Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Eventually last week I decided that enough is enough and filed a complaint with Canada Post.
I started with the registered item mailed from the Netherlands thinking that being traceable it would be the easiest to track down. How wrong I was.
By means of the tracking number I found out on the PostNL web site that the item had been posted on Jan 9th, 4 days later on the 13th it arrived in Canada where it was transferred to Canada Post.
Unfortunately as the Canada Post employee I dealt with informed me, Canada Post does not track foreign registered mail once it arrives in Canada. As far as they are concerned it is not their problem and I was told to take it up with the sender who should file a claim with PostNL.
I then brought up the issue of the other eBay items and the missing magazines, initially they tried to dismiss the magazines saying that the subscriptions have likely expired or the company could be having problems, but as I pointed out they were all from different publishers and all had been renewed in the last few months. As for the missing eBay items I was told that they may not have been sent, but that seems unlikely as one item came from Israel, one from Greece and one from the UK all from sellers with excellent feedback.
In the end, the only response I could get from Canada Post was "we will investigate".
I am incredibly annoyed. Monetarily it is not an enormous amount, but one of the eBay stamp lots I have been looking for for ages, as for the magazines, all are technical journals that feature multi-part articles that continue over multiple issues, two will be replaced by the publishers, but one, a small-run niche journal is already sold out.
As for 3rd world standards, apparently they have Canada Post beat hands down. Last year I sent a registered item to South Africa, after 6 weeks not delivered I managed to trace the item using the Canada Post tracking number on the South African post office web site, I managed to find out exactly which post office, which shelf and in which bin the item had been languishing in for over a month. Armed with this information the recipient went into the relevant post office and walked out a few minutes later with the item. Apparently it wasn't lost, just not delivered!
It is ridiculous in this modern age that we in Canada have to be saddled with such an abysmally unreliable postal system.
Clive
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Clive,
Sorry for the frustration. The USPS started a free service here in the US called ‘Informed Delivery’. Each morning it automatically emails you a scanned image of all mail items expected to be delivered that day. At first I thought this did not have much value but I signed up for it anyway; I have been surprised at how much I learned.
First, I have always suspected that one of the my mailmen was sandbagging. My regular mailman has always been great, but I noticed that when he was out we rarely got mail from the substitute mailman. Now with ‘Informed Delivery’ this trend has been verified and documented. The son of a gun has indeed been simply not delivering mail whenever it rains or he is running late. It is easy to see, the ‘Informed Delivery’ service notifies we have mail but it does show up in the mailbox. There is a quick and simple checkbox on the USPS site which allows me to notify them that ‘I didn’t receive this mail piece’. This gets compiled into metrics which allows them to see if they have issues with certain mailmen.
Additionally, it is also uncovering some of the ‘marker monkeys’. Imagine my surprise when I see some scans of the mail item come through with nice machine cancels but when it arrives in my mailbox it suddenly has ‘marker’ cancels defacing all the stamps. The local postmaster had no snappy answers or defense for this and admitted that it was a waste of time/money and appeared to malicious. He quickly identified the person, had a talk with them, and I have not seen an ‘marker’ cancels since then.
I have been surprised at how many of the issues I was seeing were local. Not sure if Canada Post has a similar program but you might inquire.
Don
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10:03:02am
"I have been surprised at how many of the issues I was seeing were local."
Given the description of the multiple problems in the original post, the only logical conclusion is that the problem has a local central trouble point.
Time for a Postal Inspector to get involved.
We mail hundreds of parcels a month and I don't think we have lost a Canadian parcel in 15 years.
Roy
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I am trying to mail three heavy boxes and have USPS pick them up.
I don't believe they understand this... certainly their web site, which appears designed to handle this, doesn't facilitate it. Six attempts at getting it right.....
I finally did the contact me option.... took me a while to actually find that.
filled it out (including returning to the phone number they requested and ADDING the little dashes, becuase they want it that way and couldn't program the dashes in themselves).
complete the form
submit the form
Email Us
Problem processing request.
There was a problem processing your request. Please try again later to submit your feedback.
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you know, if you can't make it easy for people to give you money, well, they won't
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Don,
Informed Delivery sounds like a wonderful service, unfortunately it doesn't seem as if Canada Post has something similar here.
""I have been surprised at how many of the issues I was seeing were local."
Given the description of the multiple problems in the original post, the only logical conclusion is that the problem has a local central trouble point."
I think that it is likely that most of the problems I am experiencing are local, but that doesn't explain why Canada Post are unwilling or unable to track registered items received from other countries.
I occasionally mail stamps via registered mail to other countries and in every single case have been able to track delivery via the web site of the receiving postal authority.
Clive
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David, the USPS did a system upgrade today. Not sure if that had anything to do with your problem.
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Thanks for that info, Don - I just signed up!
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During the last two months I have had a number of foreign postal items go astray. Three eBay stamp purchases sent via regular mail, a fourth via registered mail as well as three British magazines that I have subscribed to for years.
Eventually last week I decided that enough is enough and filed a complaint with Canada Post.
I started with the registered item mailed from the Netherlands thinking that being traceable it would be the easiest to track down. How wrong I was.
