GSP Purchase From US to Canada

[chridel_70]

Hello everyone,

So i decided to purchase from a seller in Richmond Virginia (I'm from Winnipeg Manitoba), and i'm not too worried about the seller, but more so towards the GSP part of this order.

I probably should've looked into GSP before purchasing but oh well, nothing I can do bout it now lol.

My question here is, any fellow canadians have a good experience with the GSP? It seems as if every single purchase made from the US to Canada using GSP has either been delayed or vanished from the face of the earth. 

Should I prepare myself to open up a refund dispute with eBay or what lol?

[reallynicestamps]

? It seems as if every single purchase made from the US to Canada using GSP has either been delayed or vanished from the face of the earth.

It's a "man bites dog" situation.

If everything goes smoothly, there is no reason to complain, either here or to eBay.

Many  of the problems are from two situations:

Until July 1/2020 the Canadian duty-free allowance for shipped imports was $20.

Because few buyers ever imported anything, because CBSA made the sensible decision to ignore the law on low value items, because the cross-border shopper has a $200 duty free allowance, and because couriers (like UPS or PitneyBowes which runs the GSP) must obey the law:

Buyers were horrified that their $19US ($23.75Cdn)  Thing was being charged duty and sales taxes and a $5 service fee.

Also many believe that NAFTA applies to things purchased in the US, when it is actually things made in the US.

Anxious buyers compulsively watch tracking.

But carriers, including USPS, UPS, FedEX, PB/GSP, Canada Post, DHL, etc use hub and spoke delivery.

This means the shipment goes to a central point from thousands of smaller locations, and is redirected from there.

If you've ever flow from Whitehorse to Cuba by way of Calgary, Vancouver, and Toronto before reaching Havana you have experienced hub and spoke.

PB/GSP uses a hub and spoke delivery system.  AND when the package wends its way to Erlanger KY via USPS' hub and spoke system, eBay shows it as "delivered". Cue screams of dismay.

Then GSP gives it a new tracking number. If this is delayed in being sent to the customer, and given Murphy's Law it will be, the customer is babbling is fury and horror.

Then it goes to Canada, with thousands of other items, and enters Canada Post's hub and spoke system.

The first problem is more or less resolved.

Canadians now have a duty free allowance of $150.  ($112.75 US) which takes care of most problems, since it was low value items that were most annoying.

However, sales tax is being charged on anything valued over $40Cdn - we should be seeing those complaints as Christmas shopping starts up.

The hub and spoke system is very efficient.

But watching it is like watching sausage being made.

Don't.

Just mark the last estimated arrival date on your calendar.

If your purchase hasn't arrived by then, the Resolution Centre is at the bottom of this page.

[chridel_70]

Yeah that makes a lot of sense. Welp, guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Really appreciate the in-depth response reallynicestamps!

Cheers!

[15westcoast]

Many, many, posts have been on here for a couple of years about the negative results

with the GSP.  It would appear that the posts are not read until a buyer has a problem with

the GSP.  One word :  Don't order from seller using the GSP.  Long delays, lost in transit,

items not shipped due to a variety of GSP reasons and an extra charge.  It is only good for

buyers in the USA or UK and not for out of the country buyers.  If you message some sellers

they will change the shipping to USPS, but some have no clue how to do this and won't bother.

I resist the temptation to 

purchase from a GSP seller as I have experienced all kinds of problems.  Yes, you will get a refund

if the item does not show ,but sometimes it is a one of a kind item that will not show up  again.

A very flawed system to say the least.

[marnotom!]

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@15westcoast wrote:

Many, many, posts have been on here for a couple of years about the negative results

with the GSP.  It would appear that the posts are not read until a buyer has a problem with the GSP.  One word :  Don't order from seller using the GSP.  Long delays, lost in transit, items not shipped due to a variety of GSP reasons and an extra charge.  It is only good for buyers in the USA or UK and not for out of the country buyers.  If you message some sellers they will change the shipping to USPS, but some have no clue how to do this and won't bother.

I resist the temptation to purchase from a GSP seller as I have experienced all kinds of problems.  Yes, you will get a refund if the item does not show ,but sometimes it is a one of a kind item that will not show up  again.

A very flawed system to say the least.

---

The "flaw" that I think you're running into is that Pitney Bowes, DBA as the Global Shipping Program, is the entity responsible or on record for importing GSP-forwarded items into the country, not you, the buyer.  That means that it's going to go above and beyond keeping its nose clean and ensure that it's not on record for importing anything illegal, anything that could be weaponized, anything hazardous, and so forth.  Also consider that the carriers that it contracts out will likely have similar restrictions, and it's not a good idea to get on those carriers' bad side.

