Mail mishaps

[plushroo]

I usually have good mail luck, but recently I had two different parcels arrive at the mail depot in my state and then nothing. The tracking stops there. Luckily, the sellers have been very good working with me on trying to locate the parcels. One has already refunded me because they told me it was shipped priority to get to me quicker, but for some reason, it's not showing anything after the 7th of December. I've since ordered a replacement of one of the items and got it, but still kind of peeved that the postal service managed to lose two separate parcels from two separate sellers!

[Mewtwofan1]

I haven't had any bad luck with mail, but the mail service in Canada is pretty okay. They don't just drop the parcel and run, and they actually try to keep the parcel dry and with minimal damage. Not to mention the mail lady is nice, and understands my excitement with pony filled packages.

[Galactica]

My mail luck is usually pretty great considering all of the thousands of packages that I receive and send - But I have had a couple of terrible mishaps burned into my memory.

The worst one- was after I found a crispy gorgeous NRFB Blueberry Muffin Blow Kiss baby on Mercadolivre-  I bought her and the person didn't even put the doll into a box. She just wrapped the vintage package in PAPER and mailed it.  Cardboard packaging in Brazil is VERY THIN and since it was 30 years old... honestly it's amazing that the package arrived at all. 

Here's what I bought- absolutely pristine
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And here is the box I received- AFTER I tried to push it back into shape 

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I had another terrible incident too where someone bought my most rare and lovely Lady Lovelylocks dolls, and I carefully packaged everything up into a large box.  The buyer wanted to underdeclare (the Netherlands has a very steep tax) but the box did go by priority.  I watched as the tracking showed the package go to the major sorting center- and then never move.  It just disappeared.  The USPS people were absolutely useless and nobody could help us.  The box never resurfaced again.  Indemnity only covered the amount declared plus shipping.  Not even a fraction of the value.

I still have this hope that one day the box will surface- but the box wasn't little, it was huge. So it seems unlikely it just got miss-sorted.

[Leave a Whisper]

I once tried to trade some of my old Pokemon cards to someone here who is in Australia for some G3s. The Post Office sent it to Austria. Then it went back to New York, and then went back and forth two more times and the last I heard of it, it was in Vienna. I don't think it went any farther because there isn't a &!@#ing Queensland in Austria! 

Post Merge: December 28, 2016, 02:46:11 PM

One of my funniest was I ordered a fish tank from I think Petsmart or maybe Petco, I got the fish tank.. But I also got a random litter box sent to me as well.  This was a big litter box too, with a lid. Not sure why they thought I needed it.  LOL

Maybe they thought you had catfish.

  haha catfish!

[Dragonflitter]

That's awful Galactica. So sorry.

[lolaandbean]

My husband ordered some magnets. Tiny little package that fit in the mail box. The next day a big huge crate from the same company was delivered. He wasn't home so I accepted the package wondering what the world he had ordered. The company accidentally shipped us a generator. Poor UPS driver had to come back and pick it up again.

The packages I ordered for everyone else arrived fine. I had no luck with the stuff I ordered for myself. It's been 2 weeks and 1 hasn't been shipped. The other 2 arrived reeking of cigarette smoke.

[lostpony]

Amazon says much of the stuff I ordered for myself for xmas is out for delivery today....hope some makes it here!

I ordered Gypsy this week on eBay and she arrived yesterday Yay!  she's right here right now.

When I was in high school I ordered a dox matrix printer and its color kit, and they shipped me the printer and then another one arrived, but no color kit...instead of shipping the color kit they shipped a second printer (worth a lot more than the color kit).  I wrestled with dishonesty then called them up and had them pick it up and send me the right thing.

One time at work a 3.5" disk arrived in an envelope and it had just been put in there without any cardboard or anything, and clearly the width of the disk had stalled the envelope going through a sorting machine and there was a big arc-shaped burn mark that went deep into the disk and we got a good laugh about how they just went ahead and delivered it in that condition anyway.

Slightly off-topic, I once bought a whole bunch of costume jewelry from the 30s from a person on eBay that I got into an argument with, so she smashed the pieces into the little box and they arrived in pure fragments.  Then she gave me negative feedback on my previously perfect record...good times.

Lately when I have a package for pickup at my local post office, they often tell me there is no package and sometimes say the tracking number isn't a tracking number...then I ask to talk to the supervisor and go over to the little half-door on the side and the supervisor always finds it for me.  Once when it had been routed back out for redelivery and I was on my way to work and wanted to get it then, he called the driver, found my package, and setup a place I could rendezvous with the driver on his route, and then I found a different driver first but in a few minutes the right driver happened along and I got my package.

Mailing can be fun.  I hope my toys get delivered today!

Oh I just remembered two more.  Once at work we received a laptop that had been shipped skin-tight in the mailing box with no packaging...needless to say it was no longer working, and months ago I ordered Sunnybunches and tracking showed her going from the East coast to somewhere in southern California, then sitting there for weeks and when I called up about it, they sent herr back to the shipper who had to receive her and re-ship her (without paying again) and this time Sunnybunches arrived in three days.  Her green hair arrived superdry and lots of it broke off when the seller said it wasn't like that before so....I wonder if the hair got cooked in a hot warehouse or something.

Galactica your stories illustrate why it's best to never underpack, and never underdeclare.  I underdeclared a gift to the UK so the recipient wouldn't get socked with customs fees but it's because the stuff was unique and unreplaceable anyway so if it got lost no amount of money would have fixed it.  I also had to send without tracking because the shipping fee was outrageous, and I did a lot of nail-biting for weeks until she said the gift package arrived so I lucked out that time Yaay.