According to David MacDonald, the record collecting community is a fairly understanding bunch.
The 60-year-old, who runs Blue Sky Vinyl, is lucky but admits, “Your patience only goes so far.”
Why? Because Mr MacDonald, like many other small business owners, has been waiting for almost a week to ship international orders via Royal Mail.
And as others have told the BBC, he has absolutely no idea when his broadcasts will be able to resume.
Last Wednesday, Royal Mail urged customers to stop sending letters and parcels abroad after criminals launched a ransomware attack on the company.
It has impacted a system used by Royal Mail to prepare mail to be sent abroad and track and trace items from overseas.
The problem first appeared on Tuesday, January 10th. Customers were notified of the issue the next day.
“As with all technical issues we have had to rule out many things to ensure we are only passing on accurate information,” said a Royal Mail spokesman.
The company has assured customers that it is “working around the clock” to resolve the issue.
But Mr MacDonald says a “disappointing” lack of regular updates has stalled his business.
“There’s no indication of when things will be fixed,” he says. “It could be a week, it could be a month, it could be six months.
“If it’s going to be a month or six months, at least give us, as a small business, the opportunity to make decisions that can overcome that hurdle.”
Around 45% of Blue Sky Vinyl’s business comes from overseas, including Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Japan and China.
There are even buyers in Ukraine, although recently Mr MacDonald had to explain to a customer there why his order was delayed. “He said he’ll be patient and wait,” says Mr. MacDonald.
Royal Mail says: “We understand how frustrating this situation is for our customers and we apologize for the disruption.
“As with all of these technical issues, we are evaluating multiple workarounds to restore our systems as quickly and safely as possible.”
But a week is a long time in business.
Companies say the delay in international mail is compounding problems they have been facing since before Christmas, when Royal Mail staff went on strike.
Mr MacDonald said: “We are issuing refunds on parcels that have not arrived and were posted in November and the Royal Mail refund compensation scheme is running at a snail’s pace.”
It’s “a big problem on top of a big problem,” according to Andrew Bradley, who runs Lello Living, a family business that makes prints, picture frames and homeware.
Even before the ransomware attack on Royal Mail, Mr Bradley said some international customers had been waiting for packages for more than a month.
“Right now I’m just trying to placate customers,” he said. But as a small business owner, his hands are tied.
Once a package has been sent, “we can’t get it back,” he said, so the package just sits there.
It’s expensive to send a replacement and doubly difficult for a company like Lello Living that makes personalized prints.
“We sell a lot on sites like Etsy, and we see one or two star reviews,” he said.
“Right now, the majority of people are understanding and patient, but we’re seeing patience waning.”
Simon Thompson, chief executive of Royal Mail, is likely to face questions about how the company has responded to Tuesday’s attack when he appears before MPs on the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee.
Meanwhile, freelance illustrator Danielle English, 31, says the delays caused by the ransomware attack were “a pretty big blow” financially.
The artist specializes in fantasy and sci-fi images and relies on her online shop, Kanizo, for half of her income.
“Just today I had to refund some orders that were placed over the weekend that I can’t fulfill right now and I would say about 70% of them were international,” she says.
Ms English said she tries her best to keep her customers informed, “but it’s obviously so limited”.
“I don’t want to keep them waiting too long because I don’t want them to think I’m not a legitimate company by not shipping their order, but there’s only so much I can really tell them.”
Others, like Karen Gilroy, are unsure whether to book a courier service to send deliveries to countries like the US or wait for Royal Mail to resume shipping.
The 62-year-old retired civil servant runs a sewing shop called KraftyKoriginal and says it typically costs around £20 to send parcels overseas using Royal Mail.
She could use a specialized parcel service, but they are more expensive – costs that she is reluctant to pass on to her customers.
“I think I could ask her, but it’s not really her fault, is it?” She says. “If I decide to send it by courier, I think it’s up to me to bear the costs.”
At the moment she’s not sure what to do – book a courier in advance and risk losing money when Royal Mail services resume, or wait and see?
“I’m kind of stuck and stuck and I’m like, ‘Surely they’ll sort it out this week,’ but who knows?”
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