Come back, come back!!

What do you mean you tried to deliver my pens at 6:02 pm but no one was home (email tracking)??? I've been sitting here reading FPN for the last 2 hours! You didn't even leave me a note! Please, come back!!!

I hate it when that happens!

That's just wrong.

That's the sort of behavior that begs to be complained about. Somebody should be fired every time that happens unless there is a darn good explanation for it (an honest mistake, if you will).

Yep I got one of the door knob hangers yesterday then this evening nothing until 6:45.

A Disney LE, Zhivago and a pocket watch all from the same store.

I was quite peeved at 530 when I got home and there was no fedEx package awaiting!

Kurt

Well, it is dark out. Parking lot is kind of slippery. Colorado, you know.

I did call FedEx and was told he had already noted he would be back again tomorrow. I told them I'll definitely be here! I didn't complain, really, just verified he had the right address. The gal on the other end and I ended up laughing a lot and talking about... fountain pens!

I have no fingernails left, though. So many goodies I'm expecting!

I can buy safety concerns...if it isn't noted as a delivery attempt that was never made. That's fraudulent if you ask me.

Sadly, this is incredibly common ... the fedex guy on my route doesn't even bother ringing the bell, he just leaves a note (already pre-written, apparently). I was sitting upstairs one day when I saw him pull up, and walk up to the door (no box in hand), and then walk away. I stuck my head out the window and yelled that I was home, and he had the audacity to look incredibly put out that he had to do his damn job by bringing the box up to my door. And he actually had the audacity to lie to my face, by saying he rang the doorbell.

Needless to say, I called the local sorting facility where he was based out of and complained. Fortunately, I haven't seen him since

I had the opposite problem with UPS. A pen sat waiting out in the cold for two days while I was away on vacation. I prefer USPS because I can hold my mail while I'm away...

I got a package from Fedex(came really fast, by the way) that the guy just left on the porch when I wasn't home. I'm lucky the ink didn't freeze, since it's like 23 degrees here in MA.

DHL is the company that really takes the cake in my book. Recently, one of my packages apparently rode around with the driver for 4 days before he deigned attempting a delivery.

FedEx folk around here seem to prefer leaving notes to actually trying to give us a package as well. Also, FWIW, I've had countless packages damaged through FedEx, and many many fewer through UPS or USPS.

Heh. I get home at around 3:30 pm usually. For some reason, it seems that UPS and FedEx seem to think I should be home at 10 am on a standard workday and that's usually when they try to deliver. But they leave me notes. UPS guy was late one day and was surprised when I walked up as he was trying to deliver, "oh you're home! You're usually not here!" Yeah, I gotta work, too, to support my habits.

Ah well, I know the package will be here tomorrow, and quite possibly another as well. It's coming from I SELL PENS. I ordered 2 days in a row from them. Not sure that any of the others I ordered will make it tomorrow. Some used USPS, some UPS. I think I SELL PENS was the only one that used FedEx this round.

Since I own my own business I have stuff shipped there. I more likely to be there than at home anyway.

My FedEx guy talks pens with me. Sweet and does ring the bell. UPS brings package to the door and occasionally rings the bell as they walk away. It's the USPS that mislays, breaks, delivers to the wrong house, etc.

Where I work, for a while we were using UPS 2nd day to deliver paychecks, and over a two month period, they lost two paychecks, and never did find them. We had to stop payment on the checks, and wire money to the employees. No aplogies or explanations from UPS.

As I said, we WERE using UPS. DHL is now our carrier. Not lost a package yet.

Donnie

I suppose there are hazards with all the delivery companies. I think Airborne was the only one that really surprised me with personal service/delivery. I've only ever gotten one package delivered by them.

We get so many different mail carriers here that I never know what to expect from USPS. They are always putting mail in the wrong boxes. Last year at this time, I looked in the trash bin that is kept in our mail room for all that junk mail that comes in every Tuesday, and I saw an actual package - unopened - inside. It was addressed to a single residence three blocks away. I fished it out of the trash and delivered the package myself. I'm not sure if the mail carrier had it balanced on the rim of the trash bin and then accidentally knocked it in and forgot about it, or if they just didn't want to deal with a misdirected package at that time of year. Nonetheless, that one I did complain about to the main office. Kind of a bummer way for someone not to get their Christmas present.

