Item stuck at Chicago hub - Should I be worried?

[bargain_hunter1991]

Purchased an item from eBay on March 27. It was shipped the same day via eBay International Shipping from California. It arrived at the Chicago hub on March 29. Haven't received any updates since then... From my understanding of the process, I am supposed to be receiving a 2nd tracking number when it gets transferred to Canada, but haven't got that yet.

Item estimated delivery is from April 8 to April 15. I feel like I should of gotten an update by now at least... Hope its not lost or stolen... I could easily get my money back if worse case the item is lost or stolen... But I really want this item! Should I be worried?

[marnotom!]

Just to make sure we're on the same page, is the last scan event that you see for your item "Arrived at hub" or "Received by Individual" or something along those lines?  It looks like there's two stages for items being handled by the eIS forwarding hub.  They first get checked in and warehoused, and then they move to the processing hub when there's room for them.  Another buyer's recent posts suggest to me that the warehousing stage may be taking longer than usual right now.

You may be worrying just a little on the soon side.  I'm on Vancouver Island and my two eIS-forwarded purchases pretty much took the full three week estimate to reach me.  Having said that, not seeing an event scan beyond what you're seeing at this stage is a bit concerning.  Since you are within the delivery time window for your item. you may want to double-check the tracking of your item on Parcelsapp as that site usually does a pretty good job of pulling together event scans where multiple carriers have been used.  The second tracking number should be assigned before the item leaves the hub, not when it reaches Canada, so there's a chance you'll find it on the Parcelsapp tracking page.

I doubt your item has been stolen.  However, posts like yours are suggesting that there are items that eIS finds problematic to handle that aren't on the list of prohibited and restricted items, particularly items containing lithium-ion batteries.  If I had a better idea of what you purchased and where it's bound, I might be able to give you a bit more advice.

[bargain_hunter1991]

The last scan event on the eBay side says "Item arrived at hub" on April 1st. Parcelapp says the item was delivered to an individual at Glendale Heights, IL on March 29. No other tracking number on Parcelapp...

I purchased an automatic watch and the destination is Toronto. I was reading horror stories about packages getting lost/stolen at this hub. Hopefully thats not the case. Appreciate your reply. Let me know your thoughts and advice.

Thanks!

[marnotom!]

The problem with those posts about items stolen or lost at the hub is that the buyers have no evidence to support these statements and they don't tend to follow up to let us know if there were any further developments such as information from the seller or the item ultimately arriving.

My guess is that many of these items that disappear failed some aspect of the process for preparing the item for forwarding and simply dead-ended.  It may be that the item is ineligible for insurance due to its nature or value, or there's some information in the "Item Specifics" section of the listing that triggered an automated red flag, rightly or wrongly, when the information on the item was called up at the hub.  The problem is that there doesn't seem to be a scan event to communicate these sort of exceptions to buyers.

My suggestion would be to try to stop checking the tracking until the 17th, which would be three weeks from the date you purchased the item.  I've come to the conclusion that we buyers have been oversold on the value of tracking anyway.  It doesn't matter where our items go or don't go as long as they arrive when they're expected to arrive in the condition in which we expect them to be.  Knowing that our item was last scanned in Chicago or Charlottetown actually doesn't do us much good as we still don't have it and we know we don't have it even without tracking.

[reallynicestamps]

Item estimated delivery is from April 8 to April 15.

There was no reason even to look at shipping details until the 8th (and certainly not four days before the first estimated date for arrival).

And you can't do anything by watching the tracking.

Until the 15th, which is next Monday, watching tracking is just an exercise in frustration.

[bargain_hunter1991]

Good advice, thanks!

[pjcdn2005]

It looks like there's two stages for items being handled by the eIS forwarding hub. 

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Good point.   The delivered to  individual is the usps scan  when it arrives at the hub.   Then arrived at hub must be an acknowledgement by eBay that the hub has received the package.   That arrived at hub scan often seems to be delayed.   In the op's case the first scan was on Friday so that might have been the reason for the delay until after the weekend but I've seen much longer gaps

[bargain_hunter1991]

So in your opinion nothing to worry about? Seems like items going through this hub usually take longer than normal to process. Still no update yet.

[pjcdn2005]

So in your opinion nothing to worry about?

Well yes and no.   The estimated delivery dates do seem a bit optimistic as it isn't unusal for a package to take from 14 -21 days with any non express service from the US.   Personally, I don't think that it is good customer service to have had it sitting at the hub for so long without any indication of moving but it doesn't seem to be that uncommon for that to happen.  But there is no point in worrying as it is out of your own control and even if you are disappointed and don't receive the item, you will at least receive your money back.

If there is no movement by April 16th, the day after the estimated delivery date, you might consider opening an item not received claim or you might want to wait for a couple of more days after that.  I would probably wait a few days but if there was nothing on parcelsapp.com showing that it had left the hub and was on its way by Thursday or Friday, I would open a claim.