eBay

triber · ‎02-14-2022

Canada Post is now returning craft booklets and paper sewing patterns that are sent letter mail saying that have to go package rate. For sellers selling low cost craft items, having to charge or pay for package rate now makes them far too expensive. Has anyone else had them returned? I am going to phone CP and see if I can see what is going on.

jt-libra · ‎03-26-2022

"but I'm not wasting any time removing US buyers from my listings"

On reading over my last post, it sounds like I meant it was a waste of time removing US buyers from my listings. Gosh, that's not the case. What I meant was that I wasn't going to let any time go by before I removed the International Shipping from my listings. And I haven't. I've spent several hours doing this. I finally found a Bulk Edit for this but then it introduced all sorts of other fields I was supposed to fill in ... you know the one "please don't remind me about these recommendations again". Well it reminded me.

jt-libra · ‎03-26-2022

Relax!!! We weren't complaining .... what many of us were expressing is our surprise that, for so many years, it seemed that what we were doing was an accepted practice. Now the Post Office has decided to enforce something they had not enforced for years and we're dealing with it. I certainly didn't rub my hands with glee each time, thinking, wow, I got away with another one.

renata6 · ‎04-22-2022

My husband sent 3 greeting cards, in one envelope, to his family in the US. These were sent in a plain manilla envelope, not commercial goods, and well within the size and weight guidelines for oversize lettermail, with sufficient stamp postage. They were returned indicating not conforming to lettermail standards. This is getting ridiculous! Now we can't mail cards too?

38e_avenue · ‎04-22-2022

The problem here might be the new sorting machines. Anything not behaving like a letter (I mean not bendable or too sturdy) might be automatically rejected. The letters with a sturdy carboard inside might damage the sorting/ reading device. Each machine can sort up to 36,000 pieces of mail per hour and such a "letter" can slow down the sorting process or even damage the machine itself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4nj7IH_fik

brettjet38 · ‎04-22-2022

Did you use a cardboard stiffener to protect the cards ?

Did you have a customs declaration stating "gifts" on the package?

Cards are meant to be posted one at a time using Air Mail it is why they come each with an envelope, bulk sending 3 and it becomes a package of "goods", yes even if they are just cards...

brettjet38 · ‎04-22-2022

That actually makes sense, mail one card, and it's flimsy enough to pass through the equipment, put 3 cards in a single envelope, and now it is stiff like a package of "goods"...

...and back to sender you go.

fergua3 · ‎04-23-2022

so what is the point of CP allowing lettermail to be up to approx 20mm thick then? According to the sorting machine argument, nothing will ever qualify. Apparently only the thickest thing allowed is a single greeting card and that's it.

According to CP's own rules, you can send 20 pieces of paper in a letter mail envelope. I guarantee, under the current situation, that would be rejected by CP. 100% for sure, even though it may not be 'goods' and is within their letter mail regulations.

CP has gone way overboard with their enforcement of this new policy. CP is here to serve the Canadian people, not dictate to them.

lotzofuniquegoodies · ‎04-23-2022

@fergua3 wrote:
so what is the point of CP allowing lettermail to be up to approx 20mm thick then? According to the sorting machine argument, nothing will ever qualify. Apparently only the thickest thing allowed is a single greeting card and that's it.

According to CP's own rules, you can send 20 pieces of paper in a letter mail envelope. I guarantee, under the current situation, that would be rejected by CP. 100% for sure, even though it may not be 'goods' and is within their letter mail regulations.

CP has gone way overboard with their enforcement of this new policy. CP is here to serve the Canadian people, not dictate to them.

This has been a neverending back and forth. See below.The removal of light packet air caused most of the problem several years ago. It was an affordable legal middle option in comparison letter and small pkt air.

https://community.ebay.ca/t5/Selling-on-eBay/Rules-to-shipping-by-lettermail/qaq-p/453722

Personally me thinkth the bots of taken over the world. Between eBay(that's another can of worms), CP and the etc's. There is no flexibility built in when money is involved. For the postage issue, paper being the critical point. Should sellers really be harrassed for mailing a $10.00 paperish item internationally when duties do not apply? Does CP really want our(home bases) businesses?

