I’d wait to see…I feel the extra day with the holiday today might be more of a reason why it didn’t happen. See how it is next weekend…
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Hi all,
So it is starting again. Today is a Sunday and am working on packing orders and to states like NY, CA, and even MI is not giving me USPS GA option. But I am pretty sure that USPS GA will be available to the same states for orders received tomorrow.
This has been the same trend the last month or so. So this proves my template settings have nothing to do with it. It seems like Amazon adds another day on weekends for some reason. Now, I don’t have A to Z protection…
Also, should I be updating this on this post or should I have created a new post?
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This post was fine.
We just did all of our labels for the weekend. They were all Zone 5 and Zone 6. All were done as USPS Ground Advantage (under 1lb). All of the Amazon estimated delivery time was 3 or 4 days.
Is your issue with USPS GA 1lb to 70lb? … or USPS GA under 1lb?
What Zones are having an issue with?
What is the state you are shipping from?
What is your Handle Time set to?
What is your Shipping Template Transit time set to?
Do you have more than one Shipping Template?
Is it the same type of item that has the problem or a wide variety of items (big and small items)?
Since this is re-occurring for you and others are using USPS GA without issue, there has to be some common setting that you are using that is causing the issue.
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It seems to be the timing of the purchase.
Had 1 customer order X on Friday.
Then today he ordered it again.
I decide to ship tonight since I am busy tomorrow.
The order placed on Friday only shipping options were UPS ground advantage (I.e slow boat to china) or priority mail.
The order placed today had all options.
Deliver by date the same, ship by date the same. and yes the shipping address was the same.
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USPS GA 1lb to 70lb? … or USPS GA under 1lb?
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Thanks for the detailed questions to help!
- Mine are almost always under 1 lb.
- I actually don’t know how to see the zones… it’s states that are most likely far from me, like CA, WA, NY, PA, VA and even SC and NC. I sometimes have issues with LA which is right next to where I am, TEXAS!
- I am in Texas, so this makes me think since I’m in the middle of all, I shouldn’t have problems with shipping.
- Handle time is set to 1 day and my cutoff time is set to 1:30 PM. my weekends are set to not operating but I do ship on Saturdays for orders received by 11AM. (should I change Saturday as working day? maybe this will fix it?)
- shipping template transit time: for example, CA is set to 2- 4 days. CA can take 5 business days but with handling time set to 1 day, that should add up to 5 business days.
- I only have 1 shipping template.
- Just one type of item. Pretty much the same size and 99.99% of them are always around 4oz - 8oz.
But here’s the catch. I don’t have this problem during the weekdays. Not 1. It just happens on the orders I receive on weekends.
I’m currently packaging orders right now and it sucks I can’t use Amazon buy shipping…
Thanks for your attention to my issue @Lost_My_Marbles
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So are we … near Lubbock
No … we are Monday thru Friday also with 1 day General Handle Time and 2 days at item level.
Same for our shipments.
This is what we use and never have an issue …
This is where you need to change. You can try 3 - 5 days but, for us, it has to be 5 -8 days to avoid having issues with USPS GA.
Your other option is to use another service like PirateShip to purchase the labels when it isn’t available and then enter tracking into Amazon. You loose A to Z coverage so you will have to choose that risk or change the shipping transit settings.
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I’m in WA State and created plenty of GA labels this morning including all over east coast with no problem.
Out of curiosity, did you edit the ship date when creating labels to change it to Monday?
Outside of your shipping settings or 2-4 days which I agree with @Lost_My_Marbles, my only other thought would be the Saturday setting.
Here are my settings that never give me issues with GA availability.
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under 1 lb.
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Thanks for the zone chart! I’ve bookmarked it.
Ah, nice to see a fellow seller from Texas! I am originally from Philly and moved out here a little outside of Dallas last year.
And yes, I use both shipstation and pirateship for the ones I can’t buy USPS GA with Amazon buy shipping.
@Lost_My_Marbles @wadeorcas Here is my screenshot of the template. What’s weird is, long time ago, I remember having 3-5 days but I don’t have that option anymore. That’s why I chose 2-4.
Here’s a screenshot of the options I can choose. I don’t have 3-5 days.