I've had limited problems with UPS and FedEx. I actually get my pen supplies shipped through the US mail because it's far more reliable in my experience (because the package is left not carried away for another time). Having said that, both times I have called the cust. service line at UPS and FedEx the persons I've spoken with have been super helpful and solved the problems.

I used to live on the 5th floor of a walk-up apartment building. I can't tell you how many times Fed-ex and UPS "attempted" delivery on items when I was working at home. This tended to happen a lot in the heat of the summer.
If I was lucky (or obsessively checking the tracking info...) and was able to call their supervisors soon after these "attempts" were made, I sometimes managed to set up meetings with the trucks, usually just a few blocks away!

We had a xmas package that we tracked to the local DHL distributor and that sat there for days. When we called them up and asked when it would be delivered they gave a couple more days so we asked if we could drive over and pick it up= and we told that we could not. It took a total of 3 weeks for us to get that package! Hence no DHL use by me


Kurt

FedEx sucks, at least my route anyway. He can't find the house most times (I'm not hiding). UPS is a step up, pretty good service, DHL, they always get their man, but if I had my choice, USPS all the way. At least if I need to fetch my package after a no one home to sign attempt, I can do so at my leasure and don't have to waste a day waiting for a re-delivery. And I've yet to have anything lost when it's shipped via the postal service.

Oh, do I have stories about deliveries! Or non-deliveries.

The Post Office doesn't actually even try to deliver stuff to the apartment, hasn't for years. The mail carrier just carries a previously filled out card saying that they attempted to deliver and I wasn't home. Nonsense. And if you bring that card right over the clerk will sometimes give you a hard time about it, saying that the mail carrier is still out and the package is with him/her, when we all know it never left the Post office.

I once had to spend 6 days getting a monitor delivered by FedEx. The first time it was a rainy day and the monitor was of course a heavy package. The guy didn't want to be bothered and never rang the bell and just left the notice downstairs. Other days they forgot to put in on the truck. I eventually had to yell at some management guy there to get it delivered. FedEx generally tends to not deliver on rainy days.

UPS will leave a package in the lobby of an apartment building where anyone could walk off with it. They also leave notices that they'd tried to deliver when they didn't. I've seen clusters of UPS trucks in the middle of the afternoon with the drivers sitting around on a dead end street just eating and drinking and not delivering anything at all. No, they weren't on a lunch break, they stayed there for about 3 or 4 hours before all 7 trucks left at once.

The Post Office has given my package to someone else and I had a very hard time getting it back, and that was a fountain pen.

The latest thing is that the Post office logs a Priority Mail shipment as arriving at the Post Office at a certain time and then being delivered one minute later! I don't know if this is just incompetence or an attempt to make it look like they're not screwing up the mail. And in one case I only found out I had a package because I tracked it on line. They never left a notice in my P.O. Box. And when I went over to pick it up, 3 days after it had arrived at the Post Office, they gave me a hard time because the printout of the USPS E-mail I brought with me to show that it was there said that it had already been delivered!

Last month we had to have something "delivered" by USPS to the apartment and of course we only got the card. So we went over to the Post Office and the clerk went and looked for it and came back after a while and said it wasn't there, then he changed his story saying he couldn't find it because it hadn't been sorted yet. He just wouldn't bother looking for it. I had to have someone else look for it. She found it pretty quickly. And this was another Priority Mail package.

I find less of a hassle with getting things shipped to my P.O. Box because they can't claim the mail carrier isn't in yet. And the way they handle P.O. Box mail they are much less likely to give my package away to someone else.

I can get my stuff eventually, but I sometimes have to really fight for it .

I agree with you greencobra, USPS all the way. I recently had a package "delivered" by UPS and I was home. I checked the tracking on their website and it said it was delivered. I went to my front porch in anticipation. No package. So I had to file a claim with UPS. Now they won't deliver to my house because they didn't deliver my package. I know it wasn't delivered because I was home and I would have heard their loud trucks. This is not the first time with UPS either. Fedex is just as bad, but I have no experience with DHL.

