Not a fan of the eBay standard envelope

[jayshum]

Originally Posted by tschock

I recently sent one in the ebay PWE. My local PO person knew what it was, but I've seen ebay items in their in-box before so maybe he was familiar with it. I told him it was the first time I tried it and he 'scanned' it and accepted it without question. Whether it really scanned into the system or not, I do not know. The buyer had a similar experience as mentioned. It showed up as 'delivered' yet he had not received it yet. Later in the day it was in his mail box. (similar experience to PO workers who scan priority packages as delivered before they really are)

My theory is that the 'scanning' that occurs for delivery is similar to how other first class PWEs (and junk mail) are scanned and processed. It would be better in ebay's system only indicated it was "out for delivery" rather than delivered, which would be more accurate. If you look at the tracking, it does seem to only include the distribution centers and not the local source/destination POs. I wonder if/how it would show up in my daily USPS notifications. Maybe I should sell something to myself to test this out.

Since it is impossible to even purchase the ebay PWE postage for an item that is more than $20, it all boils down to how much is the seller willing to eat if the PWE doesn't get delivered. The seller risk is no different than slapping on a forever stamp and dropping it in the mail. The ebay service provides some convenience with limited tracking.

The tracking shows both Out for Delivery and Delivered, but in this case, it wasn't really delivered until around 6:00 PM not 10:38 AM as indicated. I understand if it can only be scanned at distribution centers that the tracking is not as detailed as a package with a USPS tracking number, but if the carrier can't scan it then how does it eventually ever show as delivered, either before it really is on when it really is?