i mailed out a book earlier this month to a member who requested it. i mailed the book out on may 14,2016. according to the usps tracking the requestor received the book on May 17,2016. my question is how long do i wait for this member to mark received until i do something. i sent a pm on Saturday. and it has yet to be read and the book has yet to be marked received. how long would you wait to contact PBS or retry pming the requestor? i hate to seem impatient. but with the holiday weekend almost here. i would like to have most of my transactions cleared before the holiday. what would you do?

I do not contact the requestor until 2-3 days before it is to go lost. At that point I PM them saying that I want to assure them that I mailed the book on (fill in the date), USPS noted it received on (fill in the date) and to please marik it received so that I can get my credit. If you do not hear from them in 5 days you can contact PBS asking them to look into whether it is an inactive account. However, PBS will not do so until the book has gone lost. Asking them to do it now, for your convenience, will not get results. You need to wait until the book has gone lost. Remember, with the holiday a lot of people are traveling, the receiver might not even be at home to mark it received. The book might have been delivered to the wrong house. You must be patient and wait until the book has gone lost before proceeding further.

Now that the Post Office provides tracking. I provide the tracking to every requester and set my self up for delivery confirmimation. When USPS says delivered I email the requester.Seems simple.

Well I f Post office says deliverd on 5/17 then that is the date would have emailled. Long overdo!

The person could be away.  I have had that happen before.

Yepp..and scanned delivered doesn't mean it wasn't misdelivered or delivered a few days later. I would pm again about a week after the first one. I usually don't get members who mark received fast. Scanning will show delivered for a couple of weeks before they're marked. I actually think the pbs emails is what reminds them to mark received.  May be the same in your case.

The PBS team will investigate if a member is non-responsive to your emails, but as Sally said, they won't get involved until after the book has gone lost.  Wait until about 5 days before the "lost" date, send another PM, wait a week, and then contact PBS if they are non-responsive.

the frustraing part is that according to the usps website. the sooner you report a lost piece of mail/package with tracking the more likely the post office is to find it. i wish i knew if that was the case here or if this is just a requestor who delayed is marking. or is on vacation or something else came up. lack of communication is a major problem with a lot of this members not marking received. and if they went on vacation for the memorial day holiday. if the package got received in their  home mailbox (no this didn't get sent to a p o box) even if it was a few days after the 17th. they still have a whole week between then and the holiday.

I agree on lack of communication. Although sometimes something unexpected happens and you just go and not think of pbs.

With most media mail within CONUS arriving within 7 days now (compared to 2-3 weeks a few years ago), I usually wait to send a reminder PM  just 7 days after tracking shows it delivered. Every time I have done this the recipient has replied that they 'just forgot' to mark it received so it's not been a mail issue just inattentive members. So I feel justified in sending the PM.

Or you could avoid the whole issue in the future and use PBS postage so you will automatically get your credit when you mark it mailed. The small fee might be totally worth it for your peace of mind. By the way, I have had times when the PO marked the book delivered to me several days before it actually was delivered...

Well..I hear that well spend the exra .55 but that adds up. Sure a few books is fine but personally, I won't waste the extra money. For me, I just wait and wait until the other member decides to mark it.

well i just checked my account page and this member has still not read my pm or marked the book received. although they did put their bookshelf on hold. kicker is they didn't put their wishlist on hold so people can still send them books. lol. so send this member books. (just don't expect them to mark them received) oh well.

I don't PM senders unless it is close to the loss date. The system sends reminders if the book hasn't been marked received. I don't know what is going on in the other person's life. Bad weather could have disrupted his or her life. He or she might be on vacation and the mail is being held at the post office. Life happens, if I needed a credit quickly, I have the option to use PBS Postage.

You know, this member could have had a medical emergency, had a death in the family, be out of town, had their computer go down, been affected by some of the tornados that ripped thru the heartland recently...we have no idea what is going on in other member's lives, but I can guarantee you that their life is completely different from yours. This member has done nothing wrong, they still have plenty of time to mark the book received. I think you are getting pretty het up without knowing why the member hasn't read your PM or marked the book received...there could be a very valid reason or they just could be irresponsible... But you are not going to lose your credit, you just have to wait until it is marked received or the book goes lost. Patience!

How can you check to see if a PM has been read?

Yes, you can and she says it hasn't been read. Many people are not at PBS every day, only log on when they want to request a book or mark one received. I don't get notifications from PBS when someone has PMed me so it is possible the member is not even aware there is a PM waiting to be read. 

