USPS strikes again

Hang in there, It ain't over until its over. Good Luck. Casey

Delivery confirmation number?

My experience is always check regional weather when shipping.  I lost an order many years ago in an apparent trucking accident.  My brother in law used to be a USPS mid level mgr who explained it's best to wait out storms of all sorts if your shipper is involved.  Good luck

I can beat that one...sadly!

A few years ago when my son was too young to go to preschool my parents watched him at our home. Told my mother to watch for a UPS package that was due that day...it never came. My mother noted that all she saw was the neighbor getting one...so I tracked it and saw it "was delivered". Contacted UPS the next day and they said the driver informed them he delivered it to my address, I told them it hadn't made it and I then told them about what my mother said and gave them Javier's address. They said it was delivered. 4 days later I spy an "empty box" way in our backyards...yup, you guessed it - had my name and address on it! Recontacted UPS and told them of the whole thing...they asked me to talk to my neighbor to which my reply was he's new and might be able to speak 10 words of english...and no the only spanish I knew would get me in trouble{bad words}. They filed a claim for me right there on the spot and I was on a 3 1/2yr hold as "sign only" because of that. That delivery guy came one night that I was home- I asked him why he left it at the wrong house - and he told me quite arrogantly that he did in fact deliver my package...I then told him my neighbor across the street had a security cam in his living room that showed he, the driver, leaving the package at the neighbor's house that day and that my mother was at the picture window when he showed up to deliver it and if I could get a copy of it I would see him fired for his current crappy attitude. He promptly quit smirking, and that was the last time I saw him as we got a new delivery girl and she worked around my schedule to get me my packages.  

A true story that should never have happend.

Your mother should've gotten a receipt for those items...have her file a claim on here end as only the sender can do that{so I'm told} and they will issue a track on it and should give her a claim number if it's found to be lost. She'll need to get a value for the item{s} lost, USPS will evaluate that amount and issue a check out.

One should always insure a package if it has valuables.  I note that Priority Mail only costs a few sents more than Parcel Post.  FedEx Home Delivery is also reaosnably priced.

Some of the blame for stuff like this has to go to the shipper.  I've received stuff that it was a miracle that it made it to me intact, and some things don't arrive intact.

It's not that difficult to pack things correctly, and I've had a 99.9% success rate sending with USPS and UPS with proper packaging.  Contrary to popular believe, it's not always the shipping company's fault when a shipment gets damaged.

hello guys and gals.........

SIGH, those 3 big shippers are getting worse by the day and how much worse can it get 10 years from now?

the woman who loves the S.F.5011

Tiffany 

the only problem I had with a delivery was when I got my 736. we live in the counrty, and get rural delivery. I saw one day there was a package hanging from the mailbox in one of those plastic shopping bags(was normal when a package wouldn't fit in the mailbox) I went out to get the mail, and I was maybe three feet away when the bag broke, and th box hit the ground. The Berk hit the ground pilot fost. snapped off the cow catcher,and bent one of the marker lights. had the delivery insured, and the post office bought replacement parts. Got a bigger mailbox that day. and we've never had a problem with UPS leaving a package at the door, but I would prefer them getting a signutare face to face.

Steamer- face to face is fine when your home while they're delivering, but that can't always be the case.

UPS, FedEx, USPS--all pretty much the same, and all have provided me with very good service over many years and through literally hundreds of transactions.

With millions of parcels handled by these services on a daily basis, and given all the variables involved from packing to delivery, there are bound to be a few problems.

when I sell something to someone, I always put my address inside the box in case it gets the label torn off or damaged.  LOCOMOTION

This has always been a MUST-DO as far as I am concerned!

And I pride myself in packing things VERY well--far better than most merchants and dealers do.  I just assume that the package will be subject to some rough handling somewhere along the line, and try to pack for that eventuality.  

My experience has been that a good many folks, including some dealers, really don't know much about how to securely pack an item for shipping.  That said, there have been VERY FEW items that I have received in damaged condition--probably less than a handful over a period of 35 or more years.

My experience is exactly the opposite.  USPS brings any packages that don't fit up to the house and puts them on my front porch, I even have a box for them.  UPS and FedEx just drop them in front of the garage!   I've come out the next day and found a soggy package that I didn't know was coming sitting there!

I think the USPS service level is directly related to the quality of your carrier.  I tread my guy good, I have holiday candy and stuff for him on a regular basis, he treats me good.

There's bad stories about all of them. Mine was with FedEx. The main thing I want to point out is USPS and UPS are F.O.B Shipping Point, while FedEx is F.O.B. Destination. This matters!

It was maddening to me listen to a FedEx "Customer Service Technician" calmly attempt to explain to me how something that I had bought, and paid for, and paid to ship, and paid to get repaired, AND paid to have shipped back to me, "Was not legally MY property until they delivered it".

This mess was because the 1st and 3rd delivery attempts were to a neighbor whose LAST name was Thomas, while my FIRST name is Thomas. When I tried to explain the issue with the names, the response was "there's really no difference in those names, Sir".

