I only use Royal Mail ...ebay sent me a QRcode for Inpost ! Why ?
Summary: A participant expressed confusion about selling on eBay and receiving a QR code for InPost instead of a Royal Mail label, as they typically only use Royal Mail. trishthedish.0199 shared a similar experience with difficulties due to the limitations of courier services in the Scottish Highlands and mentioned unexpected delivery options being added without consent. *vyolla* advised on how to opt out of InPost in account settings but noted that these settings might revert back. The discussion highlights frustrations with eBay's delivery options and lack of communication.
It worries me that I don't have a physical label to put on. And I thought ebay had dropped Inpost.
43 comments
trishthedish.0199
·2 months ago · EditedI got caught the same way last week, sold some fabric I had left over from a project, was happy for someone to have it at a reasonable price, but the amount of faffing to get it posted, hardy made it worth while. I had only ticked royal mail as delivery option, live in Scottish highlands and take to village post office. Couldn't find a label to print as usual, but discovered QR code emailed to my phone, to take with package to a in-post locker. No idea where one was or how to use it. Had a long and painful online chat with a Ebay agent who was no help at all, went round and round, saying the customer had selected to have it sent this way, but kept saying, I had not offered it as an option. Could not tell me how to refund the person even, as it was classified as awaiting shipment and I was committed to doing so. I rechecked my listing and found in-post and DHL added as options. Found in-post map of locations online, nearest 20 miles away at Tesco. Husband kindly drove me there and we worked it out. Yes, we are retired, yes we found it and made a day of it, but it cost in petrol and effort and we have a car, otherwise would have been 2 buses each way. So, so cross about this, and why all the changes all the time without our knowledge or approval?!
*vyolla*
·2 months agoYou can opt out of Inpost in your account settings.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/ship/prf/simpledelivery
trishthedish.0199
·1 month agoYes, you can opt out, but watch it, as Ebay often add the other options in again after a couple of weeks, without your knowledge. I know people in real life and on this forum who it has happened too as well, they have some very sneaky software.
rainbowbottles
·3 months agoI have just had the same experiance. Went to post office as usual they said you have to take it to a Inpost locker. So I took it to Morrisons who had one and after a bit of faffing as I had no idea how to use it managed to post it. On getting home I went on to the selling hub found postage options and sure enough the inpost option was turned on , so I have turned it off just leaving the royal mail option. Will see what happens now.
jonatjonatjonat
·3 months agoI would imagine in most cases there you would be supplied a Royal Mail label.
Now ebay do state in the Simple Delivery terms that if your product can't be shipped by any of the couriers you have selected - they may still supply a label for a courier you have blocked - but in most cases that would I think apply to things like you only have Evri selected and your customer is in the Highlands of Scotland - where Royal Mail would ship (and Evri wouldn't).
trishthedish.0199
·2 months agoI live in Scottish highlands and believe you me, if the seller has selected Evri, the item gets shipped by Evi, even though we no longer have any Evri service here. Everyone I know in village has been caught like that at least once; there software is not intelligent, it does not know which areas of UK is served by which couriers or delivery services. Parcels just get lost in the system and never arrive when despatched. Even John Lewis and many retailers ship by Evri and the items never arrive here. Hence I only buy from retailers and Ebay sellers who shop by royal mail.
buyincornwall
·6 months agoI ALWAYS USE ROYAL NAIL. but eBay has added Inpost and DHL and ticked them as my choices along with Royal Mail ( I had previously unticked EVRI as I would rather send on Granville's push bike). How dare eBay make changes to my choices. Today I went to create a label and was given the choice of Inpost only. I contacted eBay who were very defensive and wouldn't explain why this had happened but told me my request is being passed to a specialist department who will provide me with a RM label within 24hrs. I assume eBay have managed to screw up another unwanted change. RIP EBAY.
gjalp
·9 months agoThey snuck it onto mine too and Ive removed all but Royal Mail (and DHL but can’t remove that and I don’t plan to sell large items on ebay because of it). Ive now removed this too.
summerteddy
·9 months agotheyve just done thee same to me , getting so tired of there con tricks
incredible_how
·10 months agoI'm so glad I randomly saw this post. Inpost isn't on my listings yet, but fond it on both both my parents' accounts, so changed it. Will have to keep checking mine. The nearest is not quite as far away as the nearest Evri drop-off, but somewhere we don't ever go to and currently no driver in the household, so need to stick with Royal Mail and collection
nixbarchetta
·10 months agoI’ve seen no mention of it anywhere until I came looking on here tonight to see if others were having this problem. Where did eBay say this? I’ve not had an email detailing it.
I hate letting buyers down. It’s not easy for me to get out to send things, it’ll be at least Wednesday before I can post this parcel. I have offered to cancel and the buyer repurchase using RM but no reply so far….
