eBay

momcqueen · ‎05-17-2018

Saw the 'new workflow' offered today, so I tried it. Immediately regret doing so.

It imports all item dimensions from the listing which would be nice except when you need to change those, it doesn't allow you to do so, and also prints a label for you as soon as you click on the service option to see anything about it.

So, yes, faster... but all wrong.

I had to go back to the old workflow in order to print another label which means I have to get them to agree to Void this one which we all know is a big pain in the butt. With the new workflow, it allows you to enter new dimensions but it won't re-calulcate postage for it. Unless I did it all incorrectly, I couldn't say. I tried twice and failed both times.

Boo.

mrdutch1001 · ‎05-19-2018

dunno how much more seamlessly and effortlessly the workflow between eBay & PayPal used to work.. works the same for me now as did several years ago...so other than not having the bigger discounts, I see little to no difference. I also see no difference in prices between using PayPal and using Snap Ship...using PayPal directly is much more convenient.

momcqueen · ‎05-19-2018

Oh, I do not agree there was seamless perfection between ebay and paypal Shipping. Not at all.

Paypal Shipping left me shafted for almost two year without access to Tracked Packet for more than half the places offered whereas they were all there where they should be with Shippo.

I would rate Shippo at 100 per cent until now. This problem with the new workflow makes it 99 per cent.

The long-term marks for Paypal Shipping and their ugly Pitney Bowes hybrid? About 75 per cent. And that's me being kind. They were utterly useless any time there was any sort of trouble with a label and always comically and predictably blamed Canada Post who would turn around and blame Paypal Shipping.

Remember the debacle with HS Codes? I certainly do.

momcqueen · ‎05-19-2018

"What I meant was the seamless (and effortlessly convenient) way eBay and Paypal used to be connected, like an escalator taking you up to another floor, then back down to your starting point again, no muss, no fuss, everything connected."

Uh. No. Canada Post expanded Tracked Packet service to 31 countries six months into offering the service.

Paypal Shipping/Pitney Bowes NEVER bothered to update that list. Not once in the 18+months I waited and asked and kept waiting. Had the countries with Tracked Packet service were missing. Is this a big deal? Why, yes, it is. Imagine you cannot print a Small Packet label for half the world to which service is offered. Never fixed.

That's how much Papyal Shipping cared about ebay Canada.

On the other hand, Shippo responds to problems.

Paypal Shipping IGNORED them.

Once this issue with the new workflow is fixed, I will once again wholeheartedly recommend Shippo.

Ever had anyone from Paypal Shipping email you a reply to a question about a problem? I haven't. And, trust me, there were problems.

Shippo is WAY better to use than Paypal Shipping ever was.

Like night and day.

Until you use it and have some basis of comparison, you simply will not know.

The only thing I miss about Paypal Shipping is a proper packing slip. The result? Now I don't print them. The trees can thank me later.

momcqueen · ‎05-19-2018

"I know the discount on Small Packet Air has vanished on Shippo."

It has vanished entirely. That was an ebay-related discount, it was not a Shippo incentive.

https://community.ebay.ca/t5/Announcements/Reminder-Canada-Post-rate-changes/ba-p/391965

mrdutch1001 · ‎05-19-2018

I haven't shipped "worldwide" for years so never encountered problems with shipping labels to the various countries...rarely shipped beyond Europe, Australia & New Zealand and for several years now do not even offer shipping outside of North America although if a buyer contacts me from outside my normal shipping area I do accommodate if possible. Rarely have encountered serious problems using PayPal...occasionally had to take a package directly to the Post Office when there was something gone awry with PayPal or Canada Post but never any long term issues.

As to the HS codes, used them briefly when a label couldn't be printed without them... and haven't used them since.

lotzofuniquegoodies · ‎05-21-2018

Thanks again for posting about the new Shippo Workflow thing-a-ma-jiggy Momsqueen problems. Inadvertently had a sale to day and processed in the original system. No issues. Took all of 2 minutes to process. Approx 1.00 less with Shippo vs SnapShip. Not sure why they needed to fix something that wasn't really broken. For now will stick with it until everyone can confirm there are no problems associated with it. I've personally never had many major issues with Shippo except getting temporarily locked out when Hub kicked in. Fine after that was resolved.

-CM

rose-dee · ‎05-21-2018

@momcqueen wrote:

Shippo is WAY better to use than Paypal Shipping ever was.
Like night and day.
Until you use it and have some basis of comparison, you simply will not know.

