For all of our recent purchases where shipment was through the Global Shipping Program, the final destination carrier has been Canada Post – which is great actually – it is way more convenient for us to go to the post office to pick up a parcel then to have to drive usually a long distance to FedEx or some other courier depot.
We live in a small town where this is no door-to-door delivery, so we receive a parcel notification in our post office box – ONLY if there is a PO Box on the address. If there is not a PO Box, Canada Post will return the item. (Btw our experience with Canada Post has always been really good – we’ve always lived in small towns where they get to know you and will sometimes make exceptions but they can’t do that all the time.)
The problem can be that the ebay deliver to field won’t allow PO Box numbers. So advice to buyers – put your street address in the deliver to, BUT find a way to embed your PO Box somewhere in the address line – ie. use pbx1111 or something – so that you get the parcel notification in your mail box and they hold the item for you to pick up.
Recent experience: bought a bike from the US. Because it was a large item, I assumed that it would be delivered by UPS or Purolator or some other courier, so I did not put my PO Box on the deliver to address. The automated tracking showed every destination that my parcel reached but not who the carrier was, so on the day I expected delivery I was home all day watching for it. While I was waiting I got an automated email saying there was a failed delivery attempt and a notice was left on my door. I immediately phoned ebay customer service and advised them that no delivery attempt had been made. I was escalated to GSP support – they were able to tell me that the final carrier was Canada Post and give me a reference number. Luckily we live in a small town, so I immediately went to the local post office and my bike was still there – they hadn’t returned it yet, and I was able to pick it up.
Feedback to GSP – it would be helpful to show the final carrier in the automated tracking notifications. Without phoning customer support there was no way for me to get that info.
All in all – I was surprised how fast my parcel made it all that way and cleared customers (11 days) and the shipping cost was really reasonable for a big item like that. Also when I did phone customer support they were really helpful – I didn’t phone in a huff – we just worked the problem.
Cheers!
