A trader contacted me today.
I sent their items last Wedneday form work- so it got picked up Wedneday the 19th.
And they were concerned, and kinda hinted they mgiht want me to remkae them.
The item was tracked, and hasn't arrived yet.

Am i wrong in thinking 8 days, 8 postal days isn't that long a time?
Today is Friday if you count the day over to getting them out, it was received wedneday- so assuming it got sorted and toss on a truck thursday morning.
Thursday.Friday.Satruday.mon-friday.
8 days.

From Indiana to California I believe.

TO me, it seemed postal service was slwoer due to heat, and gas- and the attempt to put more on trucks to be more efficient lately- at least that was in the last thread I read..

How long do you all wait to redo a package- I haven't had one lost in a long time. But 8 days doens't seem that long
Meanwhile, their items so far haven't been shipped or if were, were not till yesterday or today. So it isn't liek I am sitting here watchign their stuff, while they wait. I sent out far before them

Post office doesn't classify anything lost for over 31 days. They
won't even allow the paperwork to be filed til then.

Delivery confirmation is one of the strangest things when it comes to the
Post office. The way it works now is that the package is delivered to
the door and the Post person scans it with a wand. Then when they get
back the information is downloaded into the database. Hence they say
it won't be updated til midnight. Unfortunately when it's scanned it only
guarantees that it was at the door at somepoint. Doesn't mean it stayed
there.

Plus I'm assuming that the Delivery confirmation didn't have anything on it
yet. Still 8 days is a little impatient to start to say that they didn't get it.
especially if it was shipped media mail.

that seems kinda strange that your items weren't shipped. Was this part
of the agreement that you would send first and they would wait til they
received it? If that's the way the agreement was stated then they really
haven't lost anything. But if it wasn't, then that's something a little strange
and seems to be contridictory to the spirit of the trading agreement.

Media mail can easily take weeks. I've seen priority mail take up to a week or more. It all depends on how the post offices in between interact. When I lived in Boston, the main postal facility for New England was next to my building. I'd mail stuff from there, and if it was going anywhere in New England, it would take twice as long to get there because of how the local POs interacted - everything came back to that PO to be sorted.

If something hasn't arrived in a month, when you can show you mailed it, then I'd be concerned. But 8 calendar days ... nah. That's just impatient.

i agree
stuff gets lost sometimes or is delayed
give it anohter week or 2 and see

i always send mine priorty mail i do not trust media mail it's to slow and can take 2 or 3 weeks to get to sombody

A trader contacted me today.
I sent their items last Wedneday form work- so it got picked up Wedneday the 19th.
And they were concerned, and kinda hinted they mgiht want me to remkae them.
The item was tracked, and hasn't arrived yet.

Am i wrong in thinking 8 days, 8 postal days isn't that long a time?
Today is Friday if you count the day over to getting them out, it was received wedneday- so assuming it got sorted and toss on a truck thursday morning.
Thursday.Friday.Satruday.mon-friday.
8 days.

From Indiana to California I believe.

TO me, it seemed postal service was slwoer due to heat, and gas- and the attempt to put more on trucks to be more efficient lately- at least that was in the last thread I read..

How long do you all wait to redo a package- I haven't had one lost in a long time. But 8 days doens't seem that long
Meanwhile, their items so far haven't been shipped or if were, were not till yesterday or today. So it isn't liek I am sitting here watchign their stuff, while they wait. I sent out far before them



2 weeks from the day you shipped i would start remaking them if she hasn't gotten them.

Recently it took 7 weeks for a Priority package to get to me. One time it took a media shipment only a day to delivered to washington from here in texas.

USPS is an odd bunch.

A lot depends on where you are and where the person is and what's in between. For example, here in Pennsylvania, there have been a lot of power outages recently as a result of storms moving through the area. Whole towns shut down - including postal facilities. If anyone's mail had to move through any of the affected areas, there would be days, possibly weeks, added to the transit time. I don't get concerned until it's been a month since the package mailed.

What I find odd is something from a different country arrives faster than a border state. Now that is just weird to me.

What I find odd is something from a different country arrives faster than a border state. Now that is just weird to me.