My package ended up in the FedEx unclaimed freight warehouse in Atlanta. It was scheduled for auction. The shipper was able to recover it and I did receive my package about 90 days later.

You can find idiots anywhere and sometimes you don't even have to look. They'll find you. No charge.

My $0.02 on shippers.

Gilly

I have bought from forum members who ship (my request) USPS. My maillady is very good. I was out of town for a couple of weeks and had the mail held at the post office. The day i returned I met the postlady at the box and she told me that she thought we were to be home the next day and she knew I had a package for delievery. I told her no  problem tomorrow would be OK.,She brought the mail and package that afternoon , after her shift.

Thr Post Office has problems but very FEW are the local employeess, they are in WASHINGTON, nuf said

Some of the blame for stuff like this has to go to the shipper.  I've received stuff that it was a miracle that it made it to me intact, and some things don't arrive intact.

 

It's not that difficult to pack things correctly, and I've had a 99.9% success rate sending with USPS and UPS with proper packaging.  Contrary to popular believe, it's not always the shipping company's fault when a shipment gets damaged.

So true!... like my thread [now deleated] on the old forum.

While my package wasn't train related, I had an interesting time following it via the USPS tracking. item was shipped from PA, went to Atlanta(instead of West palm Beach), then to Opa-Locka(where it dissapeared for 3 days) then went to WPB, then to Port Salerno(instead of my house), spent extra day going back WPB, then finally got delivered to the proper address!

Never had a problem with USPS...UPS, I hold my breath.

hello Gilly@N&W.........

I am sorry that you had to go through crap like that with FedEx as if that happened to me, i wouldn't be able to handle that .   You paid for the item out of your own pocket then they had NO RIGHT to speak to you like that.   My husband and i went to San Ramon to pick up my Sunset 3rd S.F. steamer and Z4000 from Mr. Mann office because i been hearing more and more shipping damages from the 3 big shippers and didn't want to go through that.   The trip cost us about 200 dollars (gas and travel expenses) and it was worth it knowing the engine and the transformer has no damages at all and got free tour at the Sunset 3rd office to boot.  It was a 8 hour drive. 

the woman who loves the S.F. 5011

Tiffany

I tried to collect on a missing shipment which was insured by the post office and they made me wait SIX MONTHS to collect. And that was AFTER their own inspector found that the item had been STOLEN INSIDE THE POST OFFICE SYSTEM ITSELF.

Now I don't waste my money with insurance and just take my chances. Usually it works out fine.

Just a little off-topic but I must vent on both UPS and FedEx policy on delivering packages only on the "delivery by date" even if the package is shown as "out for delivery" days before, just sitting in the truck waiting for the delivery date to come.

That's happened to me two times with each company.

One time I got this bit of trivia from a UPS driver:  it's an undocumented policy to hold packages that are ahead of the projected delivery date.  If packages came early, customers would opt for ground services over the more expensive, faster delivery options.

I'm in for a class-action suit!

I travel 11 months out of the year.I visit train shops and attend train meets coast to coast.Most of the time I fly. I'm always buying and sending trains home.I use USPS almost exclusively. I only ship priority mail with tracking and I buy plenty of insurance.So far,So good. I only use UPS IF the box is really huge and can only be moved by a hand truck.

Cute story. Reminds me of an old joke.

Guy walks up to the airline ticket counter, tells the agent he wants to fly from Baltimore to Miami. She starts to get info, but he says he wants to go via Raleigh, El Paso, Butte, Chicago, Memphis then to Miami.

She tells him, "Sir, we don't have any flights that fit that itinerary."

Then he tells her that they most certainly do. The last time he flew to Miami, "that was the route that his luggage had taken before they finally got it back to him in Miami!"

Greg

Had bad luck with USPS I never got a Hudson I bought off eBay lost 400 bucks.

well since I do alot of shipping package to customers.. I have the USPS make FRAGILE ON THE PACKAGES ID SHIPPED OUT!! SO FAR IM IN THE GOOD!!.. BY MAKING YOUR PACKAGES FRAGILE THERE CAREFUL WITH THEM..BUT DID ANY OF YOUR PACKAGES HAD FRAGILE MAKED ON THEM??

I bought a Southern Lionel Trainmaster on eBay some years ago.  The person shipped it with delivery confirmation and tracking and it was supposed to arrive in something like three or four days.  

The USPS tracker always showed as arriving in an Atlanta sort facility but never leaving.  I contacted the seller and they started inquires as did I.  This went on for a few weeks.  Just as the seller was about to issue a refund it showed up one day.   The corner was bashed in and the packing was roughed up but luckily everything was OK with the actual engine.

What happened at the Atlanta facility that caused a few weeks delay I do not know.  I was just glad it eventually showed up.  So there may be hope yours will as well.

NOTHING leaves my hands w/o tracking at the least. BUT even registered mail is lost (stolen) and not much you can do......but with tracking you can claim the insurance money anyway.