I've only purchased four GSP-forwarded items since the program started in 2013 but all my purchases went smoothly.  I'm one of those dorks who tends to over-research and overthink stuff and I did a lot of homework before taking the plunge and making my first purchase of a GSP-forwarded item.  Hey, if I'm the one paying the big bucks to have a seller basically ship something to Kentucky and forget about it, I'm going to do my homework!

It really helps if both the buyer and seller have a pretty good idea of how the program works, but unfortunately that's not always the case and that's often how problems develop.  I think if people understood that the GSP was a glorified forwarding service, it would go a long way to helping both buyers and sellers use the program to its best advantage and understand its quirks and flaws better.  No, it's far from a perfect set-up, but buyers always have the option of setting up their own forwarding scheme for dealing with sellers who refuse to consider alternatives to the GSP.

The fact is, International Shipping is no cakewalk.  We Canadians have been lucky in that many of the hurdles to trading with the US have been pushed aside since the Second World War.  Not all countries have this sort of trade relationship with the US of A.

Food for thought:  Back in the day, there used to be SCADS of posts about how awful PayPal was to work with and tonnes of posts about things that went wrong with a PayPal purchase.  Now that Managed Payments is kicking in, we're seeing posts from users who are expressing how wonderful PayPal is and why can't eBay keep things the way they are.  Not saying that people are going to be in love with the GSP if and when it meets its demise, but "careful what you wish for" comes to mind.  (Some might say that eBay Send/eBay International Standard Delivery is what some users may have inadvertently wished for.)

[07sierra60]

Hub and spoke or not, I still expect to be able to track my shipments end to end with real time up to date information.  Once my items arrive at the hub, I lose all tracking ability while it's handed of to some unknown carrier right up until it arrives at my door. 

[marnotom!]

@07sierra60

Not trying to troll you, but I do have to ask why you feel you need to babysit your item as it makes its way to you?

See my post here, if you haven’t done so already:

https://community.ebay.ca/t5/Buyer-Central/GSP-shipping-doesn-t-provide-up-to-date-tracking-informat...

[reallynicestamps]

Once my items arrive at the hub, I lose all tracking ability

No.

I got this from another seller a couple of years back and have been reposting it constantly since:

Step 1: Go to the Pitney Bowes Parcel Tracker page at https://parceltracking.pb.com/app/#/dashboard/
 
Step 2: Enter your eBay-supplied Global Tracking number (mine began with UPAA...)
 
Step 3: You will be shown limited tracking info. In my case, only up to the point the package left the USA and entered Canada.
 
Step 4: Click on the "Track on carrier's website" link at the top right.
 
Step 5: You will be provided with tracking on the page of the actual shipping company, in my case Canada Post, with a tracking number in THEIR system.
 
Problem solved! If only eBay would put a link to https://parceltracking.pb.com/app/#/dashboard/ in their shipping emails, this could all be avoided... 
 

[07sierra60]

Hi Marnotom, there are lots of reasons WHY some people may need (or want) to know where their packages are. In my case with this package, I'm waiting on parts that were unavailable elsewhere that I need to return an important machine back to operation as quickly as possible.  Between my message this morning and this message, the tracking has been updated and I see that the item was rejected at the hub - you see, had I not been checking the tracking, I wouldn't know that this part will definitely be late and that I need to make other arrangements to get the machine running again ontime.  The fact that this shipping season is quite different than those past gives all the more reason to "babysit" our shipments. Maybe yours aren't that important, mine are. 

[07sierra60]

Thanks - I don't have the option in the PB tracking tool to see the other carrier information as you say. I think this could possibly be because while my item arrived at the Hub, it hasn't been processed yet.

[marnotom!]

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@07sierra60 wrote:

Hi Marnotom, there are lots of reasons WHY some people may need (or want) to know where their packages are. In my case with this package, I'm waiting on parts that were unavailable elsewhere that I need to return an important machine back to operation as quickly as possible.  Between my message this morning and this message, the tracking has been updated and I see that the item was rejected at the hub - you see, had I not been checking the tracking, I wouldn't know that this part will definitely be late and that I need to make other arrangements to get the machine running again ontime.  The fact that this shipping season is quite different than those past gives all the more reason to "babysit" our shipments. Maybe yours aren't that important, mine are. 

---

You're given a delivery time estimate when you make your purchase.  Yes, we can throw that information out the window, but what you're describing could be accomplished by checking the tracking after the last estimated date of delivery had past.  I'm assuming you took the delivery time into consideration if your purchase was time sensitive.

My mechanic once had to order a part directly from Asia for my import SUV.  He had no tracking information to consult.  It was no problem for him to pick up the phone and make some inquiries after it became apparent that it wasn't arriving within the expected delivery window.  He didn't call every day after ordering the part to find out where it was.  His time was far too valuable to waste doing that, and so is yours.