I’ve checked a couple of listings and can only see RM on them so hopefully deselecting it in my preferences will have got rid of it 🤞🏼
jonatjonatjonat
·10 months agoit was in the November update in eBay seller news but you know what I can’t see an email so it would be reliant on you having read the eBay news on site.
i know I’m fortunate that I can get to any one of the locker boxes near my kids school, but can appreciate the frustration. It should have been opt in or at least better communicated.
nixbarchetta
·10 months agoThanks I’ve found it now, buried right at the bottom of the November Updates post, surely the November Seller News would have been a more appropriate place to tell us about this? I always read the seller news as I thought that’s where eBay told us about important changes 🙄
nixbarchetta
·10 months agoI have just fallen foul of this. Only found out Inpost is now an option on my listings when I tried to book a Royal Mail collection for something that sold earlier. I’m absolutely fuming if I’m honest, why was I not told about this. I think it must have only happened today as the items I sold at the weekend were RM as usual. Ebay CS were a waste of time wanted to refer me to a different dept with a reply taking up to 48 hours. I’ve had contact with them before and they’re useless so told him not to bother.
I have now deselected the Inpost option, can I assume this won’t happen again or do I need to check all my listings?
jonatjonatjonat
·10 months agoSimple Delivery is in theory at account level - so it should roll out across all your listings with Simple Delivery on them.
In theory.
Agree - any change like this should be opt in. From ebays point of view, that is a bind - because they have a deal with the couriers and they want labels to be purchased. But ebay also said Inpost would be rolled out by the end of the week at the start of November. It clearly did not happen.
Communication of Simple Delivery is not improving.
They aren't alone in this though - over the years, when amazon has rolled out a new country in Europe - they have often registered sellers into these countries automatically. Think selling a few hundred items to amazon.nl is a darn site more inconvenient!
incredible_how
·10 months agoHope things sort themselves out for you.
I must keep an eye out, inpost drop off too far from me, a fraction closer than nearest Evri drop off. And as currently have no transport and live in the sticks, RM collection is the only option
neovass0
·10 months agoIn general, since the introduction of simple delivery, I've reluctantly selected 'seller pays delivery' in an effort to have at least some control over postage, also choosing only the royal mail services to limit the possible options. At the time I think Royal Mail standard delivery (Tracked 48) was £3.38, but also available to the seller was a faster service (equivalent to Tracked 24) for only slightly more and they were opting for this. I have a three day dispatch time, but buyers don't realise the next day delivery is only valid after the day of dispatch. They expected to receive the item the day after purchase, even when buying late in the evening. Even now, they can still purchase the faster delivery service, but given the choice of paying nothing, or the £4 for express tracked delivery on relatively low value items, no one selects it, lol.
coyotetower
·10 months agoAs an inpost/yodel courier, this is good news for me lol. Volumes are dire atm. So inpost/yodel are now on simple delivery? I joined them after being suspended from EVRI over my youtubes exposing their shady practices. Its good but we've got no volume as evri took a lot of our contracts. Ebay adding us is good news for me at least. I've been sending exclusively inpost and yodel since I left evri and so far its been really reliable except for a couple of issues when inpost first changed the IT system.
rmoo7407
·1 month agoHow is an unlabelled parcel kept going to the right place with InPost? I just sold so. E thing and have no problem getting to locker but can't believe I don't need to put a label with buyer details on it. I have aQR code which will open a locker. If you can tell me I would be very grateful.
sml192
·1 month agoThe driver will place a temporary label on the parcel when it is collected and then the full label is applied at the sorting depot. Alternatively, if you drop it off at an InPost parcelshop (formerly Yodel parcelshop) then they will print and affix a label.
kyanyama
·10 months agoThey better not try that with me! I have just relisted some things as sell similar. I didn't notice anything different except one item was still custom delivery with 5 days dispatch.
I sometimes buy from Vin*ted but only buy with Inpost if there is no other option. I don't like Inpost cos you have only 3 days to collect an item. The other options have a week to collect. Fine most of the time but I only work 2 days a week so it's sometimes a worry I might not make it to the locker in time.
I have seen others putting unlabelled parcels into lockers - very alien to me! I like to print off my label and attach to my parcel as I take a photo of each parcel before I leave home to post it. I know it's ott but I've had to learn from using eBay to become OTT!
coyotetower
·10 months agoInpost are intent on making everyone send to lockers so need to keep the space free. Amazon is only 3 days as well usually.
*vyolla*
·10 months agoWhat delivery method did you select when you set up your listing?
Are you sure that it's an Inpost code?
cloon
OP10 months agoI just checked my postage preferences, the options I had when I set them up was Royal Mail, Evri and DPD. since you cannot delete DPD I only checked Royal Mail ...went back to double check, and guess what ?, ebay has added Inpost , and selected it as a live postage option to sellers WITHOUT telling me. I'm really starting to tire of all their secret meddling. Because it's ME that gets the negative feedback if the item does not arrive, I think they just want rid of private sellers. I'm at a loss to why someone would choose Inpost over Royal Mail, unless of course ebay chose it for them as they can make a few pennies out of it ?
sml192
·10 months agoInpost was added to Simple Delivery recently, however, there is currently very little guidance on the Simple Delivery pages regarding it. Not sure how it is shown to the buyer but it is a cheaper option and offers delivery to a collection point hence why a buyer might choose it over 'Standard Delivery' via Royal Mail or Evri.
