Very long shipping time to USA and Canada

erikboere

We got various complaints from Canada and the USA about shipments not arrived in 4-6 weeks. We shipped these by small parcel with registration number (no track&trace) so we can prove shipments have been send out.
It looks that overseas shipments take a very very long time to arrive. I know that there are many problems with airfright capacity (PostNL normally used passengers flights) .
Some buyers announce to reclame (or ask as refund) and seem to be unaware about the present situation.
I wonder if any seller has equal experiences and I also am curious about shipping time to other 'overseas' continents.
I raised the same question on another forum and shipping time up to 8 weeks have been reported.
I hope buyers understand the present situation neither of us like, and have some more patience.

Hoddie

I don't have anything to add except to say the bPost actually stopped accepting mail and parcels for the USA due to lack of passenger planes flying. What had already been received was stockpiled until such time as the service could resume, which it did only a few days ago. Even now, there's still very limited capacity so it'll take a good while for the backlog to clear.

And once they're in the US, they're at the mercy of US customs and the USPS, both of which are operating at reduced capacity as well.

To not expect delays is unreasonable.

The same is true for most non-European destinations. But according to bPost, the worst delays are actually being experienced in France, and to a lesser extent, Italy.

erikboere

Thanks for this info, this is frustating for both buyers and sellers. Maybe others could add some more info about shipping time making it possible for buyers to have some idea about actual situation and for sellers to refer to when a buyer ask why he/she did not get the shipment. Maybe a shared experience is more convincing thanthe words of an individial seller. Many buyers simply don't realize how bad it is.

Emporiosa

Sharing my experience here as a Canadian Our border is VERY backlogged. My experience is it gets to our border quickly (based on the registration number tracking, where it stops tracking here) and then takes another 4-5 weeks to process at the border and to be delivered.

Although, I was wondering how much more is the fully tracked service for you? I noticed when I purchase from German sellers most are using this registered option, while a couple are using the full track/trace and for the same shipping cost. The reason is that it's very difficult for us to know if it's just lost or maybe it had problems at customs etc...

If it doesn't cost you too much more, I'd definitely recommend switching to track/trace these days. Although if they're fully insured as registered mail with PostNL already then maybe it's not worth the extra fees.

bricksinbins

Have seen orders to US take around 2 months lately.

Aladine

shipping from Germany with DHL

US:
a 20kg parcel to US which was shipped March 14 via DHL and was cleared in Frankfurt March 19 arrived in US (Texas) today !!! So it was shipped and custom cleared and on flight to US well before DHL started their restrictions. Since April 1st DHL doesn't accept small packages to US and only accepts bigger parcels of at least 5kg with Service Premium (=additional fee of EUR 16). On their info page they say that this is due to Transport and delivery problems inside US.

Canada:
for quite a while DHL didn't accept any parcel shipment to Canada. Now they again accept some, but only small parcels.

Australia:
no shipment accepted by DHL

further Information: end March before DHL restrictions started they stored a lot of shipments in their facilities awaiting that they could be forwarded. When there were too many and they ran short of storage facility they sent shipments back to sender and finally simply stopped accepting such shipments.

Pikka

Same here in Czech Republic. Six weeks and still waiting for orders to be delivered to our buyers in the United States, Canada and Australia. Then again, it took no more than ten days for three different orders to reach HongKong. All our packages are fully tracked (International Registered) but there are huge time gaps between scannings, during which we don't know their whereabouts. The latest status may be a few weeks old, showing that shipments left Czech Republic, but haven't arrived in the destination country. So, where they are? I call this mysterious place – Postal Limbo.

WESTIEKaTH

Yes I am having the same problem. Sent an order on 14 April to USA customer messaged me to say it had not arrived, I explained that the post it taking far longer than usual. Even with track and trace it is taking over 10 days. All this is of course understandable but do some of our customers understand - I fear not!!!

Colorado Bricks

I have 2 recent international order
8 lbs Priority Mail to New Zealand, Posted on 4/20, delivered on 5/5, was impressed of the speed.
8 oz First Class to Switzerland, Posted 5/3, Left the US on 5/6 and nothing after that.

erikboere

Still I have one buyer telling me he has nothing to do with all these problems and starting a claim. What does he expect, stick the ordered sticker on my back and swim over the ocean hoping to get entrance to Canada to deliver? We all depend on these transportation systems.
PostNL has raised a corona tax, especially making the tracked and insured shipments very expensive.
The problem is that is is difficult to get the picture of what is going on. Moreover it is hard to find out what exactly causes the delay. So posting experiences might help a bit both buyers and sellers of what to expect. I would ask buyers: Don't worry too fast.

ForeverSorting

Even with full tracking, it doesn't help if at the destination country they don't scan the tracking number. There are tens if not hundreds of containers at USJFKA (the main hub at USA) in backlog waiting to be opened. My oldest one left Portugal in late March and only showed progress in USA a couple of days ago. It's sitting there for like 2 months. The buyer always insisted it was lost. Of course it isn't, it is just the situation we are living atm. Even Expedited is having problems these days.

Some countries are very fast though. Most Asian countries are fast and Europe is not too bad. But Americas in general are with big delays. I just wish Buyers could be more understanding during these difficult times.

Stay safe everyone. Play & Stay Well.

Oldfan

My orders to USA from Germany are taking at least a month. I'm not even bothering to message the sellers, it's not their fault; it's my fault for ordering from Europe when I'm fully aware of the logistical issues caused by the pandemic shutdown (I really wanted those parts!). The orders are slowly but surely creeping in, though; nothing's been lost yet.

Pikka

This is from CzechPost website, but I think it applies to the most EU countries as well:

"...Current flight capacities are lower than the volumes of received consignments. Shipments may wait in Prague for up to several weeks so that the total delivery time may exceed one month. Last week alone, we managed to send about 6 tons of consignments to the United States and about 4 tons to the United Kingdom, but the capacity is still insufficient.

Problems can also occur in the opposite direction when consignments are delivered from the United States to the Czech Republic. The USPS sends part of the volume of consignments to Europe by ship and then by truck."

The text in full may be found here:
https://www.ceskaposta.cz/en/-/preprava-zasilek-do-a-z-usa-muze-byt-kvuli-nedostatecnemu-leteckemu-spojeni-neumerne-dlouha

MinifigMan

I noticed the same, and started sending out warning messages in april after Dutch Postal Services told me it could be "up to a month". Some packages took 6 weeks. They said it was because of understaffing of USPS (due to Corona).

My customers were pretty relaxed about it. I kept them updated as best I could.

What annoyed me the most is that tracking of packages to the US doesn't work at all since Corona hit. Either the tracking is completely blank from the moment it leaves The Netherlands, or there is a delivery date that keeps moving.

Two weeks ago I stopped direct checkout for the US. US customers should know about the delays before they order. So quotes only for the US now, so I can tell them what to expect.