I usually only like trading with people on the Eastcoast but have been open to trading to the Midwest and Westcoast. Overseas Trades are defintely a NO-NO

I usually only like trading with people on the Eastcoast but have been open to trading to the Midwest and Westcoast. Overseas Trades are defintely a NO-NO

I have never had a problem over seas. I have done about 6 total to there and never had one problem. Even sent one to a military base in England and it was just fine. I don't mind taking the chance. A lot of the stuff I want not everyone has and if someone overseas has it and nobody does here I take the risk.

I have never had a problem over seas. I have done about 6 total to there and never had one problem. Even sent one to a military base in England and it was just fine. I don't mind taking the chance. A lot of the stuff I want not everyone has and if someone overseas has it and nobody does here I take the risk.


I'm too impatient to trade with someone overseas-lol

I will trade overseas traders. Sending to Canada is always the most problematic, but I know that Canada Post has issues, so I allow a lot of time before becoming concerned - for Canada, I'll allow 6 weeks before I become worried. I've rarely had problems. Now, back in the '80s, Customs charged such a premium on videotapes coming into Canada, it was prohibitively expensive to trade, so a couple of traders I worked with had drop points in the US, someone I'd mail to in like Buffalo. Problem with that was the person in Buffalo was going through the parcels and picking out the stuff she wanted and basically stealing it, so stuff I sent often didn't make it to the person I was trading with. Which bit, becuase it was off-air and I didn't have copies. She finally realized what was going on, and dropped that person and I started mailing direct to Canada and she ate the Customs fees.

I don't like to trade with overseas traders for material I can get on the US trading circuit. It's a waste of time and the extra money to mail packages overseas, as far as I'm concerned. If I'm trading with someone outside the US, I normally want something I can't get here easily. I've traded to Japan, Canada, UK, Germany, France, and Italy. I tend to group together out of US trades, though, since I have to go to the PO to mail the packages - within the US, I can use my Stamps.com account to prepare the package, and just drop it in the box. But with packages going out of the US, gotta fill out the Customs declaration and take it to the window to mail ... which means waiting in line, etc. Gotta plan for it.

theres one simple key to the postal system

the faster you get the package in the mail, the quicker it will get to whomever

another thing that helps, is to make the label easy to read

in my case almost all are printed from the postal website, its only going to slow it down, or get mis delivered to someone else

if you write like a pre schooler on the package


other than that, the mail will take as long as it needs to,

for Canada, I'll allow 6 weeks before I become worried
Yup. A few times I've had to wait 6 weeks, exactly, for air mail packages to arrive. I've never ever had a package arrive even so much as one day later, i.e. if it's not here after 6 weeks it is officially missing in action. Accordingly, that is how long I wait till I will re-send, or ask someone else to re-send, any package.

I've also had packages get here as fast as 3 days so that's a pretty wide margin. Certainly, on the whole, packages I send out get to the recipient faster than I get mine, by about a week.

Who knows what the post office does and why to cause those discrepancies, it's just the way it is. I figure there's no sense worrying about it.

Re: customs.
I always have people declare a value of "N.C.V.", meaning No Commercial Value and have never had a problem with that. A value of $0 leaves it open to the guy looking at it and he may very well decide it's worth more than that (I've had that happen before). Not only is "N.C.V." a truthful declaration (let's face it, homemade videos are not a commercially available product and therefore do not carry any real, tangible value), it's one that's hard, if not impossible, to argue with as well. Put yourself in the shoes of the customs guy examining the package, does he think his homemade videos have commercial value? Or course not. So why would the ones coming to me?

Got a package today from England that was sent out at the end of last week. It was less than 5 days including the weekend. Very quick.

The Cashier at the Post Office recommended that I do CLICK AND SHIP. How will that Help Me?

The Cashier at the Post Office recommended that I do CLICK AND SHIP. How will that Help Me?

free del con on priority packs

no standing in the-- ignorant line-- at the post office

just print and drop in any box

a free record of all packs sent avaible at any time

easy shipping since they have a 300 person address book, no need to type the names, etc, of 300 folks

no chance of poor handwriting messing up shipping

free del con on priority packs

no standing in the-- ignorant line-- at the post office

just print and drop in any box

a free record of all packs sent avaible at any time

easy shipping since they have a 300 person address book, no need to type the names, etc, of 300 folks

no chance of poor handwriting messing up shipping


Ok thanks I will look into that

I feel sorry for people in Quebec, recently I received a package of 4 DVD's and it cost the person $19.40 to send it to me, only took 6-7 days to arrive which I was impressed with. Since they paid so much for postage I felt obligated to return the favor so I asked what the prices were, I heard a quote of $1.40, I asked them to repeat that to me again, they said "$1.40", I said your kidding and the package will only take 1 week to arrive?? They said, yes so I took a gamble and sure enough I get confirmation that it did take 1 week to arrive. I asked the person I traded with why does it cost so much to mail the exact same item and she said that their postal rates are higher there. I dont know if Quebec is any different postal rates than say Manitoba, but man our neighbors to the north are getting screwed bigtime.

