For the past month or two, I’ve noticed an icky trend: More and more packages are taking longer and longer to arrive to their destinations. Yesterday, when I checked on the status of a package to the UK, which I sent July 3, the tracking information told me the package arrived in Chicago on July 4 … and it was still there.
Yesterday, in case you missed it, was July 16.
((blink blink))
Today, I received a convo from that buyer. The package arrived today. Soooo … someone clearly is having some issues at the post office.
The problem that creates for me as a seller is, once I ship an item, I can do nothing about how long it takes to arrive to its new home. Which is bullocks.
Now, I hear PayPal offers wonderful shipping labels with inexpensive tracking, which I had planned to implement as soon as I got my new studio set up. Well, it’s set up. And now … no one is using PayPal anymore.
Etsy began to offer a direct checkout option a month or so ago, removing the middle man all together — you can pay via credit or dept card straight to Etsy. Which is awesome. But now, there’s no easy way to deal with tracking short of going to the post office every time I get a sale.
Enter Stamps.com, my new favorite website on the planet.
For $15 a month, I get a free postal scale (currently, I’m using one that my dad’s lab threw out — it measures in grams and is scary accurate — it can give an exact weight of a drop of hand sanitizer, so it’s a bit much for weighing my 2-ounce packages) and … wait for it … FREE TRACKING.
So from here on out, Jac & Elsie shoppers will have tracking with all their orders for no extra charge.
With this change, however, I did have to adjust my shipping costs, from $2 to $3. But it’s not all bad, I swear: That $3 shipping is flat rate to anywhere in the world. So if you buy a dozen things, it will still cost you $3 for shipping. That’s not terrible, right??
I’m still in the process of figuring out Stamps.com, and I apologize for any hiccups over the next week as I grow accustomed to this new way of shipping. But I promise, it’s a good thing for you.
I think your flat rate shipping is great – it should go over well!
You can still use PayPal shipping with the Etsy direct checkout, just go to paypal.com/shipnow and copy and paste the info over.