Paper and cardboards are different in many ways; the methods through which they are manufactured and structured are different. Cardboard is thick paper stock as compared to paper. It is usually brownish in colour. Cardboard is made up of corrugated material. Looking closely at its structure, it has many layers of papers; one layer of paper, then the middle layer of wavy paper and then the outer layer of paper. Cereal boxes are made up of cardboard. In comparison, paper boxes are the single layer and they are flat in shape. Example of paper made box can be tissue boxes and some other packaging products.

Canada:

-Lotz

kawartha-ephemera · ‎04-23-2022

Non standard oversize lettermail does not enter the Regular lettermail stream, CP does their best to prevent that from happening, as should the public. The two types are not sorted in the same way. In other words, mail determined to be non standard is not sorted with machines as seen in the video.

kristal4742 · ‎04-23-2022

I was told that anything going from Canada to the states has to be documents of some kind or they will be returned. Within canada we can still ship these items letter. They apparently just changed this. I had to remove the free shipping on all of my license plates.

pjcdn2005 · ‎04-23-2022

We were never supposed to send 'goods' to the US with lettermail but they didn't enforce it. Now they are.

kawartha-ephemera · ‎04-23-2022

It's very possible CP partner(s) requested increased enforcement, not difficult to imagine USPS finally balked at handling/sorting imported merchandise as lettermail.

fergua3 · ‎04-24-2022

this is just over reach by CP. They are not following their own guidelines. They allow up to 20 pieces of paper to be shipped lettermail to the US, but then reject it when someone does. They allow lettermail to be up to 20mm thick, but then reject it when someone ships ligitimate lettermail that is 20mm thick.

It's also a conflict of interest because they make almost 3 times as much money by forcing people to ship ligitimate letermail at parcel rates. The Canadian Gov't has governance over the way CP handles lettermail, but not over parcels. Seems CP has found a work around so they can jack up ligitimate lettermail to parcel rates, it's merely a convenient that the UPU is enforcing this. CP is using it as an excuse to reject ligitimate lettermail to make more money.

38e_avenue · ‎04-24-2022

It happened about 15 years ago or so. I went to another post office, very far from mine. I tried to send 10 oversized letters clearly marked as Ebay merchandise. The clerk refused to send them as letters. I remember I was very angry, not understanding what's going on. Finally, I took back all my letters and went to the post office, from where I usually shipped my stuff. Just recently I understood he was right .......

I understand that for many people it might mean the termination of their business. If someone sells here 5 dollars stuff, it makes a BIG and DECISIVE difference to pay 8.90, instead of 3.19 for the shipping ......

mrdutch1001 · ‎04-24-2022

"I understand that for many people it might mean the termination of their business. If someone sells here 5 dollars stuff, it makes a BIG and DECISIVE difference to pay 8.90, instead of 3.19 for the shipping ......"

Totally agree ...I see it as maybe the common USA and/or International buyer of such items will balk at paying the shipping, but perhaps those buyers who are also sellers, maybe not so much as they have a better understanding of shipping costs. In my own situation, I hope my Canadian buyers keep things going as well...

However, it does mean being more selective as to what items I shall list on eBay going forward, but at same time I do not want to punish my potential Canadian buyers by not continuing to list items they may be interested in, so time will tell how much impact this whole thing will have on my selling...

38e_avenue · ‎04-24-2022

I introduced cheap shipping in May 2021 (see the chart), and I didn't notice any change in the sales volume. I sell OOAK items, and it seems that it's not so important to my customers they pay a few dollars more or less for the shipping (my items usually sell for +25 dollars). The situation is of course different for people who sell common items (cables, etc) - for them the shipping price might be a decisive factor.

marnotom! · ‎04-24-2022

@fergua3 wrote:

so what is the point of CP allowing lettermail to be up to approx 20mm thick then? According to the sorting machine argument, nothing will ever qualify. Apparently only the thickest thing allowed is a single greeting card and that's it.