Interestingly Inpost doesn't currently show on my 'Postage Preferences' despite there being several drop off points near me.
With Simple Delivery, if the item doesn't arrive then you are fully protected by eBay. The buyer will be refunded by eBay at no cost to you and any negative feedback left will be removed.
cloon
OP10 months agoWell, I took it the drop off shop (who couldn't print a label with a QR Code, they needed a Bar Code, typical) So all I could do was scan the code and slam it in the opened locker without a label...good luck to that..it's now in the hands of the van-man Gods. It's now showing as "locker-ed up", so I'm covered. Still don't like it though.
gengarama
·10 months agoWas there at least an address on the package???
jonatjonatjonat
·10 months agoAccording to InPost - if the QR code has been scanned - no addresses required.
kyanyama
·10 months agoJust been to look at my postage preferences on my selling a/c.
Do you have Click and Collect enabled? I don't and only have Royal Mail and DHL showing as my postal preferences.
If you disable Click and Collect you might be able to prevent eBay using Inpost. Only way to find out is to check your a/c settings, disable Click and Collect and then wait and see if any other of your sales end up with Inpost codes. I don't use my phone for selling. Hope this helps!
Every day is a school day!
cloon
OP10 months agoYou only get a Name and postcode, the rest is a secret until the courier puts on the label !
jonatjonatjonat
·10 months agoIf its the lockers - according to Inposts own site (though the page was in reference to Vinted)
"For parcels heading to an InPost Locker or Shop, you’ve got two options. You can select a printable label (which you’ll need to print at home and attach to the parcel) or a digital label (which is a QR code that you scan at the locker – then all you need to do is pop the parcel inside and leave the label to us). "
This would say to me, if you scanned the QR code on the locker and placed the parcel in the locker - the label is applied by the courier collecting the parcel.
And this explains it further
So basically...
- Initial courier collects parcels and applies a barcode to each one they collect.
- At a primary depot, the initial barcode is scanned and replaced with a complete address label
coyotetower
·10 months agoThe inpost driver shoves a label on it when he collects it. It's all a bit confusing since they bought yodel but its starting to run pretty well. Still some issues to iron out tho. It does mean though if u have several packages and accidentally put it in the wrong box (even with the right barcode on), its going to whoever was meant to get the packet in that box. U can phone inpost at the locker tho to open it again. The inpost lockers are appearing everywhere now too. I just jumped over there as a courier from evri and so far (touch wood) its miles better.
ladyemm
·9 months agoHello
With regards to Simple Delivery.
Just a warning. I sent a parcel by Simple Delivery - supposedly covered for loss.
The parcel didn't arrive - customer rightly claimed from Ebay and got their money refunded. BUT Ebay then deducted the money for the item from me as I 'couldn't provide proof of delivery'.
I appealed their decision (a highly involved and time consuming procedure) reminding them that Simple Delivery meant they claimed for any loss from the courier.
As I provided proof of postage/collection by the Postman from me, I got my money back but you could tell Ebay weren't happy.
I shall also be removing InPost as an option - too risky an option.
incredible_how
·9 months agoThat's not good. Surely they should be able to look at tracking and see it had been collected?
I've just had an email today to say InPost now on my account, been keeping an eye out, because it appeared on both my parents' accounts. I've removed it. Royal Mail only, because I can arrange collection and post office only 2 miles away. Evri and InPost both too far away.
buyincornwall
·6 months agoExactly the same here, suddenly I was no longer given the option to request a Royal Mail collection or label but had Inpost as my only option. I LIVE MILES FROM THE NEAREST INPOST SHOP. Spoke to eBay who feigned ignorance of the matter but said they would pass my query onto a specialist department who would issue me a RM label within 24hrs. HOW DARE EBAY CHANGE MY PREFERRED POSTAGE COMPANY. RIP EBAY.
incredible_how
·6 months agoI hope eBay sorted the Royal Mail label for you.
There was an email or an update announcement that inpost would be rolled out. My parents had it added to their account early on, and I just kept checking my account until is appeared in my postage preferences, then got rid of it. I can only do Royal Mail, too rural.
buyincornwall
·6 months agoSurprise surprise since eBay promised to send me a RM label within 24hrs to replace the Inpost one I didn't want I have heard a thing from them after 48hrs. Just as well I went out of my way to find an Inpost locker and have just been notified item is out for delivery today. If not parcel would still be unposted. GRRRRRRRRRR
buyincornwall
·6 months agoShould have read NOT HEARD A THING FROM EBAY
incredible_how
·6 months agohow frustrating. hopefully you will not have any problems in future.
neon-towers
·5 months agoI wasted two hours trying to sort out a sale because they had paid for Inpost delivery. The nearest boxes are a few miles from me in places I wouldn't particularly want to go. I ended up having to walk half a mile till I found one that still had free boxes. Honestly, at one point I felt like slamming my parcel on the ground and jumping on it. Sick of eBAY constantly changing things, and making it difficult to find where/how to sort things out (if you are even allowed to).
sml192
·5 months agoInpost items can also be dropped off at any Yodel parcel shop.