Extended shipping time for custom orders

[sweetniks]

You can only extend a shipping date one time by 28 days.

My product is often for events. Customers order months before their event and I am unable to extend the shipping time for them.

This shows up as though I shipped the order late and is affecting my “shipping in time” status

[PillowDetails]

What a lovely and successful shop, @sweetniks !  Has the late shipping affected you, other than not have that 3rd Star Seller badge?  Has Etsy put your shop on reserve?  You seem to be humming along, keeping your customers happy!

[sweetniks]

I am hoping that Etsy can extend “update shipping “ by an unlimited time. It shows up as unable to deliver on time

[JMOldeVintage]

@sweetniks  - I looked at one of your listings for Valentines Candy. I am shown an estimated delivery date of January 5-18th. So you have selected a relatively short processing time. 

The only way you can try to ease the problem is to set your processing time to the max. 
After that, if buyers are purchasing months in advance, after ordering the best you will be able to do is extend the 'ships by date' that one time.

So it is possible that you will still not qualify for Star Seller status since your business model does not fit in with the program. 
Between Etsy & normal business practices of credit card companies, shops taking orders months in advance is a difficult endeavor. 

[OwlAlwaysKnit]

I made a stupid mistake with 2 orders, one was a custom listing and one was ready to ship for some unknown reason apart from not concentrating on what I was doing I marked the custom one as completed. I did contact support but basically got told there was nothing they could do.

I have now been slapped on a reserve and also probably because I had to refund a customer, my first refund in 4 years, because the buyer ordered on the 17th Dec and wanted it for Christmas from France to Canada.

Nice way to start the New Year off.  

[sweetniks]

Oh no!

[CostumeCoutureNaomi]

Most of my orders are custom designs that take a long time.

You can add a separate custom order listing where the item sold is just a confirmation of their order details and ship date, then send the individual customer a separate custom listing with an extended processing time.  Look at my "design concept" listings if you need ideas.

You need to separate your custom orders from your regular, ready to ship items.

[sweetniks]

I do plenty custom orders when on request.

Customers order off the site and request the shipping date.

[PersnicketyPie]

@sweetniks I feel your pain! This happened to me once- and I lost the timely shipping badge. Now I have to keep my shipping date pushed out as far as possible, although I try to ship way before that deadline.  Also, I thought you had to ok it with the buyer as well before you could extend the date?