Cards saying our for delivery, but "never" getting delivered

[mistajandharley]

I'm having to make this conversation because this week alone I have had 2 buyers open claims against me stating cards were haven't been delivered and the tracking information says out for delivery, but had been saying out for delivery for 2-3- weeks now. Am I just suppose to lose out of cards and money because USPS can't properly scan a tracking barcode when delivering my standard envelopes?? Have any other sellers have this problem?

[cajunpicker]

I have many times. Probably 60 x between this and last year. I have had to refund buyers way too many times. Filing reimbursement claims with post office and through Pitney Bowles every time. Not one refund back for cards lost or shipping fees /  explanation. Also cards don’t come back to me when not delivered. They are just lost in the system. It’s a complete joke to even try to recoup the loss. Not delivering causes pings against your seller rating & negative feedback sometimes.  thus your fees go WAY UP for a month plus. With that and ebays high fee structures I have been building networks on other selling sites. Currently only listing about 1/16 of my inventory on eBay. 

[unclekipsy]

I don't know if this is helpful.  I buy cards, but not often. Sellers using the eBay mailing "system" (I forgot the name of the system) send me cards that say delivered on the tracking, but typically are not....at least not for another day or two. It seems when the card reaches a certain point/area/zone and is scanned, it comes up as delivered.  I cannot explain further. -  I see your situation/predicament is more serious, with cards ending up in no-mans-land.  I thought I'd just put in my two cents.

[mistajandharley]

Yeah I've had cards get scanned saying they were delivered, but weren't actually delivered until 2 days later. I've had no issues with those claims, or people opening claims that say they didn't get cards even when it says delivered because that's the only time ebay sides with sellers 😒. But the current issue is cards saying out for delivery from the last week of last month and just not being delivered.

[mistajandharley]

Where have you been having luck at? Currently only doing ebay, and I don't want to do tcgplayer because I hear there fees are crazy as well. I've recently seen ads for a website called cardtrader, but I haven't looked into it much since I'm just hearing about it.

[pokeplay44]

I know I'm a bit late but thought I would at least provide some insight. I can explain in further detail and how I know but here are a few facts:
- The "labels" you are referring to (under $20 trading cards ESUS labels) do not "scan" at any USPS location/hub in the country. The tracking numbers technically don't even exist. You can usually track any package with a tracking number, right? Type one of the ESUS numbers into a track my package online option for USPS and you will see what I mean. I was allowed to view this first hand at my local USPS hub at the front counter, self-ship kiosks and explained the same for the conveyer belt scanners.

-The point above is partially why you see "out for delivery" and/or "delivered" even though those updates may not be accurate. The best examples come on weekends and holidays. For example, this past weekend was Labor Day so USPS was closed on Sunday as normal and Monday for the holiday. I have a bunch of orders the show tracking updates on both of these days. 4 orders say "out for delivery" on Labor Day aka we know that is physically impossible. The card(s) usually arrive the following day but give it an extra day or two when accounting for Sundays + a holiday.

-Is there anything you can do? Mostly no. I'm sure you have or will have orders that don't show ANY tracking updates beyond the first when you printed the shipping label. Others that randomly stop somewhere while in transit on the tracking updates. Many other things will happen. IF the tracking shows that your shipment was at some point in the hands of USPS (regardless of inaccurate delivery message or stoppage in all updates), you can get refunded for the order if you sent a refund to the buyer. Unfortunately, this is not something that automatically happens and it can be a pain to go through the process, especially as these types of incidents are happening at a much higher rate now compared to a few months/year(s) ago.

Is the shipping option correctly advertised and thoroughly explained by ebay? Not at all. These labels are proprietary to ebay (a contract between ebay and usps to use these labels as we would use a normal stamp).