Aj

our neighbors to the north are getting screwed bigtime.
In general, that is certainly true. But for $19.40 your trading partner must have sent it XpressPost, or registered, or something fancy. Canada Post is National, so rates are the same across the country, and I (or anyone else in Canada) can ship 4 discs via regular lettermail to the US for about $2.

She sent it Expresspost, maybe she didnt need to do that in hindsight?

Aj

this is probably the most mis understood thing in dvd trdaes

the cost of canada, or foreign postage

from the states, out going


its very simple


all you can stuff in a priority envelope, for $7.50 to canada

i can easily get over 60 dvds in one


all you can stuff in a priority envelope for $9.50, to europe, uk, new zealand, australia, etc etc

again easily over 60 discs in one


its very reasonable,

i consistantly get things to the uk in 7 days, and i live in rural america

even quicker from a major city, since they go via air

Are you referring to Global Priority rates here?

Aj

Yea couple of packaged I got took weeks to finally get here through Media Mail almost thought I was being ripped off it was off of Ebay.

Well this wednesday is two weeks. So I am trying to decide what is fair.
The person hasn't sent me their end yet, matter of fact they didn't even know it had gone out till they asked me- we never dicussed a time or speed-
I tracked the item, and the post office says anything up to a month is not conisdered lost-

But I am pretty sure if I wait the 30 days that the PO thinks is fair to wait, the person will be angry with me

Ok thanks I will look into that

and also solomon,

they have a flat rate box, that costs $8.10 , that allows you to put as much as you can fit into it,. and still go priority for the $8.10, and free del con as well

i can get up to 325 discs in sleeves, into that flat rate box

I am pretty sure if I wait the 30 days that the PO thinks is fair to wait, the person will be angry with me
Just let the post office do its thing and if the other person does get angry, put them on your "do not trade with again" list. The post mark will vindicate that it was not your fault, and who needs to deal with people who are going to lay blame where it does not belong?

Just let the post office do its thing and if the other person does get angry, put them on your "do not trade with again" list. The post mark will vindicate that it was not your fault, and who needs to deal with people who are going to lay blame where it does not belong?

very fair

what becomes a problem is when this happens numerous times , and the sender doesnt have numbers

i had a few pull that, and fall back on the postal excuse

but if you have the numbers and the postmark receipt

, then these things can happen on ocassion, and a little wait for the postal to follow through is not too much to ask

of all the packages i have sent priority, not one dvd package has been lost, a few delayed, but zero lost

thats pretty darn good

i do have some issues when i send first class, like 1-4 disc mailers, they run through the sorters and get caught, and mangaled

even though i tell them to hand sort

Savage, if they start to get snarky, point 'em to this thread - you've got experiences of several different traders here for them to use as points of reference.

The fact is, most of the time the Post Office does a good job. But stuff can happen between the time the package leaves your hand and the moment it arrives at the recipient's home. You have no control over that, but you do have proof you mailed the package.

Then there's the whole issue of what happens when a parcel is left - one trader I know routinely had his mail stolen, and expected the other traders to replace over and over again. That wasn't fair, either - if a person knows their mail is likely to be stolen, they should get a post office box to eliminate the problem rather than expect others to keep picking up the tab for discs and postage. Another person I did a trade with didn't get the parcel, but delivery confirmation was showing it was delivered - I told her, and so she was able to check with the building superintendant, and together they figured out the package had been delivered to the wrong apartment box, and they were able to collect it.

My personal favorite was a package I sent from Boston to a friend in Tampa a few years ago - it was sent first class, but it took six months to arrive. By the time she got it, it had dozens of postmarks on it, including Alaska. And there was nothing wrong with the typed label or any of the information on it. It just kept ending up in the wrong sorting bin.

