"Italian Post office - anything I can do?" Topic

So I sold something on ebay to a guy in Italy. It actually went for a stupidly cheap price. I told him I would only sell it if he agreed that I could not be held responsible for shipping once I handed it to the US Post. OK, but they he whined about shipping costs. I also specified that he has to pay extra for insurce if he wants it (he didn't).

So I got the weight down so I could send it first class and save him some money. I even returned the extra shipping he had paid.

So now, as I was always told tracking is useless on international shipments, I sent him the customs number- which only shows it was handed to my post office on such a date. Nothing more – so he assumes it is lost.

I have told him he needs to contact the Italian customs people and ask with that number where the package is. But he says he can't, and he is going to do a paypal charge back.

I honestly do not think he is messing with me, just the box is sitting in an Italian Post Office. Is there anything I can do?

How long has it been – I've had parcels take over a month from the UK to Italy

Mike

Hi John,

not really.

But what you can do is give PayPal prove that you shipped it (which you can) so the charge back will not be done.

But honestly… the Italian mail service is a joke! And I always demand that buyers from Italy have things shipped with insurance.

Cheers,

Burkhard

Don't ship to Italy. It's not worth the trouble.

Yes

I will not hip to Italy either, post is awful.

Its one of the only Western European Countries Royal mail will not do Airsure to either

Al

i only send to Italy international signed for from the UK.
every thing else i ever sent to Italy went astray.

regards

jim

well Italian post service is bad but I have to say that in very few occasion I had problem shipping in Italy and from Italy to abroad in the last 10 years.

From US probably you have to blame more the Italian custom, that is very slow, and unless the Italian customer claims his stuff contacting the custom (sometimes not an easy task), there is the risk that after 2 months you see your parcel coming back to you in US as unclaimed.

Hi

A word of advice as the customer service rep for a large mail order company. Paypal is always in the buyer's corner.

A customer doesn't have to provide anything other than there mad and didn't get there stuff.

Check the dispute daily, it can change and you have a limited time to respond. It's generally a 50/50 to win the dispute even if you do everything they ask.

Most time it show up a week later and they resend the money.

Bill D

Usually in less that a week I received parcels from UK.
More if sent from US.
Starting about one year ago the time misteriously increased up to three times…
Last order form UK took a little less than one month.

Only a couple of times I did'nt received anything.

Of course I'm in Italy.

Marco

I remember when if you mailed anything in Italy, the postal workers would steam off the stamps, toss your letters, and rsell the stmaps.

As there is no way I can prove it was delievered, I may just tell the guy, look: it is stuck in Italian Customs. I can not do anything about that. Legally, I have no respsonsibility. However I am going to refund your money on the provision that you promise to resend it when the box arrives.

I wonder if that might make him feel slightly bad and actually do so. Not that I would count on it.

I've never had a lot of problems with Italy, Just give it more time they can take up to a month depending on the value of the package and the shipping method.

Other times it takes 4 days, so I'd put him off awhile yet and see what happens…

Ah, my problem was I did not just insit it be sent int priority at the higher cost. That would have been trackable. But to save a few bucks he saw the lower 1st class rate and wanted that.

The reason it shows up on the tracking, is that it gets scanned ONCE when it enters the system. Then not again at all.

That is the last time I send anything overseas by non priority.

Well advise him to do what the Italian post office would do. Close for lunch and then maybe resurface much later but only if you can be bothered.

Seriously though I'v found that although the US postal service seems slower than Royal Mail for example the tracking service is excellent.

I just ordered some figures from the US. Ok they took longer than some ordered at the same time from the UK but at each step you can log into the USPS site and track their progress. So I know my package cleared Miami early this week, was cleared by customs on Thursday and 'attempted delivery' was made today. I know what that means, I was at work and the post office slipped a card in my box telling me to pick it up at the post office.

I've had no problems receiving packages from Oz or the UK in some developing countries. Italy and it's public services are, however, in a league of their own.

I've had orders arrive home between six days and six weeks. Italian mail is unpredictable.
Only a couple of times the parcel didn't arrive here though.

Just ordered from the US, and they insisted on insured parcel.
Can't say it's unfair. but it shoot's the price per mini in the skies. :(

Lately I have had everything sent to my work. My theory is that mail or customs employees are less likely to steal when there's a company name ('C/O' and ending with 's.r.l.') on the adress.

Don't ever ship to italy without registered mail. If you judge them by their postal system, they're a third world country. I sold some fow tanks once on ebay, and thought I'd specified that it was only for north america and britain. Guess not. Some italian guy won it, and I just flat out added 10 dollars to his shipping charges for registered.

Lo and behold, a month later he tells me the package hasn't arrived. I ring up my post office, tell them to initiate a search, et voila! The package magically comes to him the next day.

I've shipped to Italy for >10 years with only one or two issues. Basically the parcel was stuck in customs and eventually made it there.

Maybe I'm lucky.