This is ridiculous!

[Melde]

Would Canadian Thanksgiving be a factor in the delay? Post office is shut until Tuesday, and maybe they don't have another way? The timing just seems coincidental to me.

[mikeylou]

Today was a US Holiday, so if the seller is US based, she would be unable to ship from the PO counter today.  However, the APCs are available 24/7 and you can put tracking on them.

Things that would color my opinion of the time would include how custom of a custom made item was it, and does the seller have any information regarding times in their shop description.

I do have a seller (who has since been kicked off of etsy) that I love her products, but my last order took a month to ship on items she supposedly already had in stock.  I feel bad because she has severe health problems, but she seemed really quick to respond to complaints and some convos, but anything that required action on her part was very slow.

[Lady Snowdon]

An interesting update: my order listed as shipped as of yesterday, a Sunday.  I messaged the seller after I saw that update on shipping, and said that I was disappointed in how long shipping had taken, since it was 4 days from the day she'd said it was ready to be shipped, to when it actually shipped.  Plus the holiday today, it effectively wouldn't ship until tomorrow, so it would be close to a week before it actually went out in the mail.  I got a convo back from the seller informing me that Sunday is when she'd finally gotten around to updating my item as being shipped, but that it should have shipped on Friday.  Apparently she's far too busy to take things to the post office herself, so she had a courier come by on Friday to take things to the post office for her.  However, she hasn't gotten a status update on anything that was taken to the post office on Friday, so she can't say for sure that it did ship Friday. 

I'm hoping that it did ship on Friday, since that would be about when I'd imagine something would ship if it was ready on a Thursday.  We'll see when I actually get my item, and what the postage mark on the box/bag actually says.  If it did ship then, I'd probably leave feedback describing the item and saying something like "seller slow to reply to messages, slow to update shipping status". 

[bah12]

So, did the item you bought need to be made first, or was it already fabricated and all she had to do was ship it?

My opinion on the customer service would depend on that.  If she were hand making the item after you ordered it, then did you agree on how long it would take?  Sept 17th to October 5th can either be a long time or not long at all depending on the work that had to go into the item.  And if the length of time to make the item is reasonable, then I'm not going to fault her for a holiday slowing the shipping down.  If however, she has the item made a while ago and just took her time getting it shipped, then I think you're justified in your anger.  And, obviously, keeping you informed is important.

As for feedback, I agree with those that said you should let her know first.  She may not be able to change things, but if she does attempt to make retribution, you can at least mention that.  I wouldn't go into long details on the review either.  Slow response and shipping is all that other customers need to know.

[Bookgirl]

Personally I don't hold small traders to the same standards I would when dealing with a company on the internet. They aren't professionals and their approach is often not business like however much you would like it to be. I can imagine with something like Etsy they are all to busy 'being creative' and toododling around with their whatits and see the back end functions as a PITA even if they are essential to the customer experience.

I take my Etsy shop very seriously, even when I'm "being creative".  It's a very rare case when I don't ship an already made item the very next day.  Several times, I've even gone the extra mile and given up an evening or two to create large rush orders to get the items to my customers as quickly as possible. 

I've purchased many many items on Etsy and I think that Lady Snowdon's experience is the exception rather than the rule.   The Etsy shop owners I've dealt with have been nothing but professional. 

[Lady Snowdon]

So, an update.  I hadn't received it by Wed the 10th, so I sent a message to the seller asking if she was able to get confirmation from her courier that it was shipped and if so, if I could have the tracking number to track it.  She responded right away, saying I should have received it by now, and telling me that she had a receipt from the courier, but no tracking numbers.  It eventually arrived on the 11th, with postage dated Monday the 8th, so it clearly was not shipped when I was told it would be shipped.  When I told the seller what day it had arrived, and that the postage was dated on the 8th, her response was "thanks for letting me know.  I'm glad it's there now".  I gave her a generally positive feedback, citing how beautiful it is, and the quickness of her response when I gave her something concrete to work with.  I did mention a slow response time otherwise. 

For those who asked - it was a custom made item.  When I asked about a timeframe initially for it to be done, I was asked when I wanted it done.  I asked if they could have it ready for an event I was going to in a couple of weeks, and they said they'd try and have it ready.  When I messaged them a few days before the event, they said it wouldn't be ready after all.  I messaged them about a week later to check on the status, and that's when everything happened.  So I never really got a clear timeframe on when I should have expected it to be done.