And I want to emphasize that, with the same setting, I don’t have any issues on weekdays. And the fact that this only started sometime around April of this year. I’ve been selling for a little over 3 years now and the last time I made changes was last year. The change I made was lowering the cost for my premium shippings.
All orders I received today are all fine. I have couple NY orders and all have USPS GA option.
I’m starting to think it’s a glitch in Amazon buy shipping. It somehow adds another day on the weekend.
I’m crossing my fingers and just hoping the buyers who purchased on weekends don’t have any real issues or watch tiktok lol
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The 3 - 5 use to be there with the prior USPS First Class Package. When it changed to USPS GA, Amazon did their tweak thing and people started seeing the 2 - 4 and 5 - 8.
Our suggestion for you would be …
TX - OK - AR set to 2 - 4
The rest of lower 48 set to 5 - 8
AK - HI set to 5 - 10
All of the US island territories and anything going to AA, AE, AP armed forces set to 7 - 14
Note … this does not mean it will take that long for packages to be delivered. It just eliminates the extended Amazon calculation problem.
Example … we typically see 6 to 7 day Amazon estimate to WA … yet packages normally arrive in 2 to 3 days. From our side of TX to your side of TX, Amazon will say 4 - 6 days … and delivery tends to be 5 - 7 days.
You probably don’t see many orders to this side of TX but, if you did, your setting of 2 - 3 would most likely yield Amazon not showing USPS GA.
@wadeorcas and us both run a little longer shipping transit times and do not have this issue, it stands to reason that you would need to follow.
Another note would be that we are more rural. That adds a day of transit time and may account for @wadeorcas being able to achieve the same results using 3 - 5 while we need 5 - 8.
And finally, the options we see in the drop down selection of transit time could be different as Amazon could be setting these parameters based on a sellers location (must like USPS does).
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Thank you for your detailed answers!
I’ve been thinking of extending the days for AA, AE, AP. I don’t get much orders from them much anyways.
I’m going to think about this a bit, changing the rest of the states to 5 - 8 days. My items are event specific so seeing faster delivery time is one of the big deciding factors for buyers.
One question - If I link Amazon to any of the third party shipping like shipstation, pirateship, veeqo, would the Amazon delivery time be forced on?
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We can not answer that as we have never done that … maybe someone with experience with that could provide the answer … and whether A to Z is lost doing that …
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@Old-Timer is our Veeqo expert 
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Originally, Veeqo would only allow you to purchase labels that meet the delivery date. Same as if you use Buy Shipping from Seller Central. Veeqo grayed out any shipping method that did not meet the required delivery date.
We stopped using Veeqo after numerous issues, but I believe those issues may have been fixed by today. I use ShipWorks, but I probably would try Veeqo again if I didn’t already pay monthly for ShipWorks.
For Veeqo, right before we cancelled, Veeqo would show a Green shield icon on any shipping method that would be protected from INR’s (or most a-z claims). You could select a different method and forfeit the protection, but I am not sure if that feature has been changed since we cancelled Veeqo.
ShipWorks, which may work similar to ShipStation, does have a feature called Amazon Buy Shipping API. It provides the Amazon Buy Shipping Protection. It 100% forces you to select a delivery method that meets the delivery date. Same as Amazon Buy Shipping through Seller Central. But you can unselect the Amazon Buy Shipping API and use your own shipping account in ShipWorks and create the label but then you lose the Amazon Buy Shipping Protection for claims.
Let me know if I didn’t answer your questions.
Side note: We have been using Shipping Automation since it first appeared. No issues with our shipping USPS Ground Advantage.
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Thanks for all your help @Lost_My_Marbles !
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thanks!
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Thank you! That clarifies everything. I have to either give up A to Z protection or pay for USPS Priority. In my case, since it’s only happening on weekends and out of the weekend orders, it may just be a handful at most where I would get an INR so I’ll just deal with it.
Thanks again!
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Yeah, I thought you were going to have issues again once the normal weekend came after Memorial Day weekend.
There is no real rhyme or reason to what gets GA on the weekends. It’s not happening as much for us but it still happens on a few orders per weekend.
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Thanks for your input!
I think it’s a small glitch and also have to do with the fact that I like to set my delivery time as short as possible.
I’m just gonna have to deal with it and hope no buyers on the weekends contact me for INR.
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