Tracking showing "Preshipment" after it has been scanned and is actually in transit

[teltuooutlet]

I noticed that I have DOZENS of orders that have been scanned in by the post office, travelled to the hub, and are in transit to their destination yet Ebay tracking updated it to show as "Preshipment". I have contacted customer service and the person said they are opening a ticket as it is obviously a system error. However, this is something that potentially could be held against seller ratings if the system thinks it was not shipped within the handling time. The customer service agent said they are putting into the ticket that my account should not be held accountable for this error, but the system needs to get updated! If there are other sellers with this issue I recommend contacting customer support so this can be corrected sooner rather than later! 

[goldguy22k]

I never rely on the eBay tracking system if I want to know where one of my packages is located.  I always go to the source website and use the eBay provided tracking number to search the history there.  It is always best to go to the source for information rather that relying on some second hand rehashing.  eBay is what it is and system glitches seem to be de rigueur and often slow to get fixed.

If you are concerned about buyers getting things late, some sellers are contacting their buyers to report (and often share links to news stories) about the massive system wide shipping delays.  Home based buying due to COVID-19 has increased loads and now the expected increased loads for the Holidays has added to that.  Plus whole sorting hubs have had massive numbers of employees test positive for COVID-19 and thus are operating with less than optimum staff.  Those sellers that report communicating with their buyers seem to be avoiding INR cases and still have happy buyers.

[teltuooutlet]

Thank you for your reply. 

I do not rely on Ebay tracking and do use my carrier tracking. However, buyers DO use Ebay tracking and that poses a problem with buyers opening claims assuming it has not shipped when in actuality it has.

The issue with this is, the system is looking at whether you as a seller have shipped your item in the handling time you have stated. If the tracking shows as "preshipment" past the handling time you get dinged in your seller performance ratings. If you get enough, you lose your status or can face other consequences. 

If the item has actually shipped and USPS (or other) tracking is showing correct on their websites, then Ebay should not be showing "preshipment" thus impacting a sellers performance.

That was the purpose of my statement here. So that other sellers who are seeing the same thing will contact Ebay so hopefully they get a fix in sooner than later. 

[goldguy22k]

Ok fair enough! Guess I missed your point of starting a rally to effect some change with ebay.

Something I do when shipping an item is thank the buyer and set expectations for delivery.  I include a link to the USPS, FedEx or UPS tracking for that package so hopefully they will use that.

Then again it is a different world now and it looks like one has to do MUCH more hand holding of buyers to stave off the Nervous Nellies.  After all Google, Ask, Twitter and Redit all tell you everything online is a scam!

[simba6]

Check the USPS site.  I have seen packages that don't show until they reach a main sorting center.

[teltuooutlet]

That's actually a good point I never thought of to include a link right to USPS on the messages I send to buyers. Thank you for that!

[simba6]

The USPS link gives far more and up to date info that the ebay one.

[pooh333piglet]

That's not uncommon. I've seen it what seems like a million times in my tracking. Not just recently either. If I ship too fast like same day or sometimes even next day but item was purchased less than 24 hrs ago..then I see usps scans like normal and then it says preshipment. Computers not updating immediately. Preshipment scan goes away shortly after package moves along 

[dbfolks166mt]

    This interface has been broken for several weeks and eBay has yet to fix the problem and it is THEIR problem. You are correct about the metrics for a seller uploading tracking information on time but the bigger problem is the buyers depending on or using the eBay link are getting an incorrect perception of where their package actually is in the USPS system. This may be resulting in a number of pre-mature INR cases being opened.