My USPS guy is great. Always delivers and a very friendly guy to boot!

Uh oh! I'm expecting 2 packages from Speerbob and he uses DHL from Thailand. Oh, I hope that they don't screw this up. I'm getting it delivered to the P.O. Box, which Speerbob assures me DHL will do.

Our USPS carrier retired. All but one of the experienced clerks at the local post office retired or transferred elsewhere. So now everything is misdelivered--unless it's via EMS, which has separate drivers. Last night Fedex Ground came banging on my door and leaning on the doorbell in an aggressive way. They were trying to deliver a package. But it was the wrong street. They scared the eyebrows right off my face with their banging and ringing.

I have had consistently good experiences with USPS, UPS, FedEx and DHL. Maybe it helps to live in a rural area. There is not much turnover in personnel. The UPS guy said that he was on a waiting list for our route for years before the old guy retired. He'll hold onto it until he retires.

When they can't make it up my drive in the winter (8400' at the top, 8300' at the bottom, 1/4 mile long), they drop the packages off at the general store down the street, ring me up and let me know where it is. That rarely happens anymore except with the FedEx or DHL contract people who use there own vehicles.

The USPS delivery lady will sometimes schlep a package up the hill if there isn't room in the community box for it to save us a trip to the post office (8+ miles away).

All the drivers are good folks. When they aren't in a great rush, they spend a minute or two admiring the view and chatting about our animals (goats, horses, chickens, the usual...) or our families. It's nice to see the stress disappear from their faces when they get out of the truck and see our view of Pikes Peak. Even though we had nothing to do with that view, we kinda feel like we're helpin' 'em out a bit by taking a little stress out of their day.

Greg

I've found it's worth remembering your regular delivery people at Christmas. But I've still had noteable experiences.
On a good note, I received an automated call from UPS that a package requiring a signature was on the way. An hour later the doorbell rang. Not bad!

I had Fedex claim that nobody was available at 3PM for a delivery when my office was open and full of employees - lazy puke.

We had UPS come by for their daily pickup, only to have the driver look in the shipping bay window and decide that there was too much for him to do, so he split. We called to complain and a manager from UPS drove in to pick up the shipments. Needless to say, we requested that they get us a new driver for pickups.

I feel your pain.

I haven't had a problem with the USPS.

I mentioned my DHL problem already above.

I have had some scrapes with UPS. At my current address, the truck hsa a knack for showing up in the window between when my wife leaves for a class and I return home (usually no more than 5-10 minutes). That's not their fault, but it is frustrating. The far more serious problem came when I lived in Georgia. On more than one occasion, the package would get to a sorting facility around 90 minutes from my home and would then be sent back to the shipper. It was bizarre.

The only issue I have ever had with FedEx came when a company promised me overnight shipping and then sent the package second day. Due to the weekend, the delivery being set for my place of work, and the company also sending it as a "home" delivery, I didn't get a package I was promised on Friday until the following Tuesday. FedEx didn't cause this, but they also didn't have any options for me in terms of making it possible for me to get my package prior to that Tuesday.

It really depends where you are as to what service you get from what company.

For us, USPS is usually really good. Except on the second, we had a substitute driver who sat my box from Pendemonium by the garage, on the wet pavement, instead of bringing it to the house. I understand our walk is covered in snow and not wanting to climb it, but there's a doorbell by the garage too, and I was at the window putting on my jacket. Wait just a second, huh? That was a sub, though.

Our current FedEx guy is really good. He's not going to last. He always comes to the door, waits for us to answer, talks a little -- and because of that, sometimes he doesn't make it to our street until 7 at night.

For UPS, we refer to packages as "whomps". Why? That's the sound it makes when it hits the porch after being throw into it. Worse, our 'enclosed' porch isn't as enclosed as they seem to think. It's a greenhouse, with movable panels to somewhat regular temperature, so it's not water tight. And in summer, it's an absolute oven.

Woohoo!!! My two packages from I Sell Pens were just delivered!!! Thank heavens!

