SeLLeR$ - how should I go about this & what would your advice be in this situation?

[jdominiq]

Hello everyone [buyers are welcomed to share, too]

1st, I'm not a seller & only a buyer for over 15 yrs. now & have never experience this one issue that I'm about to share.
Among the 1000's of items/listings I've won & paid for, less than 10 total over that time span resulted in refunds whether the items were not shipped at all or arrived completely different from the actual listings or simply damaged.
A couple of them, just written off as they were less than $10-15 where seller(s) did not want to refund or replace (back when I did not have a digital camera or smartphone to capture the photos needed & required by eBay).

2nd, I hardly come around here to kill time & therefore don't know all the rules that may or may not apply to all sharing this community... for that, I apologize if I do mess up by mentioning things that I'm not supposed to (?) - for example, I don't know if it's okay to share info about any sellers I've done business with as it relates to my post & so on...

I'll summarize most of it & go from there depending on what you or others are saying...
I recently had a transaction (last month) with a new seller (zero FB) who is based/registered here in the USA according to eBay's profile page & was selling
used items in very good to excellent condition... I was only interested in one of the nearly 2 dozen offerings he had so I paid no attention to any of the other ones.

After winning my item & paying for it, the seller waited a week before sending out the package with tracking which did not seem strange at all the first around until eBay's system updated it as delivered last Friday evening.
Upon clicking the tracking link, it stated that it was delivered to me personally (Left with Individual) which surprised me as I was the only one home (always) all day & no soul ever came by the house. I went to check the front door again to make sure the USPS driver did not just leave it on the ground in front of the door as s/he would do once in a blue moon, but nothing was there.
So, I thought... well, if the driver left it at the mailbox cluster/hub inside the regular mailbox or parcel locker below it, that'd be fine & I'll go by in the morning to double check & retrieve it if it's actually left there, instead. Unfortunately, that was not the case neither.
One thing about this package is that it was to contain a small item where the retail packaging would allow for it (flat enough) to fit inside a normal mailbox & even if it does not fit because the seller used a slightly bigger package, the delivery person would just put it inside one of the available parcel lockers (for all other packages too big to fit a regular mailbox) right below as this was the mailbox system set up here in our 3 yr. old subdivision [no traditional mailboxes in front of houses at all].

If you have not figure it out from the above, that means there was no reason for the driver to come all the way to my front door to leave this average small package with me or at the door unless it was an oversized box/package that could not fit inside a parcel locker or several packages happened to show up the same day & the driver could not fit them all inside one, two, or all three on my side of the cluster/hub.

Needless to say, this is a situation where there's delivery confirmation & yet I don't have the package, much less the item in my possession.
I've sent the seller 2 messages that Saturday morning after returning from double checking the mailboxes & still not heard a word from him/her still.

Oh BTW, the package was not sent from within the US or the State listed in the auction, but from out of Europe... (?).

Opinions?

[castlemagicmemories]

You need to check with your local Post Office.  They have GPS that will show where the item was delivered.  It may be that your item was sent to a different address in your zip code.

Good Luck.

[jennzet-0]

Did you try calling your local Post Office?

Hopefully your Postal worker can remember what happened with this package.

[forgottenape]

its your responsibility as a buyer to have a secure delivery location and once its been delivered your responsible to go get the item from your box. if someone is stealing your mail its your job to take care of it maybe waiting a day wasn't the right move. if you don't have a safe place for your delivery perhaps you shouldn't be ordering things that are mailed 

[sam9876]

eBay doesn't require pictures of items that are SNAD.

[city*satins]

I've sent the seller 2 messages that Saturday morning after returning from double checking the mailboxes & still not heard a word from him/her still.

I'm not sure what you are hoping the seller can do for you.  Even a seller located in the US will at most be able to advise you to check with your post office and a seller overseas is in even less of a position to give you advice.

This is something you will have to take up with the post office that the USPS carrier is working from.  

You say the package was sent from Europe?  Is it possible it was sent quite quickly but that USPS tracking didn't pick it up online until it reached the US?

[jennzet-0]

How do we know that it was not just misdirected?

It sounds like this OP has community mail boxes and the Postal worker could have delivered in someone else's mailbox.

Since  OP has had over 1,000 successful deliveries with only 10 problems he obviously has a safe place in which to leave them.

[coolections]

If it shows delivered there is not much your seller can do. Looks like a mailbox pirate. Check your PO as they are the ones you need to ask about the package, not your seller.

[jennzet-0]

I believe the OP said tracking shows it was left with an individual, but it was not him.

[green-night]

Can you tell based on the tracking number if the buyer printed the label from eBay or if it was from the PO?   There is a way you can tell. 

If your seller purchased the shipping from the PO I will bet they shipped it to a different address in your town. 

[jdominiq]

I filed an inquiry with 'Missing Mail & Lost Packages' online that Saturday following the previous day of the delivery & got email confirmation that it was received & nothing new to date...

On Monday, I filled another inquiry with the USPSOIG & received confirmation Tuesday morning from the 'Supervisor of Customer Service' at the local branch with his full name & the location's phone number - I may call him tomorrow to see what he may have to share or not...

[jdominiq]

I did try on Monday afternoon after 3PM, but it kept on ringing forever with no one picking up...

[jennzet-0]

If it were me, I would then go into your local post office in person.

If you go early enough while the trucks are being loadedup, you can ask to speak with your postal worker.

[jdominiq]

I'm not sure I follow, but here's a capture of the beginning according to tracking...

[femmefan1946]

@forgottenape

its your responsibility as a buyer to have a secure delivery location and once its been delivered your responsible to go get the item from your box

Thank you for that information.

It has always puzzled me, as a foreigner, that Americans would allow their mail to be left far from their homes in an unlocked box, with a flag to tell thieves when there was something in it to steal.

We Canadians have  a either doorstep delivery or 'community mailboxes' which are locked. We also have many sub-contracted postal outlets, so if a parcel won't fit in the household box, it can be picked up  at 'extended hours'.  A lot of postal outlets are in pharmacies, which have long hours, meaning the outlet is open from ~8am to ~8pm, seven days a week.