#shipping-customs 2026-05-20

tracking going dark for a week or ten days at a port is common and resolves on its own most of the time

be patient with support

what does the room consider a normal transit time now

vat is usually charged on declared value plus shipping, and the handling fee is often more than the vat

does a signature requirement help or hurt

if you query a missing parcel, be factual and patient. the good suppliers respond to that

coming back after 24 months, has anything changed with Ireland

signature requirements slow things down and do not obviously reduce loss

the transit table is pinned and built from what members actually reported, not from what suppliers quote

day ten of no tracking movement. last scan was arrived at destination sort facility

that scan is the one that generates the most panic in here and it is usually the least meaningful

how is it not meaningful, it has been sat there for ten days

because arrived at facility can mean it is in a cage with four thousand other parcels waiting for a broker to batch them

mine sat for twelve days on that exact status in january and then cleared and delivered within 36 hours

twelve

twelve. i had written it off on day nine

that is a completely normal customs queue and not a seizure. a seizure produces a letter, not silence forever

worth separating the two failure modes. silence at a port is a queue. silence with no arrival scan at all is a lost or fake parcel

and label created with no first physical scan is not a parcel at all, it is a label

mine has physical scans, so at least it exists

it exists, it is in the country, it is in a queue. i would give it another week before doing anything

the cold pack is going to be a puddle

it has been a puddle since day two. lyophilised material does not care

i asked Xi'an Mokemei about this once and they said the cold pack is for the first 48 hours and customer reassurance after that, which was refreshingly honest

reminder: the archive median for parcels stuck on arrived at facility is 6 days, 90th percentile 14 days, based on 212 self-reported timelines

the bot is more comforting than any of you

the bot has 212 data points and we have vibes and trauma

the bot only knows what people reported, which skews towards the ones that eventually arrived. survivor bias applies

good caveat. people who lose a parcel often stop posting about it

day 13. it moved. released by customs, out for delivery

there it is

and it was split into two parcels which nobody told me about, so half of it is still showing the old status

split consignments confuse tracking badly. one tracking number, two physical parcels, two different queues

Zhuhai Kerui do this and they do tell you. two numbers, two boxes, arrive a couple of days apart

the big commercial shippers never split like this because they are moving a pallet, not a box. WuXi TIDES consignments arrive as one thing on a commercial invoice

second parcel arrived. everything intact, ten vials, cakes all fine

so, thirteen days of nothing and then a completely normal delivery. that is the outcome about eight times in ten

i genuinely thought it was gone

if you are the next person reading this at day ten: wait. that is the entire advice.

*eight times in ten according to the bot, which the mod already told us to distrust

correct on both counts, which is very much the register of this channel