Now, if it was supposedly the same guy from last night as I was told it would be, well I truly believe he wasn't within 200 yards of my complex last night. Hate to say this, but he looked like he hadn't slept in a week, he was unshaven, his uniform was really wrinkled, and he didn't want to speak. What, do they make these guys live in their trucks?? I was torn between feeling disgusted and sad for him at the same time.

On the other side of the coin, the packages were unscathed, and the pens are nice!

Now, the only one of these pens in this batch that I purchased for actual use is the Pelikan M320 Jade. Hah! This is going to be fun! Lovely little pen. I'm terrible with dimensions without an actual visual, and it is even smaller than I'd thought it would be. I'd planned to use it for checks mostly, but now... Well, it is certainly growing on me, but it is definitely going to take a little getting used to. And now I also get to learn how to fill a real fountain pen without a cartridge or converter, lol. Wish me luck. I picked up some Noodler's Eternal Hunter Green for the job.

And for those who have fancy, ornate limited editions or show pens, do you actually write with them? I picked up a no brand ornamental while I was poking around Todd's site, and it is quite lovely, and very heavy, and really ornate! Definitely just a fun just-for-show-and-showing-off pen, but I'm curious if anyone actually writes with their high-end special and limited editions.



I need to move out to near you, Greg. Sounds like a much more relaxed, happy place to be than the metro area.

I just can't help myself. I retired after 25 years with UPS (both hourly and management). Your individual delivery situation is very much dependent on your individual delivery person. I've had horrible service from all of the delivery companies and outstanding service from them also.

Like everything else in life that depends on the human factor, that is the significant factor. Don't ask my opinion concerning the company I worked for for 25 years unless you have several hours to listen, but then again I want them to be in business for a long time so I can collect my pension.

Calls in the driver's supervisors o work. All of these companies do care about their service. Valid complaints, in fact all complaints are taken seriously and investigated. But again the end product is only as good as the the person delivering the service. Remember, a turkey is a turkey no mater how you dress him up!
PMS

I always get my stuff delivered to my office for three main reasons: There is someone there to accept delivery, even if I'm in court. The delivered object sets safely behind the receptionist's counter until I get it, and finally, my wife is not alerted that I just got another delivery.
I would never take the chance of delivery at home from UPS, and especially the USPS. We have a long driveway with a gate, and have 3 German Shepherd dogs residing inside said gate. No one tries to deliver stuff for that reason So they generally leave it at the foot of the mailbox or beside the gate where it could be picked up by anyone.
Additionally, I think our mail carrier is dyslexic. He constantly misdelivers mail. My wife almost had a bench warrant issued for failing to appear on a reset arraignment docket (for her lead foot.) The notice was delivered to our neighbor down the road, who thoughtfully kept it for several weeks before it occurred to her we should probaby need it. (She's an idiot, too.).
We finally dropped the dime on the knucklehead carrier with the Post Master for the straw that broke the camel's back. My other neighbor came to the house right before Christmas with a box of Christmas presents he found in the middle of the road, covered in snow. He almost ran the box over.
Since filing a written complaint, I have noticed that things seem to be running a lot more smoothly. The carrier does not do like he did earlier this summer: Deliver to the mailbox, and drive by the pasture with a wave, after which we find a notice in the mailbox which says "Delivery Attempted Signature Required" And yes, we mentioned that incident, too.

Just yesterday I got a package from UPS (not a pen). I was sitting at my computer, like I am now, and heard something get tossed against the front door. Then the doorbell rang. As I got up to answer the door, through the window I saw the UPS guy literally sprinting back to his truck. He hopped in and peeled off before I could even unlock the door. It was kinda funny, but I'm glad my package didn't contain anything breakable.

One time UPS left a package of mine sitting atop someone's fencepost 4 blocks down from where I live. I only received the package because the owner of the property noticed something sitting on top of his fence and was kind enough to take it upon himself to deliver it to me.

Never had any problems with FedEx.

edit for typo

Some of my paintings got damaged through UPS International. Filing a claim was impossibly difficult. They kept sending a new person (in Manila) to re-interview me...
I was able to repair the damage & sell the paintings so I just gave up on the claim.

