Why can't people pack items properly?!

[timb]

So, a few days before Christmas I was browsing eBay and ended up getting a great deal on a vintage precision power supply, an HP 6114A to be exact. The seller even included free shipping! I had a couple of other items in my cart, so I checked out and thought everything was good. I was busy with Holiday activities and pretty much forgot about it.

On January 4th I get a payment reminder from eBay, saying the item hadn't been payed for. So I check and, sure enough it hadn't! Turns out the item had been moved to the "Save for Later" cart, so when I checked out it hadn't been included. Oops! No big deal though, I wrote the seller a note explaining the situation and paid immediately.

I then wrote the seller another message, asking them nicely to make sure it was well packed with several layers of bubble wrap, etc. as I had recently gotten a similar item from another seller, which had been packed with only newspaper and was damaged.

I never got a reply to either message. Three days after paying I got a shipment notification. Finally, two days ago, I got the package.

Behold, the flimsiest used cardboard box:





As soon as I saw the box, with packing peanuts leaking out, I knew... I sighed and cut the tape on the top of the box...

This is exactly how it looked upon opening it:





Surprisingly, there was very little outer cosmetic damage, aside from some bent heat sink fins and a broken banana jack.



The real damage happened inside. One of the big 4 terminal caps partially snapped from the shock of bouncing around inside the box. The voltage reference board wasn't screwed in properly and came loose. It's just a mess, but appears fixable, which is good news as the unit has a high serial number (88-89 date codes on the parts) and is otherwise in very nice cosmetic condition.

Anyway, I contacted the seller with pictures and asked why he would ship it like that after I specifically asked him to use bubblewrap. I also asked for a refund to cover the damage. He replied with the following:

1. You can't tell a seller how to pack and ship.
2. You sent that message when you paid- 10 days after the sell date and after a reminder. I box up an item when it sells, not 10 days later when you decided to pay.
3. Send the item back and I'll fully refund your paypal payment.

This made me kind of angry, so I told him that I *shouldn't* have to tell sellers *how* to pack items properly, but after nearly 20 years and thousands of transaction and a lot of damaged items, I've learned that for heavy, delicate items, yes, I do. I went on to ask him why he thought a large 20lb item was going to make it cross country via ground shipping in an oversized box half full of packing peanuts. This is common sense stuff! I told him I'd be willing to return it, but he had to pay for shipping. I told him I'd accept a $35 partial refund, since it could be fixed. (Which is a better deal for him as postage to me was nearly $40.)

After thinking about it, I opened a case with eBay explaining the above and including the pictures. 20 minutes later he offered me a $35 refund. I accepted it and eBay's system said they had a problem collecting the refund and the seller had been notified. So that's where I'm at now.

Sorry, this ended up being a long rant, but it just crawls all over me. I literally told him what would happen if he didn't use bubble wrap, and he was either too stubborn, lazy or stupid to do it. Most likely all of the above.

I just don't get the thought process that goes into this... Did he really think, "Well, once it's sold its not my problem anymore" and not realize if it was damaged due to poor packing eBay would make him either pay return shipping or give me a refund?

It just boggles my mind...

Anyway, feel free to use this thread to share examples of packing and shipping horror stories!

[MrSlack]

Had a hard disk posted to me loose in an A4  jiffy bag. Didn't work.

[Brumby]

Wanting to squeeze the last drop out of my computer, I upgraded a few things - but the CPU was the most interestingly packed.

Here is my envelope...



A true exercise of 'Re-use' .... but it's a bit thin:



... and the staples are far enough apart for you to look inside and see .... is that bubble wrap?!!!



And here it is what was inside....



I'm not sliding anything around.  I don't want anything rubbing on anything or risk pins getting caught, so I'm just going to cut away the top layer and fold it back...



and then the second layer, to reveal ....



My ... new ... CPU.   Gulp.  Fortunately, it survived ... but really?

[timb]

Had a hard disk posted to me loose in an A4  jiffy bag. Didn't work.

Wanting to squeeze the last drop out of my computer, I upgraded a few things - but the CPU was the most interestingly packed.

Here is my envelope...



A true exercise of 'Re-use' .... but it's a bit thin:



... and the staples are far enough apart for you to look inside and see .... is that bubble wrap?!!!



