Negative effect on Sellers Late Delivery Rating of items posted on time to Royal Mail service etc

[see-search]

Anyone else somewhat annoyed after posting items same or next day only to find eBay penalises and downgrades the seller late delivery rate score when a delivery service like Royal Mail delay or lose items after the customer rightly create a "Late delivery" Case.     If posted on time why is it the Sellers fault?????

1.  Why should the Seller penalised for something out of their control?

2.  Why cant Proof of Postage be accepted as proof of fulfilment of the sellers timely obligation?

This seriously effects small value sellers. What do you think as a seller? 

[see-search]

eBay are using an incorrect metric.  I agree Proof of Postage is def not proof of delivery, but neither is eBay's use of Late Deliver as measure of a sellers performance.   eBay should be measuring what a Seller can control rather then what they can't control such as a lack of service from Royal Mail and then blaming the seller.   How can that ever improve eBay's service to the customer.

The metric is flawed and inappropriate.

[see-search]

Ive tried to use Proof of Postage to remove LDR but had no luck, just got "Proof or Postage is Not proof of delivery" several times

[vintique*violet]

A proof of postage receipt will have a reference number printed on it, even if untracked ... always upload the number to ebays system, under the "add tracking" section - it should then update to show " delivered."

edit to add @see-search 

[wyntersemporium]

Maybe buy straight from Royal Mail as was sick of eBay saying my items sent the same day. When I get them collected from home and scanned on door step by the postie. And it goes then. 

[typo_lee]

All the recent storms and snow affected royal mail deliveries and we got penalised heavily especially over the christmas period and january whereupon ebay extended our est delivery dates which to be honest I am glad about as it gives us more time for delivery as royal mail are so poor at delivering now.

[forestfeline62]

Yes we have the same problem we post out either on the day we sell an item or the next day and always put tracking in but recently ebay say we have been late dispatching which we know is not right ,but also when we look at the tracking number with royal mail it will give a bizzarre time for tracking number provided ,if we post at 11 am royal mail will say the tracking number was provided at 4.am or other bizzarre times like that ,no where is open at 4 am  or 3 am so why are the royal mail giving times that don't relate to our actual posting time ,is that the reason ebay are saying dispatch was late .  I notice that often the royal mail don't scan the tracking number and the buyer doesn't say they have had it so ebay mark us down for that ,it isn't right and is open to buyers making claims for non delivery and royal mail don't want to know when we complain . 

[jlovie]

I get the same with wrong time for tracking number provided. I think eBay might be using a US timezone for it.

[iss504]

As a sometimes seller and mostly a buyer, of late I have noticed some sellers advertising impossible ETAs.  (I very often order by the earliest ETA .) The dispatch time is set by the seller and  the delivery service is also chosen by the seller. I always contact the seller when an item is late and will be willing to wait if the seller is honest about dispatch, proof or anything else.

        But,.. some delivery services out there are unscrupulous at best,  about their ETAs  and sevices. I have little  patience for sellers who use them. (read...E the former hermes.) 

[andha-21]

If I understand what you mean by ETA (as in what eBay show you on orders) that's nothing to do with the seller.

That's 100% eBay. As far as I'm concerned it's miss selling.

When I was selling all my listings had a 5 working day turnaround on them and I only ever used Royal Mail 48 Hour Tracked. eBay knew all of that. But they still used to give estimated delivery times starting from 2 days after purchase.

[iss504]

Well, I'm glad you do use Royal Mail; much better track record.