Ah, shipping to Italy. Without tracking, my hair would have fallen out

[momcqueen]

To preface my rant of the day, please don't allow this topic to dissuade you from shipping to Italy. Italian buyers are lovely. My beef is with the miscommunication between Canada Post tracking and PosteItaliane tracking. 

Talk about your 'lost in translation'. If I had not experienced this same miscommunicated item line notation in the past, I'd be upset right now. 

When shipping with tracking to Italy, and Canada Post notes: "Item refused by recipient. Item being returned to sender" what it really means to Posteitaliane is:  "The shipment has been accepted and will soon be included in the processing cycle that will direct it to the final destination." 

The two directives could not be more dissimilar. 

Above: Wait, what?Above: Oh.... right....Below: major delay for some reason

On another note, a different parcel shipped with tracking to Italy was delayed for two weeks between Canada and Italy. This order shipped Jan. 19 and was due Feb. 1 according to ebay estimates. It left Canada on Jan 22 and didn't hit Italy until Feb. 7. Today, the buyer messaged me looking for it. No wonder. It remains to be seen how she will feel about having to pay her Import Fees since Italy never forgets to charge those and it looks as if that hasn't even been assessed on her order yet. 

For the record, Tracked Packet to Italy usually arrives when Canada Post says it should. I will note, however, that the CPC estimated date of delivery for this order is Feb. 5 which is four days later than the one provided by ebay. It remains to be seen how the buyer will feel about all this in the end, her Feedback Left For Others is fair and I did everything in my power to ensure fast delivery so let's hope she does not take her frustrations out on me. Time will tell. 

[ricarmic]

An excellent example of why one should never trust any "bad" updates in CP updates without extra checking.

I also have encountered stuff like this with a few countries (including the USA and the US also have their own weird way of recording certain situations there that are misleading, they like to use the return to sender when in fact it is being redirected to a different post office there).

It is always good to go to the destination country PO and check there as you've done here...may require google translate but it is often worth the effort as it was here!

[momcqueen]

Yes, I know precisely which USA-bound 'return to sender' line to which you refer, it's given me heart palpitations at least once! When I first began to sell, I had no idea there could be discrepancies between the tracking on different country postal sites, so it's a valuable thing for new sellers to learn: check the destination country tracking before you really start to panic. For the longest time as a new seller, I was unaware. Today's example, for instance, as a new seller would have set me messaging my buyer all in a fluster with a language barrier to boot, certainly not leading to a positive experience for them. 

[zee-chan]

I thought Italian buyers should be used to paying import tax and delays by their customs... but well, I blocked Italy for that reason, but I have shipped there from my website (they can’t neg me and what not) or once via a eBay sale where I had a buyer messaged me to sell to him. He agreed that he’s okay with it taking up to 4-6 weeks because Italian customs can hold things for a long time and won’t bug me about it. The sales went okay but I don’t want to risk late defects... so will only sell to Italians if they message me. I figured if they message me even though I blocked them, then they do want it bad enough to not be too picky about slowness. I think back then I even switched the shipping to surface mail for that listing so that the estimated delivery time is longer (I shipped with air of course).

[momcqueen]

Received feedback this afternoon from the Italian buyer whose parcel Canada Post tracking still says is being Returned to Sender.

Buyer got it!CPC still says it's been rejected, not delivered

[momcqueen]

With my other parcel, however, the one that was supposed to be delivered according to ebay Feb 1 and Canada Post Feb 5, it still says: The shipment is being processed by the Postal Operations Centre. Poor buyer, this is a gift for her grandchild and she says she hasn't ordered from outside Italy before. At this rate, she won't ever again.

[lotzofuniquegoodies]

Hello momcqueen

To file away for future reference when I've sent a package to a foreign country with tracked service, I check the local postal website vs the Canadapost website once it's departed Canada. Usually has much more detailed current information. If it doesn't display in English takes a second to translate in Google. Quite often there are major delays in the tracking information even showing up in the Canadapost website. Had packages display as being in customs and the customer had received a week previously. Spain's tracking for example is awesome. As for delays in delivery, all it can take is the customs forms not having all the i's dotted, any additional required forms or documents not being in their required language.

-CM

[recped]

^^^^^ This!

Canada Post can only provide info that has been passed to them, some countries have systems that send updates back to Canada Post very quickly and accurately, others not so much.

There are now a number of 3rd party sites that allow you to easily look up tracking at multiple country sites all from one interface. One site is track-trace.com but there quite a few new ones I've stumbled across.

FYI - If you ever had a claim for INR it's possible to direct eBay to look at the tracking at the destination country if you know the url and can provide it to the csr handling the case.

[Anonymous]

Most international buyers knew they have to pay import but they choose to whine all the time which is silly and waste of time.  I had one of them asking me if I should pay the import charges as if!!

[recped]

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@Anonymouswrote:

Most international buyers knew they have to pay import but they choose to whine all the time which is silly and waste of time.  I had one of them asking me if I should pay the import charges as if!!

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You mean they are just like buyers in Canada!

I wouldn't be so sure that they all know, they could have never bought outside the EU or they never bought anything over the free limit.

Never underestimate the lack of awareness of buyers (or sellers), just wander the boards (especially US Boards) it's shocking the things that people don't know and that includes both buyers and sellers.

Of course there are plenty of "I didn't know" situations that are completely bogus.