And here it is what was inside....



I'm not sliding anything around.  I don't want anything rubbing on anything or risk pins getting caught, so I'm just going to cut away the top layer and fold it back...



and then the second layer, to reveal ....



My ... new ... CPU.   Gulp.  Fortunately, it survived ... but really?

[Brumby]

I even included a note: "I trust you will ship with appropriate anti-static precautions. Thank you."

 

[mij59]

I ordered 5 PCS 1W COB LED Filament from china, I  received about 15 broken pieces  in a plastic bag.

[timb]

I even included a note: "I trust you will ship with appropriate anti-static precautions. Thank you."

 

As soon as you said "CPU" and I saw the side view of the envelope, with the white bubble wrap visible, I cringed. I'm surprised the pins were just bent and not broken. Glad it ended up working though!

I don't know about everybody else, but when I order something online, I enjoy the anticipation of getting the package and opening it, even though I obviously know what's in it. It's awesome to come home and have a packages to open.

It's like Christmas-On-Demand. So, when you get a item that's damaged, the feeling is like unwrapping a present, but instead of the Nintendo you were hoping for, you got... Socks.

[MrSlack]

Definitely.

Occasionally you get a pleasant surprise though. I got someone else's Farnell order dropped in with mine a couple of years ago. Had some rather nice Pomona test leads and some BNC cables in it. Finders keepers!

[Brumby]

As soon as you said "CPU" and I saw the side view of the envelope, with the white bubble wrap visible, I cringed. I'm surprised the pins were just bent and not broken. Glad it ended up working though!

I skipped right over cringe and went directly to 

Fortunately there weren't even any bent pins.  The only additional effort I had to make was to pick out a small fragment of plastic from between some of the pins and then give a spray rinse with some IPA.

[wraper]

Gearbest packs most of the items in just a plastic or bubble wrap bag. Of course I received my new phone in a box which was beaten a bit (but could be much worse). If it received a hit in the middle, pretty sure the screen would be shattered. You know, there isn't a good feel of a new product when you receive it like this.
On the other hand I do package my items really well and often see appreciation from many buyers about it in the ebay feedback. Not a single complain about mechanically damaged item after more than thousand of sales.

[rich]

Too many people reselling kit on eBay don't appreciate that whilst the case looks strong the inside is fragile and heavy items in flimsy boxes makes carrying it more awkward and so increases the chances rougher handling along the way.

My horror was a small TTi 250mA power supply shipped with a Keithey 197 bench DMM. No separation packing and the oversized box was just filled loosely with scrunched up newspaper One foot snapped clean off the Keithley and the TTi board split/smashed 2 out of 4 moulded case standoffs.

[timb]

Too many people reselling kit on eBay don't appreciate that whilst the case looks strong the inside is fragile and heavy items in flimsy boxes makes carrying it more awkward and so increases the chances rougher handling along the way.

My horror was a small TTi 250mA power supply shipped with a Keithey 197 bench DMM. No separation packing and the oversized box was just filled loosely with scrunched up newspaper One foot snapped clean off the Keithley and the TTi board split/smashed 2 out of 4 moulded case standoffs.

This exactly.

I had a Power Designs 2005A come packed in a box barely bigger than the unit itself, with only a thin layer of newspaper as cushioning. The oven, which is a tube that mounts over a round Bakelite base and attached to the PCB by two screws, had completely snapped off.

(The lady was very apologetic and gave me a full refund + told me to keep it. Which is nice, because it was in absolutely original shape. I ended up buying a beat to hell unit for cheap and transplanting the oven.)

The best packed item I've ever gotten was an HP 3456A. As some of you might know, these are huge 1U full length 19" beasts. The seller used that expanding foam in the grey crinkly wrapping. That's the way to go if you ship high volumes.

Also, I may have a spare 197 bottom-half if you still need it.

[rdl]

I received an HP E3610 power supply that was shipped in a priority mail box with almost no packaging at all. There was one layer of 1/2 inch bubble-wrap around the sides, but nothing on the end to protect the controls and binding posts. The heatsinks had a little bit of wadded up newspaper between them and the cardboard, but the binding posts were right against the outside of the box.

