USPS tracking shows "missent"...but also immediately marked by USPS as "return to sender"? Whaaah?

[upcyclenw]

Sent my sold item (magazines) via USPS, destination Charlottesville, VA, about a week ago. All normal for the first few days. Then tracking showed the status as "missent"...which apparently means they loaded it on the wrong USPS truck (it shows a location about 100 miles away from where it should be).  

All that would be fine - everything I'm reading online says that "missent" occasionally happens, and the general advice is "don't worry, USPS will sort it out in a few days". Except....now the tracking status shows as "return to sender". I didn't ask for it to be returned, the buyer never saw it, and it's USPS's fault it was put on the wrong truck....and apparently USPS that directed it to be returned. So:

1) Is there anything I can do at this point so it's NOT returned to me, but sent on to the buyer?

2) If it does come back, do I have any recourse to getting USPS to pay for the replacement shipment, or get a refund for this one?

3) Has anyone else had this happen to them?

Just when I thought things were going so well, too.... 

[upcyclenw]

Showing a screenshot of part of the status so people can see for themselves...

[shipscript · Accepted solution]

I don't have a good answer. USPS does make mistakes. In the past, I've had a media mail item returned to me for an invalid address, when, more likely, the driver punched the wrong key on their tablet. When it came back to me, my postmaster said "too bad", and I paid for another label to ship it out again to the exact same address.  On another shipment, a priority package got caught in a circular loop between two post offices due to a carrier route mislabeling and I called the postmaster to intervene. In that instance, when it returned to me, the postmaster slapped a gratis label on the package and it was sent out again.

I suspect it will depend on the mood of your postmaster.

[upcyclenw]

Thanks for trying to help - appreciated. Unfortunately my "postmaster" never seems to be available (on the phone or in person) and the line at the local PO is always at least 1/2 hour long. On a good day. 🙂

I'll probably just eat the label cost as you suggest and hope the buyer understands.