mam98031 • Volunteer Community Member • Buyer/Seller since 1999
@salegall wrote:I am having this happen all the time now. Excuses on why they don’t get to the post office. Does it look like they shipped once they initiate a label? Is there a way I can notify Ebay that they actually haven’t shipped?
There isn't a good reason for a seller to do something like this on purpose. Ebay holds sellers to the handling times the sellers state on their listings. If we don't ship within those stated handling times we get a ding on our accounts. It doesn't take a whole lot of them to hurt a sellers standing on Ebay.
So there isn't a benefit to any seller doing this. And unfortunately I can't offer a reason why you have ran into this problem either. Sorry.
@salegall wrote:Well..right now I have one item that was to be received on March 1st and I prodded her to ship and another that made it on the due date that I also had to remind to ship. Both admitted to preparing labels and waiting days with various excuses for why they didn’t make it to the post office.
and of course the obligatory “thank you for your patience”
It still makes no sense. They aren't doing themselves or the health of their selling accounts any favors. I'm sorry I have no answers for you as I'm sure this is very frustrating for you as a buyer. But know this practice would be far more uncommon than a common action by sellers. Most understand the negative impact such a practice on a regular basis can be on their accounts.
@johnrj1226 wrote:1. It is not uncommon that sellers will buy a shipping label say on late Friday night and not get the package in the hands of the carrier on teh following Monday or Tues (if Monday is a holiday).
2. As long as there is a tracking number uploaded to the sales file, eBay will see when the package received the acceptance scan - of course, sometimes the carrier will screw this up but not often - normal around Christmas time. Hey I haven't met a person or a company that has been 100% spot on correct 100% of them time unless it was a young person selling from their lemonade stand. I also am a firm believer that all those computer glitches we hear about are caused by humans. But folks like to say the computer did it because they can't talk back (yet). Computers operate on a very simple principle - called GIGO - garbage in = garbage out. People provide the inputs.
While it may not be uncommon for sellers to print shipping labels on a Friday, I think it is FAR LESS common for them to hold the shipment until Monday or Tuesday.
If this is something that I find the need to do, for whatever reason I may have, I will create the label on Friday but with Monday's date on the label, absolutely not Friday's.
Obviously there are some sellers that do as the OP has described, but that does not make it common practice.
"As long as there is a tracking number uploaded to the sales file, eBay will see when the package received the acceptance scan..." This is NOT true. If a seller prints the label on Friday and does not get the package to the carrier until Monday, the acceptance scan happens on Monday. It does NOT happen at the time a seller creates a label.
@salegall wrote:Thank you for your explanation and for what you feel is a rarity among sellers. Much appreciated.
I'm confident it is as there is nothing good that can come from that practice. With Ebay or our customers / buyers. Most of us work very hard to make sure we do the best possible job for our buyers. As a smart seller wants their customers happy as a happy customer may become a return customer. And we all LOVE US a return customer.
