Yes, but sometimes stuff really does go missing, so sooner or later, you and your supplier are going to have to draw a line under it. I cut my suppliers as much slack as I can, but eventually you run up against things like EBay, AliExpress or PayPal protection time limits.
My longest shipping delay story:
I once had a package from Convoy that hadn’t shown up after 8 weeks. Simon and I both concluded it had been lost, because Convoy stuff usually arrives here within 3-4 weeks, so he reshipped the order.
The original package showed up 2 weeks later, for a total of 10 weeks in transit, and the replacement package arrived a week after that, for a total of 3 weeks in transit. The mind frankly boggles.
Fortunately, I was happy to put the extra components in my parts box for future use, so I just sent Simon a repeat payment through PayPal. It saved me the hassle of sending the parts back to him, too.
I’ve had similar incidents with a couple of EBay sellers, as well, and one interesting thing I’ve noticed is this: they’re always remarkably happy when you report the item arriving after all and give them their refund money back.
I get the distinct impression that a lot of people just quietly keep the extra stuff in these cases, i.e. steal it. That’s not something that impresses me very much, because I’m sure those people don’t hesitate to complain about bad sellers, even as they themselves are being bad customers.