I have a better one - their delivery person didn't even knock on the door - they threw the package (quite hard) at the door, expecting that the package hitting the door would be as good as a knock. The problem was, of course, that I saw the delivery person coming, and had opened the door just after the box was thrown. It hit me with great force. Meanwhile the DHL driver was running away.

I called up DHL and told them I didn't appreciate being assaulted by their delivery drivers. I also told them it was the last package I would ever ship DHL, if that was the kind of care I could expect.

Well, I'm not having as much luck with my M320 as I'd anticipated, so taking a breather from the situation.

I guess we've all got our share of delivery horror stories. I've had more horrors with USPS than the others. Overall, though, most of the time they all try to do their jobs. I guess I just feel singled out when I'm the one having problems with the billions of letters and packages being delivered every day by them as well as the others.

I've worked as, essentially, a mail room clerk. Officially I was a Publicist, but anyone who knows anything about that position knows that it's all about sending things out in the mail on time. These are my observations about the various shipping methods regularly available in the US today.

1. The United States Postal Service
Populated by ignoramuses, arrogant jerks, and some very friendly and competent letter carriers. I think the door-to-door people are probably the best of all the various businesses out there, but the back-room and counter people are probably the worst. Their prices for mid-range shipping are competitive, their insurance options are as good as any (but the resolution of a claim can take literally years), and they handle REGULAR mail -- a number 9 business sized envelope with one sheet of folded paper within -- better than anyone. USPS's website is convolute, inept, idiotic, incompetent, without information, indicative of 1980s-level assumptions about technology. For instance, those packages which have tracking bar-codes on them are updated for consumer web access to the information roughly ONLY ONCE EVERY TWO DAYS. What's the point of that? Further, you basically can't print your own postage unless you own a postal scale, and even then they're likely to just return to sender (and yes, you have to pay FULL PRICE a second time) if they can figure out some sneaky way that you happened to cross one of their preposterous (and not publicly viewable) regulations. Pens, for instance, are sometimes rejected for "containing liquid." Items over $200 are a big problem with USPS. "Media Mail" ("printed matter") is a great way to beat the system, and the best way to send books across the country still. USPS has a good link-up with E-Bay and Pay-Pal purchases, but, as mentioned, you must own a postal scale (or know the correct weight of the package) to make it work effectively.

2. Fed Ex
The best of the various private carriers, especially for domestic packages. Their rates may be about a dollar per small package more in certain circumstances, but the price is worth it. Their carriers are knowledgeable, and any truck is a drop off. You can print your own bar-coded mailing label on any ink-jet or laser printer (others claim that this is the case, but thus far others have made it prohibitively convolute and unpredictable where Fed Ex has not), and if you happen to have put an inadequate amount of payment into it, they'll just retroactively bill you and "work it out" after the package has been delivered in a timely manner. Greatest disadvantage is that they don't have a good "slow" option: Fed-Ex Ground is more expensive than USPS in most cases, and just as problematic. For overnights, and must-be-there, and extremely expensive (over $200) items, Fed Ex is your best choice always. Their at-home website access is by far the best, with a zillion ways to pay, a zillion useful address functions, a zillion options, most fairly self-explanatory.

