I've mailed this book uisng paypal shipping with delivery confirmation

9400109699938340648637 - book was delivered December 28 but the other person is yet to mark the book

as received - what is the next step?

I recently had the same issue, so I took a look at the Help Docs (please see below). 

PBS also sends periodic email reminders (Has [title] arrived?) at 2 weeks after mailing, and soon before the lost date. You can also PM the requestor. Please avoid sounding accusatory; sometimes USPS DC shows delivered, but not necessarily to the right address. Stress that you actually mailed the book on [date] because they might be wondering if you mailed it late. 

The requestor actually marked it received the day before it was set to go lost, so ultimately I didn't have to do anything. I have done the steps below with an inactive member and I got the credit via PBS.

Good luck! 

If you sent the book with DC purchased elsewhere and it has been recorded as delivered by USPS but hasn't been marked received yet:

• First, contact the requestor from the active transaction (in the Books I've Mailed tab in My Account), or from the "lost" transaction in your Transaction Archive if the book has been declared Lost in the Mail by PBS.
• If the requestor does not respond to your PM within five days, contact us and we will look into it.
• We cannot grant credit for DC purchased outside PBS, but we can check if this requestor has become inactive.
• If this requestor is inactive, your book should be marked received by the system.

If your book does not arrive by the 26th day (the 35th day if the sender or requestor is outside the contiguous US) after you marked it mailed, it will be declared Lost in the Mail at PBS.  This does not mean that the book is actually lost; it may simply be delayed en route.  You can read more about Lost books in A book I sent is lost in the mail!.

PM and politely ask if the book was received (best not to assume).  Members occassionally forget to log books in, or sometimes USPS mis-delivers.  A gentle reminder can be helpful, and if the book has not arrived you can notify USPS the package is missing.

If you get no response after several days, you can notify TPTB.  But keep in mind you might not hear back immediately.

With books traveling over the holidays, it is always a good idea to wait a while in case they took vacation time off, but by now you would think most people would be back to work or school unless they are a college student.

I agree-- it's time to PM the person, allow 2 days to respond and if no response then contact PBS.

And when I contacted the requestor, I'd include the DC number.

Unfortunately the post office won't be able to do anything because so many days have passed and therefore the mailman won't be able to

remember about this package -

even with delivery confirmation the post office won't do much (from a few experiences I have had)

Even if the post office tries they rarely find a lost item, I've tried several times. Also a delivery scan does not guarantee the book was delivered at all much less to the right address. I've had books myself that were scanned delivered but never reached me, and while the p.o. figured out at what point they disappeared (and proved they were not delievered to me) they never did find out what happened to them. It's not that uncommon either, so I would definitely not assume they didn't just mark them. They quite regularly mark them delivered at the substation before sending them out which is against the rules but still happens. Many times you will see someone here saying their DC trail showed the books scanned delivered days before they were actually received. Best to ask nicely.

When the one package went missing at my p.o. it had been scanned delivered on a Friday and I talked to my maillady on the next Tuesday (and we talked fairly regularly, she knew me a bit) and she already had no specific recollection of my actual mail delivery that day. When you think about how many houses they go to a day unless there's something unusual they aren't going to remember your mail. I doubt they even look at it much considering how often I get my neighbors mail.

A polite PM saying the DC shows the book was delivered and I'd like them to confirm if they did or didn't so I can start the USPS searching for it (or having the site follow up on a no response) has always prompted the book to be marked received for me.

I would like to point out that, though there are a few different recommendations on timeframe from members, the Help Documents show the site's request of waiting at least 5 days from sending the PM before contacting them.

I usually wait a week after the book was shown delivered by the PO and then send a PM  politely asking if they did receive the book and a reminder to mark as received. I have never had a problem from the other end and have always had the book quickly marked as received. Sometimes people just forget and one time they thought they did mark it, but apparently it didn't register in the system for whatever reason.

Barb, the fact that you actually see a pattern of missing books would indicate a local problem.  I've received over 850 books, and so few have gone missing (none that show delivered) there seems to be no one particular pattern.  Of my outgoing books, none has gone lost (although 1 tried and was recovered).

I sent a book with delivery confirmation on Nov. 2 - the tracking info says it never left Orlando (that is my local post office) - I called them and they just called me back asked me a few questions about the address the package was going to and that was all they did. 

I also sent another book with DC.  This time it was marked delivered (but not received)- when I called the post office they contacted the other post office and then told me the mail person has said she delivered the item to a woman who was standing in the yard (this is a rural place) at the address where the package was going to - that was good enough for their investigation and they closed the case.