Can UPS be than USPS? I think I am about to find out.
I just had a conversation with my delivery lady that I wish I had never had. I scheduled a pick up for yesterday for 20 packages. They were still on my porch when I got home at 9pm last night, so we got back in the car and drove them to the Post Office in town.
I've been using the pick up option because the post office here is not conveniently located, and given how many packages have been going out, figured that it was best to save myself the half hour round trip and use that time for other things (like keeping up with orders).
She rang the bell about 5pm, and I answered and said "Hi, I don't have any packages going out until Monday, they were scheduled..."
Post lady "I know, for yesterday, here's your slip for the pick up, you'll want to read the note"...
There was a handwritten note at the top of the page, detailing that the slip was not given to the other route driver yesterday despite that being the scheduled date and that she should pick up my packages today and disregard the out of date postage metered on said pick up.
When she asked her boss about the out of date postage, her boss, she said, waived it off and said it didn't matter that too many people were shipping too many things and that the worst that would happen is that the packages wouldn't get delivered, or they'd wind up late, or eventually returned to me when they got around to resorting it when it came back through the chain.
I was so floored I completely didn't think to ask her to bring me back a copy of the pick-up slip. She's keeping it because she plans on taking it, along with the dates of the other pick ups that have been skipped (this is an average of once a week that she hasn't been given the scheduled pick up slips - just for me... at this point, about 3 weeks ago, she just agreed to stop if she saw packages on the porch whether I had scheduled a pick up or not - or more the point - if she got a notice of pick up required or not).
I asked her what was going to happen - she said she plans on going to the local post master on her day off on Monday, and that if she lost her job, she'd collect unemployment for 18 months and then retire, but she wasn't going to be the only one going down. Other than that her boss could "stuff it" because she was tired of them making her look bad, and that it wasn't any wonder no one used the post office to ship anything any more.
She then recommended I start taking my packages to the next town over until this all got sorted out, and in the meantime to verify that all of my customers actually got their packages. So now I need to change my shipping schedule, because the next town over is a 30 minute or so drive one way, vs the 30 minutes or so round trip that the town one is.
Or I need to find out if its really that much more expensive to ship UPS or Fed-Ex. Etsy has this cool new hook-up with Fed Ex to save us money when we ship with them. I think come Monday I will be seriously looking into it.
In the meantime, I will be writing emails to about 100+ people to verify their package arrival for all orders shipped (that i don't have other proof of delivery for) since the beginning of November. Then I'm going to soak in the bath and cry for a while... because its Christmas season, and between this and the PayPal debacle from the other day, I think I have reached the limit of what I can handle.
Then, after dinner (which will come right after the bath - oh how I wish I had another of these ), I will be hitting the kitchen. I have until Monday to get as close to done on all current orders as I can be, so that I can start working on anything that may come up between now and then so it all still gets where its going by Christmas.
Are we there yet? Is it New Years Eve? Is it 2011?
~Amy
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12 comments:
Yowser!!!....just makes you want to buy a horse and pony express it yourself...course it might take longer than the 30 min there and back...still.......keep up the ole entrepreneur spirit!!!!!
Ick, how terribly aggravating! I hope you figure out a better solution. :\
~AtlanticCoastArt
Extremely annoying! Good luck with sorting this out...
Truth be told, I am about to go UPS with all my stuff, too. For almost ALL of my orders boing to California for the months of August-November, they downright REFUSED to deliver them! I missed out on orders that had been shipped Priority, and were returned to me OVER A MONTH LATER!
Eff the USPS, and eff the horse they rode in on, IMHO. People will pay the little extra for UPS, trust me.
sorry for all the chaos, this should be a relaxing time of year , not doing battle with someone not doing their job. xx
Yikes! I have come home a few times to find my packages still on the porch as well...until I registered a complaint. I hate that I had to do it, but I do not always have a car to get to the PO...let us know what you find :)
I have had similar issues. My mail carrier at my old house would just pick up anything I left out, amd told me not to even bother with scheduling a pick up, because half the time they wouldn't give it to him, either. Now, in my new area, there is not a regular carrier, and the three things I have scheduled for pick up have all ended up being brought to the post office that night by me.
BTW: for heavy stuff, UPS is usually competitive, if not less. For lighter stuff, I have not found it to be better priced. Maybe it has changed, I have not been shipping much recently.
OMG! This is why I have a tracker on my phone and check the delivery status EVERY day until the pkg is delivered. BTW, UPS is VERY expensive compared to USPS. What is this thing set up with ETsy and fedex and where do I find info?
Will your carrier not take packages in your mailbox? I supposed if you're shipping 20+ at a time it would be a problem, but my guy just told me to leave whatever needs to go out right in my box. I ship about 5-6 a day, and he always takes them. He even offered to come into our breezeway if I had big packages, just leave him a note in our box. He's a really nice guy though, and I always give him a gift at xmas ;)
I'm sorry this is happening to you - totally sucks. But, any other carrier is ultimately more expensive for ordinary packages. Even with the FedEx/Etsy hookup. But, I rarely ship packages over a pound of two.
2011??? Don't wanna go so far ahead
Hey everyone! Thanks for the encouragement!
For now I'm just going to be driving to the next town over to drop packages off. I'll figure out what to do next when I come back again.
I'll be in Virginia until at least late January - so after this last batch of orders go out I won't have to worry about it till then. Maybe by then the delivery lady will have filed with the local Post Master and something will have been straightened out by then.
As for the 2011 comment- that's how confused I am lately ...lol. I thought next year was 2011. Or maybe was hoping... who knows!
@madbird - there is no place for me to leave them... I'm going to have to take pics... but basically, we don't have a mail box = we have a postal collection center that looks like a post office, but is really just a big collection of PO boxes... the box is about 4x5x10.. not big enough for even a single package. those all go in big package boxes so the only option is to schedule the pick ups. especially since its 2 different carriers running this route.
Anyway... here's to hoping. It should be ok from here out... I just need to take the packages physically to the post office this week.
holy crap! that's nonsense! where do you live? i thought you lived in my city? (st. louis) i love my Post Office. The guys that work there ROCK! And my packages always get to their destination in a couple days.
I feel for you! I hope you're feeling better soon!
Much love from,
Gwynie
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