Sending message to buyers.

[mdaneke]

Here’s what I’m telling my buyers before I make the shipping label. Let me know what you think.

Hello and thank you for your purchase. I would like you to know and understand that there are some major delays with USPS right now. I am having some major problems with delays in Philadelphia and California. I have spent countless hours on the phone and in person with the post office. The whole EBay sellers forum is exploding about this issue. I upgrade shipping to priority shipping which is 2-3 business days but that doesn’t  matter. There is no rhyme or reason on how the post office operates. I have orders delivered to Washington state in 3 days and have orders to Philadelphia that have taken 3-4 weeks (45 minutes from my house in Jersey) Tomorrow is a holiday and will ship orders out Tuesday morning. If you need these buckets in a hurry or can’t wait for the USPS backlog please let me know tonight or tomorrow and will refund your money no problem. Once again thank you for your purchase and email me anytime. Mark

[pburn]

I think sending that message to someone who has already paid for a purchase is well and truly a bad idea.

[laperlalady]

Bad idea. 

No need to give them a reason to back out. 

Ship and check tracking in a week. 

[no_zero369]

I think that is a good approach and good step toward good customer service!

I would send that only  if you think there is a chance your shipment might be routed through one of those spots. 

I might pare it down a bit!  WAY too long such that it starts to look like an excuse made in advance.  What would make it more powerful would be a pledge to monitor the tracking and keep the buyer informed.  Then DO IT!  which means if something get bogged down, start the Missing Mail process and left the buyer know.

Most who employed this strategy during the late Fall - Christmas rush were able to avoid INR filings.

[slippinjimmy]

Concept is good but your example is not.

I have always sent buyers a Item Shipped message that include MY estimated delivery date and the details of their order and shipping details. In this notice I now include one single statement about general delays due to Covid-19 "due to the current Covid19 situation and very high volume of packages deliveries by USPS may be slower than normal, please be patient". I modify or leave it out depending on the circumstances.

I send this AFTER I have shipped, I don't want buyers to be thinking it might be better to cancel and I don't want to overstate the problems which for me have been mostly very minimal except for a few that have taken the very slow train.

[luckythewinner]

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@mdaneke wrote:

Here’s what I’m telling my buyers before I make the shipping label. Let me know what you think.

Hello and thank you for your purchase. I would like you to know and understand that there are some major delays with USPS right now. I am having some major problems with delays in Philadelphia and California. I have spent countless hours on the phone and in person with the post office. The whole EBay sellers forum is exploding about this issue. I upgrade shipping to priority shipping which is 2-3 business days but that doesn’t  matter. There is no rhyme or reason on how the post office operates. I have orders delivered to Washington state in 3 days and have orders to Philadelphia that have taken 3-4 weeks (45 minutes from my house in Jersey) Tomorrow is a holiday and will ship orders out Tuesday morning. If you need these buckets in a hurry or can’t wait for the USPS backlog please let me know tonight or tomorrow and will refund your money no problem. Once again thank you for your purchase and email me anytime. Mark

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I have been a seller on eBay for over 20 years and have never once felt the desire to send a message to a buyer warnin g them about something that might not even happen. 

[fashunu4eeuh]

Hi, well written communication. Appreciate both your proactive stance, and strong customer service approach. On the face of it, it seems like a really good idea.

Taking a moment to reconsider, i think I’d ultimately be reticent to send a like message. We are here to sell, not to encourage cancellations, though it is completely understandable to want to forestall shipping issues and manage buyer expectations. Perhaps a much briefer statement would serve you just as well? 

I feel the same way about emphasizing returns. The shopper can see for themselves i offer a generous return policy. No need to further suggest there could be a problem in the transaction that would necessitate a return. Why would i want to plant a seed that might cost me sales?

So, I don’t anticipate problems with transactions, and therefore do not need to do anything that might undermine that buyer’s confidence. Like putting a warning in a message. Instead, i prefer to deal with the facts and actual occurrences as they happen.

Of course, what is important is your decision and what you are comfortable with. All up to you, just a fellow seller’s alternate point of view.

[mdaneke]

The reason I felt I had to do this is that when I ship say on A Monday I will have 10 boxes. Over the past 6 weeks 3 out of the 10 boxes have been issues with shipping. I am just getting tires of answering customers who didn’t get their packages on time. I appreciate everyone’s view but dealing with this post office right now is a waste of time. Maybe if the customer gets the truth upfront they will understand what’s going on so I don’t have to check my eBay mail every hour for late shipment complaints. I have 10 orders going out on Tuesday and emailed all 10 customers this message. I will see if it works or if it doesn’t. I figured I would give it a try. Thanks for your feedbacks.

[futuremarine2011]

dont set yourself up for a fall.  i truly believe most everybody buying now online know and most understand whats going on with the delayed shipping. me personally i play it out unless i might otherwise  hear from a buyer and then i give my sermon about whats happening in the world, but thats just me 

[mdaneke]

I understand that. But wouldn’t it save you some headaches right now if you got rid of the complainers before you shipped your items. I would never conceive sending a message out in normal times but right now we are getting no help from the post office,No help from eBay and I hear that eBay is not erasing neg feedback due to late delivery. Customers sometime think we’re like Amazon where they get it in 2 days. Yesterday I had to refund 3 customers and they get to keep my product unless I spend another 15 dollars for a intercept which would really **bleep** the customer off and result in neg feedback. Right now sellers are on their own and getting help from nobody.

[fashunu4eeuh]

Completely understand. It is nerve wracking for sellers with multiple packages going out every day. Hope things get smoother for you very soon.

[serenitystrawsnstuff]

I can relate 100%!!!  In the last 3-4 weeks, I've had 4 packages get lost.  It's gotten to where I'm afraid to open questions from buyers in fear of more missing packages!!!!  I open a claim and 2 or 3 end up being delivered, but after 2-3 weeks beyond the estimated delivery date.  I used to have the problem where the carrier was delivering to an incorrect address, so I started writing the house # in big numbers above the address.  That seems to have stopped, now they just lose them!!!!  I am getting so tired of all the issues!  

[serenitystrawsnstuff]

If a buyer gives me negative feedback, I immediately block them.  If they don't even contact me if there is something wrong, I don't want them to buy from me again.  It's that simple.  I just had a buyer who experienced the long delay of delivery.  I told him I opened a claim but he didn't want to wait any longer.  He insisted I refund his order.  I was very reluctant to do it, but he wouldn't back down so I did.  Couple days later, he contacts me saying he got the package, but that I sent him the wrong item!  Long story short, He ordered the wrong item, then he said I overcharged for shipping.  After about 3 conversations, I proved to him that I was right and he was wrong and he finally thanked me for doing the right thing.  He did return the items and had to pay more shipping than I initially charged him (ha ha).  Won't be dealing with him again.  bye bye!

[mam98031]

Seems to me that you are inviting problems not heading them off.

[soh.maryl]

Just curious:  Exactly how do you know that most who employed this strategy during the late Fall-Christmas rush were able to avoid INR filings? It would be great if that were the case, but from various postings on the M2M Board, it seems doubtful.