2018 Holiday Carrier Guidelines

[alan@ebay]

Hi sellers, 

Hope you find the following useful :

[xray731]

Thanks Alan - it's very useful. May I( suggest something similar if put on the buying board or even on the main page somewhere to let buyers know when they should make their purchases by.

Thanks!

[seller*by*day]

Exactly. Ebay is all about following "industry standards" so they must follow the standard here and tell buyers when they should get their orders in by if they want them in time for Christmas. It is not 100% the sellers responsibility to make sure items are delivered by Christmas. Buyers need to get their orders in on time.

[Anonymous]

If you want any packages before december 25th you better of order last week, I have packages running late now November 17-22... North Houston Texas and Florida are taking for ever at Sub Stations Packages sitting over  a week already or more.. Its crazy already and yes thats First class and Priority mail.....

[08arctic]

Be aware that shipping to/from Alaska and Hawaii will take longer, especially for Media Mail and Parcel Post. ***ALERT*** The Anchorage, AK-area earthquake will cause longer delays than normal.

[rus_sells]

I  had shipped about 10 orders using a scan form for First Class Mail on Nov. 26 th on Dec. 1st I received an email for Where is my item? the tracking showed Accepted on Nov. 26  but below said package acceptance pending and no further tracking infirmation, I went to my post office and asked whats up? their reply was concerning, Apparently USPS is short on employees this holiday season and THEY ARE HOLDING FIRST CLASS MAIL AT THE DISTRIBUTION CENTER IN ORDER TO BE ABLE TO DELIVER PRIORITY MAIL ON TIME. in my case it took about a week for tracking to finally show up on Dec.2 . I just spoke with an eBay rep and they are unaware of this and asked me to get a letter in writing from the post office to support this so it would not affect my shipping metrics. Has any one else had this same problem?

[aplus-jewelry-and-novelty-sales]

Do you all know about 12/5/18 is a postal holiday? I saw it online elsewhere, but it's because the president made it a new federal holiday to honor the past pres. Geo. Bush since his recent passing. I don't know if this will be every year or just this year though. Anybody else know anything about this? I haven't seen any mention of this on ebay..... is it correct information ?

[miamoretori]

Hi, I made an enormous blunder today. I had 5 packages to ship out to customers. I accidentally printed out two of the same labels and affixed them to two different boxes. Of course, being identical tracking numbers one customer will get both. I don't understand how the numbers were scanned two. Why wouldn't it show as a duplicate? What happens in this case? Will I get both boxes returned to me or will they ship? Of course, one Buyer is going to be less then happy with me. I'm sure it's a holiday present. How do I handle this? Obviously, I am going to have to inform both customers. Should I just reimburse the who won't get anything? I have no idea what's going to happen to the boxes. I went back to the post office 30 minutes later after trying to send the tracking numbers to customers and discovered my stupidity. However, it had already been picked up and sent out. Thanks for your help!

[nobody*s_perfect]

Most likely one box will go through just fine.

The second box could (1) get sent back to you for postage, which is actually the best option because then you get a chance to fix it; or (2) delivered to the addressee but you or they get charged for the Postage Due which for this package would be the entire postage amount.  USPS  has a new system that automatically charges the sender for underpaid postage, so it's possible that your buyer receives both packages and is not charged for the Postage Due for either of them.

In a day or two you'll know via the tracking whether this will play out as option 1 or 2.  

[johnrj1226]

alan@ebay

Good  Morning Alan.  January 27 is  just around the corner and  the new 2019 USPS rates go into  effect.  It would be very nice if eBay sent out an announcement with links to the specific changes - the average rate increase(s) is meaningless to most sellers - gotta' have the details.

Thanks in advance  for looking into this matter - keep us posted.  Sellers don't like to  loose  $$.

[alan@ebay]

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@johnrj1226 wrote:

alan@ebay

Good  Morning Alan.  January 27 is  just around the corner and  the new 2019 USPS rates go into  effect.  It would be very nice if eBay sent out an announcement with links to the specific changes - the average rate increase(s) is meaningless to most sellers - gotta' have the details.

Thanks in advance  for looking into this matter - keep us posted.  Sellers don't like to  loose  $$.

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Hi @johnrj1226, 

We'll be sharing information before January 27. Keep an eye on our announcement board. 

Thanks. 

[beardedbovine]

alan@ebay 

Maybe it's time to un-pin this post about holiday deadlines and instead pin a post about shipping rate changes?