My personal favorite was a package I sent from Boston to a friend in Tampa a few years ago - it was sent first class, but it took six months to arrive. By the time she got it, it had dozens of postmarks on it, including Alaska. And there was nothing wrong with the typed label or any of the information on it. It just kept ending up in the wrong sorting bin.

i had one when i was doing sports colelctables

it was sent priority , about 80 miles from my house

the person choose not to insure it

it was worth about $300

he sent a money order, and i sent it del con, and priority

it took 23 days to travel the 80 miles

in the mean time, he went balistic

i sent him scans of the receipt, and the del con number with the postal stamp on it

he filed reports for fraud and theft and every dam thing he could figure out

he claimed i faked the receipt

etc etc

then it showed up after 23 days, in perfect shape, all was good

the poistmark was when i said, all numbers matched up, i did my part


the moral of the story is, protect yourself by getting documentation

do your part, and it will most likely work out , even if theres apostal glitch

Well this wednesday is two weeks. So I am trying to decide what is fair.
The person hasn't sent me their end yet, matter of fact they didn't even know it had gone out till they asked me- we never dicussed a time or speed-
I tracked the item, and the post office says anything up to a month is not conisdered lost-

But I am pretty sure if I wait the 30 days that the PO thinks is fair to wait, the person will be angry with me


Just send the replacement Disc because I'm in the same situation where someone is doing that for me. In my case the trader told me if it doesn't come by Friday he will sent out a replacement and that's a littl less than 2 weeks. So since it's been two weeks I will say just go ahead and send the replacement. To me 2 weeks is the cut-off Time

well im sure a bunch of folks can vouch for me on this one

1. my handwriting is god awful
and
2. click and ship is better

i realllllllly drug my feet on it
BUT i finally have switched over
i have had several packages misrouted b/c of my bad writing
so this way is best for me and the post offices employees vision!

well im sure a bunch of folks can vouch for me on this one

1. my handwriting is god awful
and
2. click and ship is better

i realllllllly drug my feet on it
BUT i finally have switched over
i have had several packages misrouted b/c of my bad writing
so this way is best for me and the post offices employees vision!



Yeah it was hard to make out your last name and the part of NC you are from

The handwriting was so bad I couldn't even figure out
the address and you typed it in a PM for me )

well im sure a bunch of folks can vouch for me on this one

1. my handwriting is god awful
and
2. click and ship is better

i realllllllly drug my feet on it
BUT i finally have switched over
i have had several packages misrouted b/c of my bad writing
so this way is best for me and the post offices employees vision!

maybe now most of my packages from north carolina will not end up at

LANDS END

anymore

I went to the post office.

The item was shipped the 19th of july.
First class, to CA from Indiana.

I had them opne a request for tracking information and was told they would check the truck it was on- and let me know by Friday morning.
They told me the item could have arrived, and not been scanned out- It happens time to time and to verify with the person I sent to it wasn't received.

As far as things go it was a pacakge off 11 discs. 5 master discs of double trouble I let go. SO I can't just redo the pacakge.
So I have to wait to see if it turns up now that someone is looking for it.

Meanwhile I wrote the person I did the trade with - the fact is I sent with proof ten days before they even wrote me ready to send.

I wrote them and told them of my postal stop, and the fact of the originals not being able to be redone, for the fact they were masters- and not worth keeping to me.
And told them at this point, I am in the fat of the post office.
First class is perfectly reasonable and if anything the tracking at least shows proof i sent to them ...
If they want to use my items for a different trade so be it, while time passes.
And then they can redo it if/when the package comes.
Other than that, not much I can do but hope that now that someone is looking for it, its found. I guess I can redo the other 6, but- at that point, they would have to divde the items I was getting in half and it just gets confusing at that point..so I'd problaby just call it a wash. Leavng them wasting all that time as well
If this comes acorss as any blame to the person waiting, my apologies.
I know they haev obligatiosn and spent time making the set for me as well--and I think i am so angry at the lost package, that its coming out I blame them I dont.

just another reason to be cynical over the mail system

I had the same problem. Sent out 13 love letters and not one confirmation. One was to Lamont.

A love struck Harv

Maybe the chickens got it...

I'm in CA and normally when you send me stuff Kim I get it within 3-5 days.

Thanks E-

Basiccally it just sucks *shrug*

its been two weeks as of yesterday, confirmed it was sent first class. Rian or heat, aside it should have been there- so now this poor trader is left hanging-
i'm left hanging- money/time/effort shot and the only way to replace the stuff if its lost is for me to trade for it.

all around, not adding to my mood .