According to CP's own rules, you can send 20 pieces of paper in a letter mail envelope. I guarantee, under the current situation, that would be rejected by CP. 100% for sure, even though it may not be 'goods' and is within their letter mail regulations.

I can't find any reference to this "rule" on the Canada Post website, but as a typical sheet of paper weighs about five grams, I'm wondering if it's a guide for those wanting to mail something within a 100 gram limit.

Also make sure that this "rule" is actually applying to international letter post. As others have mentioned here and elsewhere, "lettermail" refers to domestic mail, while "letter post" refers to international mailings, including those to the United States.

@fergua3 wrote:

CP has gone way overboard with their enforcement of this new policy. CP is here to serve the Canadian people, not dictate to them.

Canada Post is a Crown Corporation, not a public service. We're shareholders in it and we have a limited amount of influence on who gets appointed as CEO by the governments we elect.

That said, as a member of the Universal Postal Union, Canada Post also has to operate according to its guidelines.

marnotom! · ‎04-24-2022

@kristal4742 wrote:

I was told that anything going from Canada to the states has to be documents of some kind or they will be returned. Within canada we can still ship these items letter. They apparently just changed this. I had to remove the free shipping on all of my license plates.

I know this thread is fairly lengthy now, but if you have some time I suggest you read through it. It's not so much as Canada Post "just changed this" so much as it's now enforcing guidelines that it implemented many years ago.

marnotom! · ‎04-24-2022

@fergua3 wrote:

this is just over reach by CP. They are not following their own guidelines. They allow up to 20 pieces of paper to be shipped lettermail to the US, but then reject it when someone does. They allow lettermail to be up to 20mm thick, but then reject it when someone ships ligitimate lettermail that is 20mm thick.

Sorry, didn't realize you'd posted again on this subject. It's unlikely that this letter post item you're referring to was x-rayed. Somebody with some experience handling these mailings probably eyeballed it and figured it contained something other than documents. Mistakes happen.

@fergua3 wrote:
this is just over reach by CP. They are not following their own guidelines. They allow up to 20 pieces of paper to be shipped lettermail to the US, but then reject it when someone does. They allow lettermail to be up to 20mm thick, but then reject it when someone ships ligitimate lettermail that is 20mm thick.

It's also a conflict of interest because they make almost 3 times as much money by forcing people to ship ligitimate letermail at parcel rates. The Canadian Gov't has governance over the way CP handles lettermail, but not over parcels. Seems CP has found a work around so they can jack up ligitimate lettermail to parcel rates, it's merely a convenient that the UPU is enforcing this. CP is using it as an excuse to reject ligitimate lettermail to make more money.

Again, Universal Postal Union guidelines are at play here. I don't know how you define "conflict of interest" but you seem to be using a different meaning for the term than I do because I don't see it as such.

Hop aboard the USPS website and give their rate calculator a spin for a letter post item bound for Canada or any other international destination. You're going to find that you have a lot of hoops to jump through when it comes to describing the nature of the item to ensure that it's a legimate letter post item and not a small packet (USPS uses the term "package").

https://postcalc.usps.com/

fergua3 · ‎04-25-2022

i consider a conflict of interest to be a situation where an individual or entity that makes a judgement on the enforcement of a rule, greatly benefits from one of the outcomes of that judgement. In this case, CP is deciding what is letter post or not and greatly benefits by judging something is not (3 times the revenue) even though the item may well qualify within their own rules.

i've never looked up the dictionary definition but this certainly seems an unfair situation to me.

To be blunt, i wish CP would spend less time squeezing and fondling envelopes and more time on managing their business properly. Even though sales have been very slow lately and i've only shipped a few items, i have several packages that seem to be missing with no tracking updates in many days.