What to do? (EBay missing items!)

[comicmankev]

I have never had delivery problems on my 4 years on Ebay, until now!

 

I'm not missing one, or two, but 3 deliveries, which consist of 8 CGC comics totalling well over $1000.

 

The sellers are:

 

nuffsaid2( 248 feedback)

 

gh340( 637 feedback)

 

cappscomics( 606 feedback)

 

Now, I'm not here to abuse these sellers , because 2 out of 3 of them have been very helpful. But what do I do?

 

Only one of the wins was paid by paypal, which I have started the enquiry with them (although I think their 30 day limit can be a bit harsh on international orders). The other 2 were paid by money order via bidpay.

 

Now, I have contacted all parties and all have said that they are to enquire at their respective POs and start a claim. None of the items had tracking but they do have customs numbers.

 

The UK postal service says that the parcels can be tracked via this number but only once they are in the UK. As of yet, none are. But by the USPS I am told that they cannot be tracked by these numbers???

 

And do remember that I am across the sea so if these sellers (not saying they would) decided to now ignore me, I would have no comeback?

 

Anyway, what I want to know is, whats the best way to cover my loses?

 

 

[Rickdogg]

nuffsaid2( 248 feedback) backed out on a deal a few minutes after winning one of my auctions a while back. Luckily the underbidder was more than willing to buy the book so I had nuffsaid pay for my listing fees for my troubles

[murph0]

Hope that the sellers continue to be helpful. The amount isn't large enough to off-set the costs of you getting here and setting up a claim in small claims court. I'd just negotiate for some kind of deal with the seller, and/or hope the books still show up.

 

Brian

[comicmankev]

I have had a few books take AGES to turn up before, but never 3 from the same buying period, I'm just hoping that a delivery plane didnt come down that was kept from the press

 

And the ones that usually turn up late are ones that people have sent by (wait for it!) SURFACE MAIL but these have all assured me they went by air

[BachelorOfComix]

I have had a few books take AGES to turn up before, but never 3 from the same buying period, I'm just hoping that a delivery plane didnt come down that was kept from the press

Well it is Christmas time, the busiest time of the year for the postal services.

[comicmankev]

Not when I bought them

[goldust40]

Kev, I feel for ya. As I was reading your initial post of this thread, the doorbell rang and a package that I'd been waiting for over five weeks finally arrived. I'd paid for Global Priority, but this service is, as I'm sure you know, highly erratic. The book was a raw mid-grade Timely worth about $200, and I was on the verge of contacting Paypal (the seller had ignored all my emails) when it came.

 

Other packages sent GP have arrived in 4 days, so go figure. There's been the odd one or two that've been delayed and when they arrive you can tell that customs have "inspected" it.

 

How long have you been waiting for each package? My only advice, and I suspect you'd know this anyway, is to go for Global Express on anything above $500. This usually adds $10 , but it's worth it, especially at this time of the year (late November onwards).

[comicmankev]

And don't even talk about our AIRSURE sevice! I'm in the midst of a problem with another forum member who put in a claim after non-receipt after 14 days! Paypal of course gave him the money back even though I'd provided an airsure code (which is now stated in their prefered postal service!), but the item is still not with him, almost a month now!

 

What services do you use for US?

 

As for the other stuff, I'm still holding out hope that they arrive, the earliest one was sent on the 5th November, so I suppose it could run into problems due to Xmas. But I have received about 30 other items I have bought since then, including one that arrived in 3 days from a different forum member

 

As for paying the extra, I usually do, but split into their respective 'win totals' the most expenssive was $370 inc P&P and the price the seller was trying to charge for the next level was a bit mad

[goldust40]

Kev, the trouble with Airsure (and it's predecessor, Swiftair) is that the usps keeps on changing their minds about allowing the service into the U.S. Having said that, it should reach its' destination - but in my experience, regardless of what the Post Office tell you, it all varies depending on where in the U.S. the item is being sent to. The further west or south, the greater chance of possibly long delays. These days I just go with International Signed For, even though it's supposed to be marginally slower than the aforementioned services. If the book is very expensive ($1000+), I tend to bite the bullet and send it Fedex or DHL.

 

Still a month is unnecessarily stressful.

 

As for waiting for items to arrive, it can be a lottery. I myself am waiting for two items I paid for (by Paypal) on or around November 10th. Yet loads of stuff I bought since has arrived. I would say that if you win anything that is $300+ (or even less) now and want it before Xmas, you've (again) got to bite the bullet and ask for Global Express or similar. However the variable here is that the rate differs from seller to seller. Some are reasonable, quite a few are outrageous when it comes to GE.

[JohnBull]

Remember Kev, not only are you contending with Xmas, but 5th November would probably have been the fall out period from the postal strike. I hate to say it, but there is a previous record with these strikes of bags of mail going missing (sometimes showing up months later, sometimes not). With no real problems in the past, you'd have to be fairly unlucky to have 3 seperate problems all hit at one go and I'd be more likely to blame the PO.

 

Of course, now they've got Saddam, maybe they'll turn up under the WMD's ?

[comicmankev]

Well, some of the items were Star Wars issues, I guess Saddam would be into those

 

As for the rest, I guess I'll just have to sit and wait! I was wondering whether the postal strike would have affected it, but it would still have been noted as entering the country wouldnt it?

 

Oh well

[drbanner]

Kev - I started having problems with long delays on Global Priority mail shipments to the UK back in September. Packages were taking 4-6 weeks to arrive, and I'm on the East Coast! Prior to this sudden change in the level/speed of service, GP packages were arriving in around 2 weeks. One of the "long lost" packages was going to a well-known UK dealer who told me there had been no rhyme nor reason why some GP packages were taking a week, and others a month and a half (size, insurance, value...didn't matter).

 

Since then, I switched over the Global Express and every package sent this way has arrived within a week. One was a huge package of nearly 100 books, and the difference between Global Priority and Global Express was on the order of 20% (approximately $50 vs. $60).

 

With the holiday shipping delays, there's still a good chance your packages will show up in the next few weeks, but I'd recommend Express in the future...good luck!

[comicmankev]

Thanks for the input DB!

[thecomicsheet]

I started noticing a significant slowdown about 2 months ago. I had sent dozens of packages to Canada, the UK, and France in the previous year by Air Letter (from Tulsa, OK). These all arrived in less than 10 days (usually 4-5 days). Now in the last couple of months I've had 1 package take 5 weeks to go to Canada, and a few have taken about 3 weeks to go to the UK. I'm sending a couple more to the UK tomorrow, one by Global Express and one by Air letter. I'll try to get an exact arrival date and post it. Be interesting to compare experiences.

[Darthdiesel]

Kev - PM or email me the insurance numbers/customs numbers and I will take a look for you. BTW, I have had delay problems as well mailing to the UK and Belgium in the past. I always mail my stuff to our friend,your neighbor Harry via EXPRESS Mail and it is erratic, once it took one full month and a half to get to him. Chromium also had an express pacakage I sent him - I upgraded the service out of the goodness of my heart - and it ended up in German customs somehow for about 4 weeks I was like "WTF???" Also most of my EXPRESS packages to Harry leave the USA within a day and then sit in British Customs for ungodly amounts of time...then factor in the postal strikes there