts as proof of on time shipping?
I tried Help, but didn't find anything.
wastingtime101
·6 months agoSee post 5 upthread @tealt and wait for a reply.
That said, eBay does promote using the SCAN form in the help pages.
https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/shipping-items/labels-packaging-tips/buying-printing-shipping-labels?id=4157
How to print a USPS SCAN Form
USPS typically requires a Shipment Confirmation Acceptance Notice (SCAN) form to scan 5 or more packages at the pickup or drop-off location. Instead of scanning each individual package, they can scan the SCAN form for all packages.
You can create the USPS SCAN form on the desktop site only. Here's how:
You can create one SCAN form for each bulk shipping label purchase. Once the SCAN form is scanned by USPS, any labels assigned to that SCAN form won't receive a credit if canceled.
itsjustasprain
·6 months agoTechnically true but Ebay does accept that provisional scan as proof of mailing. USPS will consider it a provisional acceptance themselves until there is a direct in-network scan of the package. That will show it is in their hands. Before that point they will not accept a missing mail claim on it. That is mainly why it is called provisional. Nevertheless Ebay will accept it as proof of mailing.
I have plenty of weekend/after-hours SSK dropoffs in my selling account and I can see their status shown as shipped as soon as the SSK scan is uploaded to the network.
roccotacodad54
·6 months ago"The local USPS Office does not scan in mail"
Does your local post office not have a counter with a person there? The nearest PO to me is in an unincorporated town of under 600 residents (estimate) with one person staffing the counter. I bring in a package give it to him and he scans it and gives me a receipt. Just wondering.....................