Regular post service suspensions eBay protections

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Following the news of regular post service suspensions in 28 postcode areas, eBay have extended buyer-facing delivery estimates for the affected postcodes.

We did a quick check for an item promising economy delivery via Royal Mail Tracked 48 and for most areas of the country delivery is promised ‘On or before Thu. 21 Jan’. However when selecting a delivery address in one of the areas impacted by the regular post service suspensions, this changed to ‘Estimated between Thu. 21 Jan and Mon. 25 Jan’. The delivery date has been adjusted to an extended range to give more realistic expectations to buyers.

eBay say that they are actively monitoring the situation and will make any further changes as required. We are guessing that if more postcodes also see reduced post service that eBay will add these to the list of protected areas.

eBay Seller Protection support measures for regular post service suspensions

Late Delivery rates will be automatically adjusted and eBay will automatically remove Late Delivery counts and any related Negative or Neutral feedback received for Royal Mail shipments to and from the postcodes above between the 4th of January and the 31st of January 2021.

Item not received (INR) counts in Service Metrics and any related Negative or Neutral feedback will be automatically removed if you uploaded valid tracking before the delivery was scanned for Royal Mail shipments to and from the postcodes above between 4th of January and the 31st of January 2021.

eBay will be processing Defect removals and any related Negative or Neutral feedback as quickly as possible. Please be aware that it may take us a little time to remove this information from sellers’ accounts.

This isn’t a free pass however and you should maintain normal standards – even though eBay may protect individual service metrics from affecting sellers’ standard ratings, if delivery performance drops below an acceptable level or if eBay observe unusual activity on accounts, they may have to remove account privileges while they investigate the matter.

12 Responses

  1. Royal mail have been pretty much a joke for the last 3 months with deliveries.

    I have had £1000s in refunds due to lost or non delivered items across all their different postage services.

  2. Yes. I agree. 2nd class post seems to be taking around 1-2 weeks to many more areas than in that list. 1st class is usually better, but 2nd class is the first to get deprioritised. When a deliver office gets behind, all 2nd class gets put to one side and then deliveries carry on as normal. The parcels put to one a de I not get processed.when they have spare time, which may be weeks in the future. DOs operate a last in first out policy. Always the same whenever RM get stressed, beit snow or covid.

  3. The issue we have is Royal Mail not actually scanning anything. We even have EBay returns that never got scanned.
    You can forgive the Posties a lot but they need to scan these items it is directly coming out our pockets.

  4. The big issue with Royal mail is simple. If a postie does not scan nothing is done about it. If an item is delayed beause they are busy they dont do anything about it. they must be one of the few businesses around the world that can charge for a service they then dont provide and not have to refund.
    If they were forced to immediately refund the postage when it exceeds the time they would maybe start to deal with the issues properly.
    Then deal with loss claims later!

    why as a sender do we have to jump through hoops to be refunded the shipping when it is their system saying its late. An immediate refund of the shipping cost would be brilliant.

    It would be amazing at how fast they would fix the issues.

  5. But please, it is not just Royal Mail. I had an ebay packlink UPS parcel collected from Brighton, 5 days later it was delivered to a 24/7 shop in Croydon, just 50 miles away. I could have cycled it there quicker.

    I have a Hermes International parcel (UK to Germany), with all the numbers, they cannot find it, so thats a claim waiting to start.

    The increase in volume over the past 10 months has caught many firms dozing, though there was less of an excuse for their collective problems at christmas, some 7+ months in to the pandemic. There was enough time to strengthen systems, albeit harder with staff off ill etc.

    Royal Mail / Parcelforce get an unfairly hard time on here as they are one of the biggest and cheapest for many sizes.

    I cannot get hold of 2020 figures for the logistics market, % share, numbers of deliveries, satisfaction etc. Maybe Tamebay can get them and put together a balanced piece so we are not comparing chalk and cheese all the time.

  6. This is the problem….We are paying for a service and they simply do not deliver it. I can understand delays etc and do not have a problem with it (expect with companies like eBay who essentially blackmail you with the metrics system and let people still open cases).

    However if they do not scan items nothing ever happens. They do not do their job and the excuses are the same. They would sack you at our place for not doing it.

    Ofcom now need to become involved that is who I suggest people now contact as Royal Mail are shocking at actually dealing with business customers. Hit them in their pockets it is the only thing the bosses at Royal Mail will listen too.
    As I have said before I am involved in delivery if you do not get that delivery like happened to a few rural customers during the snow last week you get a refund…no quibbles no hassles no we are having Covid related issues, no we are having a bad day etc like everyone else has. 30% of our drivers are off right now sick we still deliver.

    Royal Mail seem to think they can take our money and our goods then proceed to not deliver and get of Scot FREE it is just not good enough anymore.

  7. bbc watch dog reported on royal mail delivery problems
    and lack of service 8 years ago when they upped the first class stamp to 60p
    no covid about then ???

  8. Victor Victor YES IM BACK YOUR NEMESIS being an ex royal manager probably sacked for bullying due to your victorian values could you please explain in sensible language what you’re real beef is about posties and royal mail workforce. You must remember me as you rode off on your desk I’m the guy who got you to admit posties are very important

  9. Oh dear ive hit that nerve again as i said only a useless ex royal manager sacked for being completely incompetent and not having any idea of what our job entails could come up with such a reply. With whats going on in the country at the moment and the fact we’re still working keeping people connected ok in some cases it may take a little longer but we do get there one thi ng I CAN DO is look myself in the mirror how about you vic sat in your armchair seven days a week WHAT DOES YOUR MIRROR SEE IN YOU a sad little man all alone with nothing better to do stay safe in your isolated world

  10. We are getting increased no. of item not received cases due to not been scanned. Is there anywhere we can raise this issue?

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