Could you tell me how to check?  It would be interesting to know.  Thanks.

Kathleen, go to your personal messages page.  Click the from me tab and then the unread button.

Although, lots of times it would look like I haven't read a PM when I've seen it on my phone and read it there, so it's no guarantee that the person hasn't seen your PM.

That said - patience is a virtue here.  I always use PBS postage so it's easier to be patient when I've already got my credit.  But, in the persons defense, if they truly haven't read the PM and they have put their bookshelf on hold, it sounds like maybe they have gone out of town or something.

Also, twice in the many years I've been a member here, someone has sent me a book with tracking and it was shown as delivered to me, but it never really was.  I can only assume it was misdelivered, but regardless I couldn't mark it received and the person just had to wait for it to go lost to get their credit.  And, I've never had good luck with USPS finding a misdelivered package either.

Kathleen, go to your personal messages page.  Click the from me tab and then the unread button.

Although, lots of times it would look like I haven't read a PM when I've seen it on my phone and read it there, so it's no guarantee that the person hasn't seen your PM.

That said - patience is a virtue here.  I always use PBS postage so it's easier to be patient when I've already got my credit.  But, in the persons defense, if they truly haven't read the PM and they have put their bookshelf on hold, it sounds like maybe they have gone out of town or something.

Also, twice in the many years I've been a member here, someone has sent me a book with tracking and it was shown as delivered to me, but it never really was.  I can only assume it was misdelivered, but regardless I couldn't mark it received and the person just had to wait for it to go lost to get their credit.  And, I've never had good luck with USPS finding a misdelivered package either.

Thanks so much! I never even noticed that button after all these years.

Thanks so much! I never even noticed that button after all these years.

I have this happen ALL THE TIME--to the point where I'm not sure I'll be continuing my membership when it expires in February.

The Help center says the following:

If you sent the book with printed postage/tracking 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 postage or tracking 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.

I can tell you from personal experience that I PM the person 4-7 days after the book is scanned delivered to see if they've received it. The vast majority of folks mark it mailed within 2 days of receipt of my PM. Sometimes I get a reply PM, sometimes not, but no one has ever gotten mean or nasty.

The times I've gotten no response, after 5 days I contact TPTB, as instructed by the HC (above). And without fail, TPTB tell me to wait until it goes lost, and if I don't automatically get my credit then (due to the recipient being declared inactive by the system), to contact them again. The last time this happened, I didn't automatically get my credit, so I contacted TPTB again, as instructed, and was told that they'd be contacting the member but to give them 3 more days. I was admittedly pretty ticked off by then, as the book had been scanned delivered 3 weeks prior and I still didn't have my credit. I did get the credit 2 days later, but as someone who does not have a huge stockpile of credits, it bothers me that I promptly reply to requests and ship books, and then my credits get held up for up to 3 weeks after the book is delivered.

As for printable postage--I refuse to pay an additional 55 cents per shipment. I mailed 11 books in the past month. I see no need to pay an additional $6 for those shipments when DC is FREE. Honestly, it chaps my hide that people think I should pay more because others aren't holding up their end of the bargain by marking their books received. (Many of the reply PMs I get state how the person "always forgets" to mark received. I'm sorry, but that's part of the responsibility of being a member here, not a side thought).

Yes, there can be mis-deliveries or family emergencies. I get that. But nowhere near as often as it seems to happen here.

thank you Sheryl. that's my point. members always want the sender to do everything quick and then they linger over the receiving. and i'm sorry with everybody able to access this website/their e-mail don't tell you didn't have time to mark it recieved. you ordered a book/books you knew it was on it's way to you. it's not like it was a surprise package. have the respect to say yes i received it. i swear people spend more updating their facebook and twitter accounts about absolute nonsense. this takes a quick look at your mail and click of a button.

Thank you Sheryl, I was thinking the guidelines said 5 days-ish.  That said, PBS will not take action until the book actually goes lost, so I wouldn't contact them until just before or just after that date.

I realize that real life happens and we've seen many examples here over the years (stolen cars with books inside, unexpected hospitalizations, and various kinds of family emergencies)...but we also see vacations and 'I'm busy".  IMO if you know you aren't going to be available for a week or more, it's your responsibility to put your account on hold or make other arrangements for incoming books you have requested.  Some members go into their account just before vacation and mark all incoming books as received...a lovely gesture they figure worth the risk of not receiving one.