Again, I wasn't referring to the services Paypal offered, but the efficiency of the workflow. For you Tracked Packet was a particular issue. However, for those of us who used Light or Small Packet Air on a daily basis, the Paypal workflow was quick and elegantly designed.

I liked the fact that I could start from my eBay sold transaction, be taken straight to the Paypal sign-in screen, complete my label, print out the Paypal transaction details right there for my file, then be re-routed back to eBay to print a packing slip and message the buyer. With Shippo the process is slow and awkward by comparison. I've never understood why Shippo couldn't include an automated link to its service from the eBay transaction and a jump back again. I was told I'd have to keep a separate window open for eBay. Well, uh, yes, but. That still doesn't help me access Paypal for my transaction printout (I'm old-school, paper-based). I often now find myself forgetting that step because I have to go three times around the block to get back to where I started.

All I know is that it now takes me 15 or 20 minutes (or more) and a lot of signing in and out and in again between the three sites (eBay, Shippo, and Paypal) to complete the steps that used to take me 5 minutes. For my particular needs, Paypal was a thing of beauty. I haven't found Shippo's customer service to be especially outstanding either. The two times I had to contact them I got useless responses -- and that was during their initial few months with eBay when one would expect them to be most eager to impress.

I've been using Shippo for most of my shipments since the day it was introduced, so I do in fact have a comparison for my own purposes. I still don't prefer it to the old eBay-Paypal workflow, and I now often use Paypal instead even though the workflow to/from eBay is no longer as efficient. Shippo was really only attractive for my purposes while it had the promotional discount on Small Packet. Now, not so much.

As far as personal email replies from Shippo is concerned, I expect those too will disappear once the company has a sufficient number of eBay customers using their service and the honeymoon is over. We'll be left with the usual clueless customer service "representatives" speaking in thick accents in broken English on bad phone connections from halfway around the globe.

rose-dee · ‎05-21-2018

@momcqueen wrote:
"I know the discount on Small Packet Air has vanished on Shippo."
It has vanished entirely. That was an ebay-related discount, it was not a Shippo incentive.

Well yes I know it's gone. Canada Post may have provided the break to eBay, but Shippo (and eBay) were certainly touting it as their promotional rate at the time the new shipping platform was introduced to eBay sellers. It was unarguably an incentive for those of us using Small Packet to switch to Shippo.

It seems to me that occurred some time before the announcement about Light Packet being discontinued anyway. Perhaps there were two contiguous promotions, one by eBay/Shippo to entice eBay sellers on board initially, then the other by Canada Post/eBay to ease the transition away from Light Packet. In any event, it's all gone now.

momcqueen · ‎05-22-2018

I used the 'new' workflow again this morning.

I purchased and printed a Tracked Packet USA label without incident, even changing the weight of the package. (Last time it was a domestic label and the dimensions of the parcel that I needed to change which did not changed when I required them to do so.) There was no trouble with it today. Either Shippo fixed the problem I encountered last week, or it didn't ever affect Tracked Packet, or it didn't affect increasing the weight of a package. I won't know.

So, proceed with caution: especially around the default recommendation showing only one service and that service being the cheapest one available. In this case, the single default postage option being shown was Small Packet Air when what I wanted and did purchase was Tracked Packet service, but with overseas shipments the default will always now show as Surface Packet with the new workflow which as we all know is utterly unsuitable for ebay sellers unless they want to lose Item Not Received cases against buyers who resent waiting six months for an untracked parcel to arrive.

rose-dee · ‎05-22-2018

I had an Expedited Parcel (domestic) shipment to do yesterday evening and decided to give Shippo another try. I was presented with the usual list of shipping choices, i.e. no default.

I also had a Small Packet Air item to go to the U.S., and again all the usual options were shown for shipping services. Everything seemed as it was previously, except (hooray!) it appears Shippo now leaves the link open between its site and eBay. Assuming this wasn't a mere fluke, it certainly cut down the annoyance factor and made the whole process quicker.

So I take that part back and give credit where due -- either Shippo was listening to the complaints from eBay users about the cumbersome workflow, or realized on its own that it makes sense to let sellers easily navigate back and forth between the two sites during the purchase of a label. It did occur to me that this may possibly also be an improvement associated with the introduction of Seller Hub on .ca, as I was navigating from Seller Hub for these transactions.