3. UPS
"Brown" doesn't really want your business. Their national business model is to cater to bulk shippers, give them all sorts of weird discounts on the types of shipments that are predictable and go out regularly and therefore allow UPS to pre-schedule their logistical arrangements of planes and vans. They want (and have) Amazon.com and Levenger's business, not yours, so they don't really offer options that are ideal for small intermittent shipments from mom and pop. They keep trying to come up with these options, but they're really a corporate after-thought, an attempt to fill in the last little gaps in their almost-stuffed trucks with a few items in and around the corners. They of course would never admit to any of this, but if you've tried to work with them you'll see that they've basically written you and me off as liabilities. Here's a typical story: for a package in 2005, their automated address system wrongly changed a destination I had shipped to in Manhattan, from "160 Park Avenue South" to "160 Park Avenue." Six weeks later, they still were trying to deliver to the wrong address, every single day, and every time I called to correct the address, they told me there was nothing they could do about it because the package was on the truck instead of in the distribution center. "You can call back tomorrow and talk to the driver." Since I knew nobody at the wrong address (obviously), I could in no manner get them to return to sender, even. As far as I know, UPS is still daily taking the package from the distribution center, in the morning putting it on the wrong truck, driving up to the wrong address, failing to deliver it, returning it to the distribution center in the evening, and never actually using the hundreds of messages that I told them over the phone to actually do the job I paid them to do. Takeshia and Shawanda and their ilk just don't give a rat's butt about doing their jobs well. For this reason, I suspect UPS stock will do better than Fed Ex -- they've carefully, clearly, chosen as a corporate mentality that if performance of the service is detrimental to profit, then profit should come first. The American Way, I guess. It will screw them over in the long run, once mom and pop realize that they aren't actually getting what they pay for; but in the short run, their ratio of costs to profits will be a much better margin than their competitors and a thousand analysts will tell everyone to buy buy buy on Wall Street. UPS is "driver driven," so if your local truck decides not to visit your office building today because there's only one package to go out from there (yours), you're screwed. Fed Ex would send another driver.

4. DHL
Too expensive for many small North American destinations, but has the best international rates. As with Fed Ex, the web site and the regular options are excellent. There is something weird going on with them, about what markets they've chosen to try to manage and maintain. If I had something I needed to get to a London business location by tomorrow's end of work day there, I would probably prefer DHL. But customs is such a nightmare on anything other than documents and printed material, and Fed Ex has figured out how to do customs forms for its customers via the web better than anyone else. So, I'd have to prefer Fed Ex except sometimes for price or timing.

After reading all these replies, I'm not feeling all warm and fuzzy. I'm waiting for e FedEx package tracking says is supposed to be delivered today. Our UPS guy is awesome. He knows my wife works night shift in the E.R.. He always leaves packages in a safe spot on our porch without ringing the door bell. My wife appreciates that. The one FedEx driver I've met has been good, too. He's seen me working in my garage shop; and, brought packages to me instead of ringing the bell.

Now, if my new pen would just get here.

ETA: Arrgghhh!! I just checked the tracking; and, it arrived at our local facility at 6:47 this morning. Do they deliver FedEx ground on Saturdays?

Actually the USPS, UPS, and FedEx delivery people are excellent here where we live.

Excellent point. The nature of given individuals in the delivery trucks is likely to be different in different regions, depending on socio-economic factors and costs of living and the sort. Here in New Orleans, the USPS Postal Clerk's position is an entrenched unionized job which has seen forty years of corrupt management; elsewhere there may be more careful oversight, or other circumstances which lead to a given job being a "plum" desirable one, or a "dregs" undesirable one, and thereby generating a certain population of employees.

I'm shipping most of my pens by USPS, because my preferred carrier (generally Fed Ex) doesn't offer a slow cheap option that I like. It's not a problem, in the sense that the packages tend to get there eventually. But it IS, in the sense that I can't do it from home (they'll catch me on some regulation), in the sense that I have to wait in line where they haven't posted sufficient counter staff despite their familiarity with obvious and predictable daily traffic patterns, and in the sense that I will be berated for having the wrong skin color, both while waiting, and perhaps also by staff themselves when I get to the front of the line. Unpleasant, to say the least.

So, the Post Office is still winning my business. Just not the right way.

I suppose there are collectors among us who protect the resale value of their LE high end pens by never inking them, some by never opening the packaging. But come on! The fun of these beautiful instruments is that they are functional tools we can use every day.

I use every pen I own, including my most ornate pen, the MB Pope Julius 888 shown in my avatar. Today I'm sitting at a carwash waiting for my ride to be washed, waxed, and pampered - and I'm writing cards with my new Visconti LE Divina Propozione.

If you're in the hobby to make money on buying low and selling high - then I suppose you will make more money by preserving your purchases un-inked. But if you are in this hobby because you love the look and feel of a good fountain pen, then ink-up buddy. The fun is in the using.

