Canada Post Lettermail - Ebay's estimated time of arrival

[aurelc123]

Hi All,

I ship a lot of my items using Canada Post Lettermail.  I always ship on time and have been dinged here and there for late delivery (as per the buyer as there is no tracking)  I noticed a trend.   I live in Ottawa and it seems every time this happens, it is a buyer that is located on the west coast BC or Alberta.  It's never happened anywhere else.  I'm thinking that Ebay estimated delivery date for shipments going all the way to the west coast is off.

I was thinking of changing my shipping option in my ebay listings from Canada Post Lettermail to Economical Shipping so I can choose my own delivery time buffer while continuing to ship Lettermail.

Any thoughts regarding my resolution or comments from other sellers that have experience this issue?

That you all,

Eddie

[mrdutch1001]

Yes it is a problem that I have experienced, but mainly with USA buyers and I now apply "economy" shipping to my listings for all methods of shipping from letter mail to expedited parcel, plus I increased my handling time to 3 days even though I generally ship next day...

[teenytrinkets]

I use the "economy" or "standard" shipping for lettermail...mostly because I don't want to advertise I'm shipping lettermail. A lot of buyers wouldn't understand the concept of sending some stuff by lettermail, and I don't want to ever advertise shipping without tracking.

I have also thought recently about increasing my handling time to 2 days because I've been dinged a few times not marking an untracked item shipped on time.

[pjcdn2005]

The est. delivery time for lettermail is too short.  I use the generic standard shipping and 2 day handling which gives an estimated 2-13 business day eta which seems to work. For the US I use standard international and use economy for the rest of the world.

[pjcdn2005]

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@teenytrinkets wrote:

I have also thought recently about increasing my handling time to 2 days because I've been dinged a few times not marking an untracked item shipped on time.

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You don’t get a late shipment ding for untracked mail unless the buyer marks it as arriving after a certain date in feedback.

[ypdc_dennis]

Canada Post's optimistic view of lettermail delivery in Canada:

https://www.canadapost.ca/tools/pg/manual/PGletterml-e.asp

I tend to use the generic choice when making ebay listings that use lettermail, just for the extra delivery time flexibility.  "Under-promise, over-deliver" is a good standard.

If a seller promises to mail within 2 business days, they need to make sure the order is properly marked in time as shipped to meet expectations. Buyers get worried when time goes by and their purchase is not marked as shipped.

-..-

[unique-attic-treasures]

We have noticed this as well...it's a combo of issues I think...the estimated time of arrival from Ebay is to short and the main issue is sending across country....always have issues"lost mail" or not arrive on time when going out the the west coast...haven't had many issues with East coast(we are in Ontario)...and people seem to also think "business days" as every day...especially state side where the postal service seems to run 7 days a week...they don't understand till you explain our postal service only goes mon-fri

Bottom line Ebay needs to change that est time of arrival....I would love it if they would make like international ground option(type of time)....make it 30 days and if they want something quicker they can pay more for the expedited 

[richardcm]

eBay has to use the Canada Post estimated days for letter mail. They cannot make up their own. A seller has the pad any of the Canada Post estimate days with handling time or using the generic options available that have longer estimates.

This was explained to us years ago by eBay staff in a weekly session.

I assume this is still true.

[reallynicestamps]

I'd consider Victoria a major centre, it is the provincial capital.

But if I mail to another address in this city, the letter goes to Vancouver (by ferry) to be processed then back to the Island (by ferry) before being passed to a carrier.

Even more annoying if I sent a birthday card to my BIL , the one with the distillery on Hornby Island, there are two more ferry rides for the card before he gets it.

It's a big country.

Hub and spoke distribution systems are.... counter-intuitive.

[michaelbb2]

I ship everything by lettermail as well from Saskatchewan.  I recently checked into my products and saw that the estimated delivery times I had set up were as follows:

Domestic (Within Canada) = 2 to 6 business days

International (USA) = 5-9 business days

International (World) = 4-9 business days    (not sure how they figure this)

This was ridiculous and explained why I had lots of late delivery dings from US and international customers.  Not their fault as they were honestly answering the feedback survey questions.

I recently changed everything to economy shipping for Canada and Economy International for both US and World.

Now the times are as follow:

Canada = 1-15 business days

USA = 11-35 business days

World = 11-35 business days

I still ship everything lettermail.

I'm not sure yet how these changes will affect business but over the long run my metrics should improve and buyers might not be messaging me on day 9 that they haven't received yet.

[reallynicestamps]

The standards for Global Top Rated Seller are much looser than our American colleagues must meet. Tracking being a Very Big Thing for them, but not for us.

But we get our Global TRS and the 10% discount on FVF anyway.

To become a Top Rated Seller, you'll need to:

• Have an eBay account that's been active for at least 90 days
• Have at least 100 transactions and $1,000 in sales with Global and/or US buyers over the past 12 months
• Comply with eBay's selling practices policy
• Meet the requirements for transaction defect rate, cases closed without seller resolution and late shipment rate. You'll find the requirements in the table below

If you've met these performance standards requirements, we'll automatically upgrade you to the Top Rated Seller status at your next evaluation. 

Although Canadian sellers do not need to meet the US tracking requirements to be a Top Rated Seller on the US site, they do need to meet all US requirements (including tracking) in order to have the Top Rated Seller seal on their listings. This is to ensure a consistent buyer expectation for US buyers.

The Global TRS seal doesn't necessarily appear on dotCOM pages.

But since buyers happily order from sellers with 95% FB or thousands of negs, it's my opinion that the badge is just another silly idea someone remembered from summer camp.

The discount is the important part. And we get that without the tracking requirement.

[lady.stark]

I do the same things as "mrdutch1001".