I screwed up now..

[Pezzle]

I recently ventured into eBay sales for a local classical (minis, board games, RPGs) game store. However, my first two sales got the shipping labels mixed up! My boyfriend wrote PP on one box for one game and GG on another, and somehow I read his pretty handwriting wrong and mislabeled the boxes! Now two people have the wrong games!! AH!

The person who pointed it out to me was understanding and I feel really bad about the whole thing. What would you do in this situation? They live closer than I do to them (both Mountain Time) and it would be cheaper for them to ship it to each other and have me reimburse them through paypal, but i have less control over the item's status this way and can be held at fault.

Manager isn't mad he just told me to deal with it and move on.

I don't know how to handle this return! Advice?

[marasbaras]

I've done that myself. I shipped each person prepaid shipped labels that they could just slap onto the boxes and drop into the mail. Worked great, people were very understanding.

Also, because I used USPS Priority Mail, I was able to give each person the delivery confirmation code.

[Pezzle]

I've done that myself. I shipped each person prepaid shipped labels that they could just slap onto the boxes and drop into the mail. Worked great, people were very understanding.

Also, because I used USPS Priority Mail, I was able to give each person the delivery confirmation code.

I used USPS Priority Mail but I didn't think to make prepaid shipping labels! Oh no, I don't know what to do now

[Titi]

I used USPS Priority Mail but I didn't think to make prepaid shipping labels! Oh no, I don't know what to do now

I think that what they meant was that after the mistake they used prepaid shipping labels that they mailed tp the people who got the wrong orders. Do you still have their addresses? If so do that.)

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Prepaid shipping labels printed through Paypal are your friend. Saves you the hassle of having to wait in line at the post office. If the package is small enough you can just drop it in the bin inside.

I'd personally ask them to ship the mislabeled packages back to me so I can relabel them. It was, after all, my mistake, plus I'm not sure I'd trust a total stranger to forward a package to its intended recipient.

[marasbaras]

If the stranger isn't going to forward the package to someone else, they're not going to return it to you.

Prepaid labels, best way to go. Via PayPal or Stamps.com. Just wonderful.

[Pezzle]

I had printed the labels out through paypal before, I'm just wondering like.. do I reprint shipping labels/return labels and mail them to them so they can mail the packages to me?

[workerbee222]

send each customer prepaid labels to send the merchandise back to you.

This stuff happens from time to time. At one of my old jobs, I got a package that should have been shipped to a different store. The vendor had me send it back to them, and they re-shipped it.

I'm not sure I'd want some unknown person to have my address, even though we all know it would be quicker just to have them mail the packages to each other.

I screw up weekly at work. I'm really good at doing part of my job, but actual sales is hard for me. I'm not mean or anything, I just don't gloss over the truth. I'll come right out and say, "Well the disadvantage of this product is..."

It is a weekly event for my sup and asst manager to be in the break room sputtering, "She said what to a customer?"

[Pezzle]

Can you write "return to sender" on a priority mail box? :P The prepaid label thing sounds best. One of the customers just asked me if they can write "Return to Sender" on the box and leave it for a well liked/known postman.

[fma_fanatic]

You can write "return to sender" on anything sent via USPS. In this case, it might be a good idea to have the customers write that on the box, and take it into their local post office.

[Pezzle]

Even if said box is opened?

[Andara Bledin]

I've done a lot of eBaying. (most of my job is to handle eBay purchases)

The first thing you need to do is make sure that you've contacted both parties. Obviously Party A has contacted you to let you now they got the wrong item. If Party B hasn't already contacted you, then you need to contact them to let them know that you shipped the wrong item to them. If they haven't opened it yet, just have them mark return to sender.

After that, your choices are basically to either have both parties mail the items back to you (print out prepaid labels with your address as the ship to and mail them to each party); or you can have them mail the packages to each other (print out prepaid shipping labels, one for Party A which you mail to Party B, and one for Party B which you mail to Party A).

After you get the shipping all sorted out, as an extra customer service touch to help attone for the mix-up, you might ask your boss if you can refund the shipping fees for both Party A and Party B. If it's not too much, it's a small price to pay for excellent mail order customer service.

^-.-^

[Pezzle]

One more question. Do I go to the post office and just request to make a prepaid priority mail shipping label? Can I do this from an origination zip code other than the return address? Since the A zip code closes at 4 PM and the B zip code at 7 PM...

I guess I could just petty cash out and pay at the post office since there's no ebay option to reprint shipping labels more than 24hrs after.

[Andara Bledin]

I'm not positive, as I haven't worked with the post office that much, but I'm fairly certain you can do that. They don't really care what the return address states, as long as the postage from the origin to the destination is paid.

If I were in your situation, I'd call the post office and ask them.

^-.-^