Shipping delays

[Kevin Bresnahan]

11 hours ago, bebopbob said:

Any update as to when Germany will authorize shipping to USA? I placed an order from a German Discogs seller who advised that they will ship as soon as German mail can be shipped to USA 

Thanks

Probably November 3rd.

[T.D.]

10 hours ago, bresna said:

Probably November 3rd.

I broke down and ordered the newish Sam Rivers (Ricochet) from NoBusiness. This won't be quick, so I'll heed earlier comments, forget about it and let arrival be a surprise.

[Dave Garrett]

On 7/6/2020 at 2:31 AM, Pim said:

Well, as some state here that USPS suck, in my opinion: PostNL sucks too! Till now almost every heavy delay I experiencedwas to blame on PostNL. The packages departured pretty early from country of origin but were kept endlessly in the Netherlands....

Not to speak of the ridiculous rices they dare to ask for shipping these days: 28 euros for a cd to the US! Insane! 

Wow, that is an outrageous rate for a single CD. I was only charged 20 euros shipping for the book I purchased, and it probably weighed around a kilo. Does PostNL have different rates for printed matter? 

[Pim]

3 hours ago, Dave Garrett said:

Wow, that is an outrageous rate for a single CD. I was only charged 20 euros shipping for the book I purchased, and it probably weighed around a kilo. Does PostNL have different rates for printed matter? 

No, not that I know. Maybe the book seller payed some from his own pocket? That is at least what I do these days to not spook US buyers.

[Dan Gould]

 

On 7/6/2020 at 7:16 AM, Dan Gould said:

This is disturbing news as I am waiting on something originating in the Netherlands.. Has said processed thru facility in Amsterdam since July 3. Does this mean next stop New York City?  And it was supposed to be expedited delivery?  Who knows now.

It's 8 days now since this package was scanned in the Netherlands and no indication of movement. On an International Priority package. I am only comforted by the fact that this was the largest recent purchase and that was before the highway-robbery shipping charge, so when I give up and ask for a refund I'll get a decent chunk of change back.

And it reminds me of the "shipping delay" I hadn't mentioned - June 1, shipped from the UK. July 11, nothing at all. When I initiated the eBay dispute the seller begged me to wait until it was 6 weeks since shipping. We ultimately compromised on 5 weeks before he issued the refund but we're a week past that now. 

And even that wasn't without difficulty, as I had bought four items from this seller, and initiated the dispute on the first item listed on the single order. When he finally issued the refund he made it a partial refund for that item, as if it wasn't the entire package that was MIA. That was pretty infuriating.

[sidewinder]

I must have struck lucky with recent deliveries. Mosaic set from Barcelona arrived in 2 days, replacement CD from Mosaic HQ arrived without a hitch and I have a CD coming in today from the Netherlands, ahead of schedule (cost £2.99 inc. postage ).

[T.D.]

FWIW, my package from Lithuania (NoBusiness) shipped and Valerij said to allow up to 10 weeks for delivery (Northeast USA).

Edited July 11, 2020 by T.D.

[cliffpeterson]

I ordered about multiple cds from No Business around May 22nd.  Just arrived a couple days ago-nearly seven weeks. 

[Kevin Bresnahan]

For the first time in about 10 years as an Amazon Prime member, I had a package disappear. I ordered a couple of internal 1TB hard drives and an external SSD hard drive and they failed to get here. I wonder if it is because of their value? Did someone steal them?

Amazon was great about it and they're sending a replacement order with next day delivery. Even better, if the old order ever does arrive for some reason, they said to keep it.

Which really makes you wonder about their mark-up.

Edited July 12, 2020 by bresna

[jlhoots]

I ordered a CD from a 3rd party on Amazon with Amazon fulfillment on June 27. It was supposed to arrive on July 3. The 3rd party says they have nothing to do with shipping since fulfillment is by Amazon. Amazon refused to allow me to cancel the order . It now says arriving July 16, but it still hasn't been shipped. The good news is I haven't been charged for it. I wonder if the item even exists.

[king ubu]

Well, I got some US orders from end of March and May 1st (bandcamp day) in early July ... Switzerland is being served by overseas shipping by US Post (do they still exist?), and it seems a container with mail is leaving NYC every few weeks or every month - so shipping delays of 6-10 weeks are the norm (as they used to be when I ordered from Mosaic in the late 90s ... but that cost 7.50$, no matter how large and heavy the box ... I remember odering 5 or 6 Mosaics and a couple dozen CDs from TrueBlue once or twice a year back then ... and then waiting for 1-3 months, and feeling like x-mas when it finally arrived!)

Japan is doing air mail again - a couple of Discogs orders of mine shipped last week, no clue how long that will take. Other orders with SAL method are still stuck (my choice usually with CDJapan - I guess they're flooded with requests these days but as long as I don't know the exact raise in shipping/total cost, I'll not give them a go, as in the worst case this could mean 30$ taxes/fees added onto a 50$ order, which would be totally out of proportion).