By means of the tracking number I found out on the PostNL web site that the item had been posted on Jan 9th, 4 days later on the 13th it arrived in Canada where it was transferred to Canada Post.
Unfortunately as the Canada Post employee I dealt with informed me, Canada Post does not track foreign registered mail once it arrives in Canada. As far as they are concerned it is not their problem and I was told to take it up with the sender who should file a claim with PostNL.
I then brought up the issue of the other eBay items and the missing magazines, initially they tried to dismiss the magazines saying that the subscriptions have likely expired or the company could be having problems, but as I pointed out they were all from different publishers and all had been renewed in the last few months. As for the missing eBay items I was told that they may not have been sent, but that seems unlikely as one item came from Israel, one from Greece and one from the UK all from sellers with excellent feedback.
In the end, the only response I could get from Canada Post was "we will investigate".
I am incredibly annoyed. Monetarily it is not an enormous amount, but one of the eBay stamp lots I have been looking for for ages, as for the magazines, all are technical journals that feature multi-part articles that continue over multiple issues, two will be replaced by the publishers, but one, a small-run niche journal is already sold out.
As for 3rd world standards, apparently they have Canada Post beat hands down. Last year I sent a registered item to South Africa, after 6 weeks not delivered I managed to trace the item using the Canada Post tracking number on the South African post office web site, I managed to find out exactly which post office, which shelf and in which bin the item had been languishing in for over a month. Armed with this information the recipient went into the relevant post office and walked out a few minutes later with the item. Apparently it wasn't lost, just not delivered!
It is ridiculous in this modern age that we in Canada have to be saddled with such an abysmally unreliable postal system.
Clive
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re: Canada Post - first world prices, yet not up to third world standards
Clive,
Sorry for the frustration. The USPS started a free service here in the US called ‘Informed Delivery’. Each morning it automatically emails you a scanned image of all mail items expected to be delivered that day. At first I thought this did not have much value but I signed up for it anyway; I have been surprised at how much I learned.
First, I have always suspected that one of the my mailmen was sandbagging. My regular mailman has always been great, but I noticed that when he was out we rarely got mail from the substitute mailman. Now with ‘Informed Delivery’ this trend has been verified and documented. The son of a gun has indeed been simply not delivering mail whenever it rains or he is running late. It is easy to see, the ‘Informed Delivery’ service notifies we have mail but it does show up in the mailbox. There is a quick and simple checkbox on the USPS site which allows me to notify them that ‘I didn’t receive this mail piece’. This gets compiled into metrics which allows them to see if they have issues with certain mailmen.
Additionally, it is also uncovering some of the ‘marker monkeys’. Imagine my surprise when I see some scans of the mail item come through with nice machine cancels but when it arrives in my mailbox it suddenly has ‘marker’ cancels defacing all the stamps. The local postmaster had no snappy answers or defense for this and admitted that it was a waste of time/money and appeared to malicious. He quickly identified the person, had a talk with them, and I have not seen an ‘marker’ cancels since then.
I have been surprised at how many of the issues I was seeing were local. Not sure if Canada Post has a similar program but you might inquire.
Don
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BuckaCover.com - 80,000 covers priced 60c to $1.50 - Easy browsing 300 categories
06 Mar 2018
10:03:02am
re: Canada Post - first world prices, yet not up to third world standards
"I have been surprised at how many of the issues I was seeing were local."
Given the description of the multiple problems in the original post, the only logical conclusion is that the problem has a local central trouble point.
Time for a Postal Inspector to get involved.
We mail hundreds of parcels a month and I don't think we have lost a Canadian parcel in 15 years.
Roy
Login to Like
this post
Auctions
re: Canada Post - first world prices, yet not up to third world standards
I am trying to mail three heavy boxes and have USPS pick them up.
I don't believe they understand this... certainly their web site, which appears designed to handle this, doesn't facilitate it. Six attempts at getting it right.....
I finally did the contact me option.... took me a while to actually find that.
filled it out (including returning to the phone number they requested and ADDING the little dashes, becuase they want it that way and couldn't program the dashes in themselves).
complete the form
submit the form
Email Us
Problem processing request.
There was a problem processing your request. Please try again later to submit your feedback.
Login to Like
this post
Auctions
re: Canada Post - first world prices, yet not up to third world standards
you know, if you can't make it easy for people to give you money, well, they won't
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re: Canada Post - first world prices, yet not up to third world standards
Don,
Informed Delivery sounds like a wonderful service, unfortunately it doesn't seem as if Canada Post has something similar here.
""I have been surprised at how many of the issues I was seeing were local."
Given the description of the multiple problems in the original post, the only logical conclusion is that the problem has a local central trouble point."
I think that it is likely that most of the problems I am experiencing are local, but that doesn't explain why Canada Post are unwilling or unable to track registered items received from other countries.
I occasionally mail stamps via registered mail to other countries and in every single case have been able to track delivery via the web site of the receiving postal authority.
Clive
Login to Like
this post
re: Canada Post - first world prices, yet not up to third world standards
David, the USPS did a system upgrade today. Not sure if that had anything to do with your problem.
Login to Like
this post
re: Canada Post - first world prices, yet not up to third world standards
Thanks for that info, Don - I just signed up!
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