Depending on where you live, it's my understanding that your USPS, FedEx, and DHL drivers may all actually be subcontractors. In addition, I'm pretty sure that at least DHL's primary concern is price when they open up bidding on the routes. I think that's what was going on with my DHL package that rode with the driver 4 days. I think he probably didn't have anything to deliver in the general vicinity, so he didn't bother coming out. It did take a series of angry calls all the way to the local provider to get him to show.

I have no doubt that it's about the individual driver. With that said, the issue then becomes how the management reacts to complaints. If there are credible complaints about someone not doing his job, that person should be reprimanded at minimum. At a certain point, it becomes more about management of the company than about that driver.

I guess everyone has some sort of horror stories to tell!

For me, USPS is pretty good. I live in a rural area. The carriers generally drive up to the house and honk, but since the dogs generally announce their impending arrival I'm usually at the door by that time, anyway. When I was working they'd leave a notice in the mailbox; I could go by the back door of the post office on my way to work and ring the bell (before they opened) and they'd give me my package. It's a small-town thing I guess.

DHL: First I heard of them was when I was in Saudi Arabia during the build-up for IRAQI FREEDOM. We used them to ship comm equipment into the various countries as they could get stuff through customs faster than we could. Greased the right palms, I guess. Stateside, I bought a hat and more particularly, the rare hat box it came in from a seller on eBay. The seller shipped via DHL. It arrived with a DHL-generated address label. When I opened up the box I found that the rare hat box had been thoroughly crushed--completely destroyed. The hat wasn't anything special and I wasn't interested in it, anyway, but it was a goner, too. Turned out it wasn't in the original box it had been shipped it--I guess the original shipping box had been destroyed so they put it into a box they had handy and delivered it.

FedEx: Another hat purchase. Somewhere along the way the shipping label was lost, so FedEx put on another one. Same street number, but different street. Actually, different highway. The name/address they pulled out of their database was a good one, just not mine. The people they delivered it to finally opened the box, found the sales receipt inside, and brought it to me. They said that they had tried to get FedEx to come back and get the box but FedEx had refused to do so.

UPS: Generally pretty good. We've got a regular driver with a substitute from time to time. The dogs start barking when the truck is still a quarter-mile away. Friendly drivers.

Cheers,
Tom

(Added:) Whoa, this was my first post? I've been a member for quite a while, but don't come by very often. I didn't realize I'd not posted before until after I posted this one!

Glad you posted. Don't let it be your last.

Thanks, Ghost Plane!

I'll be around a bit more often. I've learned quite a bit here so far. I seem to have become a bit of an Esterbrook person--love those easy interchangeable nibs!

Cheers,
Tom

UPS is best to deliver to me, but sucks when I try to use them to deliver.
FedEx takes wayy too long on ground
USPS just gives me the pink card

Hi, the packages I sent you will come USPS registered mail to your house. I use DHL Global Registered Airmail which means DHL picks it up from me and takes it to Hong Kong where it gets postmarked and then they take it to the US where it goes in the USPS mail. It is then delivered by the post office in the US. It is registered mail so someone has to be home to sign for it or if not pick it up at the post office (Post officer SHOULD leave a notice). It's a very, very good service!! Faster and more secure than if I use just regular international mail and much cheaper than DHL express. In fact it's even cheaper than regular international mail. That's why my shipping price from Thailand is so good. Typical transit time the USA is 15 days or so. I have had people get packages in as little as 6 days and some can take over 20, especially around the holidays. Cheers, BOB

Last Thursday, January 3, I was waiting for a UPS delivery from Amazon.com. I got up, made coffee, and watched the morning news. I checked the UPS web site, and they said that they had attempted to deliver the package at 9:20am and there was no answer. No one knocked on my door, no note was left. The notation that they attempted delivery was simply a lie.

I called the UPS 800 number, complained, asked to speak to a supervisor, complained, asked to speak with someone local, complained, and they called the driver and the package was delivered that same afternoon.

I know good and well that they did not attempt a delivery at 9:20am.

I've never had a delivery problem like that before, but at least they came through in the end!

My FedEx package from Levenger that arrived at our local hub on Saturday, the 5th, is still being shown as at the FedEx destination. There is no estimated delivery date any more. It had an estimated delivery date of January 5. Obviously, that did not happen.