Within Europe (other than France in March/April) from my experience, things worked (and work) well. But it seems to depend on both country of origin and destination (I've had Discogs and other orders from Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Slowenia, Hungary, Lithuania and UK delivered within 1-2 weeks, so just a bit slower than usual ... and France is no problem by now, either).

[sidewinder]

47 minutes ago, king ubu said:

when I ordered from Mosaic in the late 90s ... but that cost 7.50$, no matter how large and heavy the box ... I remember odering 5 or 6 Mosaics

Sigh......... golden era.

[king ubu]

Yup. But with Brexit we might get all nostaltgic soon, when UK orders - with an added  0 - will be 75£ take 2 months  

[sidewinder]

23 minutes ago, king ubu said:

Yup. But with Brexit we might get all nostaltgic soon, when UK orders - with an added  0 - will be 75£ take 2 months  

Unlikely - and in any event the ‘B’ event has already happened.

My recent deliveries from the ‘mainland’ have taken a couple of days at most, which is quicker than it was 5 years ago from my recollection. 

Edited July 13, 2020 by sidewinder

[Pim]

Well it’s definitely The Netherlands’ PostNL that delay things. Ordered two cd’s separately from Japan. They left the country within 4 days. But they are now in Holland for more than a week. They aren’t even checked in at customs yet so best case scenario it would take another week.

[Dan Gould]

Partial credit where it's due: I got an LP from a UK seller, the listing had a crazy price for priority shipping but despite the cost on the invoice being correct, Paypal only charged about $5 for shipping and the seller was satisfied with it so I resigned myself to a 30+ day wait and the knowledge that it might go missing anyway with no tracking info. But then I got actually got tracking info, and its now taken just six days to get from the UK to Concord NH via Pitney Bowes. 

Of course at some point I think it will get turned over to the USPS and god knows what they will do with it but that is a concern for another thread.

 

[Dan Gould]

On 7/14/2020 at 9:16 AM, Dan Gould said:

Partial credit where it's due: I got an LP from a UK seller, the listing had a crazy price for priority shipping but despite the cost on the invoice being correct, Paypal only charged about $5 for shipping and the seller was satisfied with it so I resigned myself to a 30+ day wait and the knowledge that it might go missing anyway with no tracking info. But then I got actually got tracking info, and its now taken just six days to get from the UK to Concord NH via Pitney Bowes. 

Of course at some point I think it will get turned over to the USPS and god knows what they will do with it but that is a concern for another thread.

 

Well this should be interesting, didn't seem to move out of Concord NH but a flurry of scans yesterday. Strangest thing is that Pitney Bowes puts it in the Plant City PO right now which means I'll have this on Monday. Yet when you click the "track at carrier website" link on the Pitney Bowes site it shows that the USPS is waiting for the item in Indiana.  So which is it?

I wonder what deal Pitney Bowes has with the USPS. Is it truly "last mile" delivery? If it is then getting it to the local PO makes sense and Monday will be a happy day. But  if its like that horrible DHL system, it will probably be five more days before the USPS sucks its into their maw, and another week to show up from Indiana.

 

[Pim]

Surprise after surprise. An order from Canada arrived within a week.... a week from Canada to the Netherlands. And in the meanwhile, my package from Japan just keeps laying somewhere on the airport in Amsterdam...

[felser]

On the flipside, I just received one from Russia this week which mailed the second week of March.  133 days...

[Pim]

Wow! That must have been a pleasant surprise!

[Dan Gould]

On 7/19/2020 at 3:18 PM, Dan Gould said:

Well this should be interesting, didn't seem to move out of Concord NH but a flurry of scans yesterday. Strangest thing is that Pitney Bowes puts it in the Plant City PO right now which means I'll have this on Monday. Yet when you click the "track at carrier website" link on the Pitney Bowes site it shows that the USPS is waiting for the item in Indiana.  So which is it?

I wonder what deal Pitney Bowes has with the USPS. Is it truly "last mile" delivery? If it is then getting it to the local PO makes sense and Monday will be a happy day. But  if its like that horrible DHL system, it will probably be five more days before the USPS sucks its into their maw, and another week to show up from Indiana.

 

This one is so confusing ... Pitney Bowes suddenly updated their tracking on the 20th and showed it in Indiana again, not Plant City. Since then I've been checking the USPS tracking and they have continuously shown that they are waiting for the item, for six days now. 

So I decided to go back to Pitney Bowes and they show that they still have it and it is in Atlanta. I found a third party tracking website which predicts delivery to the Post Office between the 26th and the 29th - we can only hope.

[T.D.]

To my surprise, CD ordered from NoBusiness (Lithuania) shipped July 9, arrived August 5. That's comparable to pre-COVID speed, maybe slightly slower.

Edited August 5, 2020 by T.D.