I haven't yet had to send an international shipment, so I can't say whether the "default to cheapest surface service" still pertains on Shippo, but domestic and USA shipping seem to be just as they should be, with all options shown before purchasing the label.

momcqueen · ‎05-22-2018

More from Shippo. All paraphrased.

I wanted to pass along an update regarding the technical issue that we have been discussing. The original issue should now be fixed; you can use our new label creation flow without worrying about the rates not populating and updating correctly.

So it has been fixed. Good news abounds. But since I had their attention, I decided to make my point about the single default postage potion in the new workflow. (For the record, you have to choose to use the new workflow. It's not forced.)

'Thanks, I noticed that when I opted to give the new workflow another attempt this morning with a Tracked Packet USA label. I had to change the weight and it worked fine when I went to print the label, as expected.

'That being said, I appreciate that Shippo is trying to streamline the process but to default to the cheapest postage service is not wise. Many of us sellers don’t care about cheap when we what we need is tracking.

'Like with international shipments outside North America, the default is Surface Packet but it really should not be. Surface Packet is untracked and takes four to six months to deliver so any seller using it as recommended by Shippo as the default will lose any and all Item Not Received cases with ebay.

'I’d like to set my own defaults: Tracked Packet always for international and Expedited Parcel always for domestic.'

So we'll see if Shippo has a response to that. I find Shippo to be attentive to suggestions. I don't know if a user-set default is possible but I think it would be lovely if it were.

lotzofuniquegoodies · ‎05-22-2018

For me I've always based shipping on the service the customer paid for and then if there is room to upgrade(I actually made some money on the transaction or the calculator caused me more profit than expected) I can upgrade if I so choose. Also, in some situations with a bit of creative packaging you can reduce final shipping, then you could also have the option to upgrade the shipping service if you wanted to.

-CM

PS. On a side note for any that dealt with that previous problem was there the possibility of incorrect charges for postage and if so, would refunds be processed? Or just voiding and re-processing?

momcqueen · ‎05-22-2018

I am impressed. Instant response from Shippo now to this last message.

'Thanks for sharing that, I agree that with Small Packet the low costs are seductive but the lack of tracking causes potential problems. I have set your preferred shipping level for US-bound shipments to Tracked Packet - USA, so you should see this option as the default shipping option going forward. This can be adjusted on the Settings tab of your Shippo account. Unfortunately, we do not yet have a way to set multiple preferred shipping settings, but this way at least, you are able to more easily choose Tracked Packet - USA for your orders where this shipping level makes sense.'

So they can (and we can) make those adjustments to at least some (one?) of the default postage options. Nice! Helpfully, this will be an area with 'improvements' to follow. I'd love to set all default shipping choices to Tracked Packet for all destinations outside Canada where Tracked Packet is an option but all my domestic labels to Expedited Parcel. That would be a real timesaver.

tobey_arih · ‎06-28-2018

Hmm. if you have purchased the label then Shippo will not refund it. I think when you download the label then its official. If you didn't, then Shippo will give the refund as credit but it takes 14 days to show up. That was back then.

ypdc_dennis · ‎06-28-2018

@tobey_arih wrote:
Hmm. if you have purchased the label then Shippo will not refund it. I think when you download the label then its official. If you didn't, then Shippo will give the refund as credit but it takes 14 days to show up. That was back then.

Yes, you only get a credit back for future purchases.

But I have downloaded a label (but not used when I saw it was surface instead of air) and still got the credit for the bad purchase from Shippo.

A confirmation purchase step would have been nice.

-..-

phantom-vintage-gear · ‎04-17-2020

I just signed up and how useful can this actually be if when I got the the Shippo site and open up the sold item, all the dimensions and weight are missing and asks me for dimensions before i can print label. Im getting out of Shippos as fast as I got in.

reallynicestamps · ‎04-17-2020

ZOMBIE THREAD FROM 2018

Zombie threads often include out of date and misleading information.

It is best to start your own thread when so much time has passed.

Personally I prefer Paypal labels for shipping, when I use a label at all. Mostly I use discount postage stamps.
Shippo, Paypal and SnapSnip (Canada Post) all offer the same discounts and all are tied to the Solutions for Small Business program of Canada Post.

Start your own thread for better information.

brettjet38 · ‎04-17-2020

tyler@ebay · ‎04-24-2020

Hi everyone - due to the length of time that has passed since this thread was created I have blocked it from further replies. If this is still a topic that warrants discussion please don't hesitate to start a new thread!

Tyler,