I think a lot depends on your delivery person. The lady that delivers our mail always brings packages to the door and out of the rain. We had a sub last week as she was on vacation. I have a large mailbox but the package was a little larger. He smashed a box of parts in the mailbox even though it was to large. It took me ten minutes to get it out. Luckily everything was OK. Don

Working for a company which ships 500,000 packages in a year, most of them in a 6 week period, I have been in the freight analysis business for 17 years.UPS and FedEx don't want the home delivery business and they charge more to make people go in other directions. (see other complaining posts about freight costs). They both have services which hand off packages to USPS. Fed Ex hands it off as soon as possible, UPS takes it a drop off near the delivery post office.  I prefer UPS ground commercial to my place of business instead of my house. If you think the big 3 have problems try a regional carrier!

Also with start of the on line personal seller (and every Mom and Pop store with a Web site) craze everyone thinks they know how to pack and ship.

That will be

$2.00 standard shipping

$1.50 fuel surcharge

$1.00 rural delivery

$5.00 address correction (sorry you spelled Avenue Avenew)

I wish I was kidding.

I think postal problems are world wide these days, not only US but in Europe too.

There are a few providers now who are really sloppy. Sometimes it's just an individual, a guy saving up parcels till he has a van loaded, delivering all in one day. Sometimes they just don't know, or don't care. I'm an old nag of course but there are times I really do miss that uniformed official from the old state post, instead of that hired hand with a MacDonalds like outfit.

My first buy, on Ebay.com went to Mexico...that's just the opposite direction.

Not even Mexico City but some smaller town. Somebody from US post must have thrown my package in the wrong container. But the seller, and her US postal lady were more then helpfull and finally all went right. One thing I'll never do again is reading these forums on the net, with all those horrifying experiences people seems to have gone through. That gives you the impression that postal services are in a state of anarchy, and one forgets most of deliveries are going well.

Kieffer

A couple of years ago I had a rather surreal experience with the postal services.

A package was sent to me from England, I had the tracking number and so I followed it on its journey, and all seemed to be going well.

However, when it was delivered I was confused. The package being shipped to me was fairly small. But what arrived was a very large box indeed. Not only that, but it had large labels on it with an intended destination address in central Germany. Nowhere did it have my name & address on it.

I questioned the delivery driver about this, and he simply stated that the bar-code said to deliver it to me. End-of-story as far as he was concerned.

Instead of the package I was expecting, I had received a very fancy golf-bag with wheels etc. (I had to partially open it, just in case it really was my package.)

Anyway, I contacted the shipper, and they assured me that they hadn't sent me a golf-bag, and we both contacted our respective mail organisations.

The next day, FedEx delivered my package to me. It had apparently been delivered to a bio-medical company just outside of Munich, and they had very kindly FedEx'd it to me.

After quite a few 'phone calls, it transpired that somebody at a ParcelForce main depot in England had had period of confusion and had stuck the bar-code labels for a whole shift onto random packages, instead of the correct ones. Thereby sending packages on wrong journeys all over the world. It would appear that once a bar-code label is attached at the depot, that no further notice is taken of any address actually on the package, and the bar-code label is the only thing that matters.  As a result of this, it took me three weeks of 'phone calls, and eventually a threat of legal action, before they would agree to collect the golf-bag from me and send it to correct recipient. Isn't technology wonderful?

This looks like a classic case of the item not being packed properly!

you have been VERY lucky marking your packages fragile.  disgruntled employees will toss the fragile packages more then needed.  I NEVER mark any package fragile for this reason.

packing the package is the key.  lots of padding and NO room for the item to shift around.

if you packed your item like the engines are packed there would be a lot LESS damage.

I kind of know the inside working of a post office processing center.

Getting a lot of UPS stories but the guy that started this thread is talking about the USPS.   I will hijack further by mentioning our Fedex deliveries.  They seem to hire a lot of dyslectics that can't tell the difference between 20866 and 20886.

Generally stuff needs to be packed well enough to take a six foot drop.

.....

Dennis

As for parcels arriving damaged, we all know s**t happens and even though we might seek out someone as the scapegoat, it'll continue happening in the future. This isn't a perfect world with perfect people. Who of us in our personal or professional lives haven't had times when we've done less than our very best - one of those that's good enough for now moments?

As for MIA parcels it's not always the shippers fault. It personally happened to me over a year ago that a package was stolen from the porch of my home after it had been delivered. Just last month a local tv station reported instances of people following delivery trucks in upscale neighborhoods and when a delivery was left by the door when no one was home to claim it, thieves would wait near those residences and watcgh whether anyone eventually opened the door to claim it and if not, they'd scoop it up and take off. A few resident's security cameras filmed such occurrences.

Although irritating, bottom line is they're only things damaged or mia and not irreplaceable human lives. 

For what it's worth, a few weeks ago I wanted to ship some items from VA to KS.  Packed them is a stout box (bought at Lowes) & went to FedEx.  The clerk refused to accept it, saying that was a moving box, not a shipping box, and would crumble when stacked.  He produced a shipping box.  It was, in fact, considerably sturdier.  We repacked & the contents were received ok.  I frequently get packages that are crushed, possibly indicating an inadequate box.