I have no idea how it managed to arrive undamaged.

[MrSlack]

This thread is painful. I only go and collect large items. I don't trust people with them.

[rich]

Also, I may have a spare 197 bottom-half if you still need it.

I could be interested, it depends on how you'd pack it 

[rich]

The heatsinks had a little bit of wadded up newspaper between them and the cardboard, but the binding posts were right against the outside of the box.

The sender's thought process was probably to use newspaper to protect the box from being sliced by the heatsink, rather than the other way around. 

[marshallh]

My Lecroy (from bncnengineer on ebay I think) was extremely well packed. The box was the size of a small fridge and had about 10-12 inches of padding on all sides of the instrument. Unsurprisingly, there was zero shipping damage.

[steve30]

I remember getting a desktop computer off ebay once. That was very neatly packaged and I actually had trouble opening it .

I got a 14" Philips CRT video monitor once from someone on a forum. There were quite a lot of packaging materials, but it was shaking around in the box a bit. Fortunately it arrived in fine condition.

Don't think I've ever had any horror stories as such.

[TheSteve]

The last Agilent supply I bought off ebay (E3630A) was "packed" in a box smaller then the supply with no packing material at all. The box had to be stretched to get the supply in. Of course it was a damaged, before shipping it was brand new, after shipping, not so much.

[edpalmer42]

I almost always mention the packing when I give a rating on ebay.  If you buy something that's poorly packed, be sure to say so - regardless of the rating you give.  Unless we make it public that the item was poorly packed, the sellers have no incentive to change.

Ed

[AF6LJ]

It amazes the hell out of me what people think is acceptable packing methods.
Having worked for a small publishing company as their shipping / receiving / distribution manager I have seen some horror stories appear at out back door.

I packed a box for shipment to Canada that weighed just over 24LBS, I was new there at the time and my boss questioned if it was packed well enough. We had seen a number or boxes with split seams.... I told her watch this; I threw the box down the hall ten feet and picked it up, and handed it to her for inspection.
"Good enough Sue".

Rule of thumb;
if you cannot drop it three feet and expect it to survive...
Don't ship it.

[fivefish]

Looks like a re-used cardboard box too.... right there, that's already a big problem.

And if a box is too big, and the packer didn't fill it up completely, it will collapse when weight is put on top of it, or it got crushed from the sides.

[chris_leyson]

Some people just don't think I guess, had a few TEK 7000 plugins arrive with broken knobs and bent shafts, lucky I had a few scap plugins for spares. A Redifon R551N packed in a cardboard box with a handful of polystyrene chips, good job they're boat anchors.
Bought some stuff from Toronto Surplus and Scientific, comes well packed, but with surplus packing materials, astro turf and old matresses  I even had an almost empty box delivered by UPS, still had the packing note and a few polystyrene chips, got a replacement  UPS. It wasn't their fault the shipper didn't pack it properly.

I've bought some fairly large items from professional test equipment dealers and they have always been well packed, usually in polythene sheet and expanding foam so nothing is going to move.

Anybody got any recommendations for two part expanding foam, just in case I need to ship something.

[KJDS]

Anybody got any recommendations for two part expanding foam, just in case I need to ship something.

http://sealedair.com/product-care/product-care-products/foam-packaging/instapak-foam-packaging

but unless you're sending lots then it's cost and space prohibitive.

[timb]

Looks like a re-used cardboard box too.... right there, that's already a big problem.

And if a box is too big, and the packer didn't fill it up completely, it will collapse when weight is put on top of it, or it got crushed from the sides.

Yup, what I thought too. I cut the tape and opened the top flaps of the box; when I did that the entire side just fell open, which is when I took the third picture. You'd expect packing peanuts to have gone everywhere, but they didn't. Only a handful came out, so pretty much what you see in that picture is what was actually in the box.

Packing Peanuts/Foam Chips are *not* designed to protect heavy items! The item will bounce around and pulverize them, which is what happened here.

Still waiting on the refund. I contacted the seller with the error from eBay and told him to try doing a refund directly through PayPal, he replied that the transaction was locked, so he couldn't. Then I told him to try the eBay Resolution Center instead. Haven't heard back yet.