FedEx Shipping Problems - Big Concern!

That’s hilarious. Way to live that lie to the fullest!

 

This is amazing

 

I have not been actively trading for awhile now - better part of 9+months. When i was, however, my shtick was homemade marinades, and that varried by season. Obviously grilling season is for grilling. Holidays is Ham and turkey Brine. Between them - whatever I feel like. The shtick behind the shtick is that I send them off for business porpoises - I claim that everyone I ship to is either a friend or a client, and that my father and I are really well known for our marinades. Nothing more personal than a homemade gift like that. Clients love it.

Occasionally I also say that my wife cans some homemade soups, and that we are sending a care package to a friend in need.

Rarely, homemade canned vegetables from our garden.

Now that I have moved, i have to develop a relationship all over again (DOH!), but I am considering printing every label (even USPS) at home and just letting everything get picked up at our office by the various carriers that come everyday.

 

Someone mentioned DHL, does anyone actually use them for shipping beer? I find it interesting that I've never heard someone chime in that they use DHL. Is it because they're horrible and lose stuff all the time (in my very limited, non-beer shipping experience with them, that's the case)? I thought they were cheaper than the others and figured someone would be crazy enough to try and save a few dollars.

 

I’d have to probably try hard to find a DHL location or shopping center that allowed DHL. That’s reason #1. Reason #2 is I feel other options are good, so not interested in going out of my way to try to fix a problem I don’t have, or to save a few dollars.

 

In my experience with FedEx/Kinkos is that they ask a lot of unnecessary questions. They always look for ways to charge more money and make it more difficult. Assuming these are privately owned, it makes sense!

When I use a FedEx Ship Center, there is far less hassle and they get upset at Kinkos style locations for harassing customers. An employee once told me to create an account as it was cheaper to send pkgs and it was.

If you have a printer cool, if not, use Kinkos just to print out labels and take to Ship Center. Also, the employee told me the location of the Distribution Center which was up the street from their location and has made life so much easier. Between 5 pm and 10:30 pm you can drop off the pkgs yourself and will ship the same night with no hassles.

 

I just had a package make it within 5 miles of the destination, then they turned it around and are shipping it back to me. Now the package is hovering somewhere in Denver for the last 3 days, I called them and they gave me a total nonanswer.

If I ever get this package back I'm interested to see what exactly happened. Going to ship it UPS, hopefully.

 

Good luck

 

I had a can explode and it came back to me. Same timing too. I did get it back but I also called about 6 times. Everything was there but the one can but it was very poorly packed so if it was bottles they would have been destroyed

 

I had a box sent to me and during transit a crowler exploded. They repacked in a new box and the box made it to me. No notes or letters.

I also had sent a box out. A bomber broke. They repacked and sent it to the destination.

Am I lucky or are there others who've had this happen to?

 

I've had it happen both ways in the two instances where a bottle broke. On one occasion the box made it all the way to California before a bottle broke (UPS shipping). On that occasion they repackaged the box and shipped it all the way back to me. On another occasion (FedEx shipping) a bottle broke on the way to Nebraska, but that time they repackaged the box and delivered it to the final destination.

It is interesting that out of only 2 times I've ever used FedEx out of 100+ boxes that I've sent during my trading, 1 of the 2 boxes broke. That prompted one of my threads from last year regarding preference for shipping company:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/poll-who-do-you-prefer-to-use-for-shipping.599540/

 

This experience seems like it is *potentially* relevant, so I thought that I would share:

For a trip next week I had to order a cable ladder for a small nuisance pit (caving related). The item was nothing but steel and aluminum. For some reason, the outside of the box contained a stain from some liquid. The guy dropping it off asked if it had liquid - I said that it shouldn't, but I was not sure (companies sometimes throw in free goodies). He wanted to watch me open it to make sure that it didn't, and if it did, then it would be considered "damaged," and he would need to return it.

This seemed unnecessary. I should be able to determine that myself. Perhaps he would not even worry if he was not a regular, since this is a business.

Had this thread not ever existed, I probably would not have given it a second thought. Thought it might be worth sharing, though.

 

Interesting... Did you open it in front of him? Definitely a unique situation and one that would have caught me off guard if a driver told me that.

 

I did. He was fairly impatient as well. The tape used on the box was stranded (reinforced) tape, and when I went to get a knife, he said "Do you need me to rip it open?" I told him that I could do it, but it's going to destroy the box. I destroyed the box, which would have sucked for him to return, obviously.

It was a very weird experience.

 

That is a weird situation. Wondering if maybe he thought it had a broken bottle and some places won’t let you return anything if signed and accepted, but declined delivery due to damage is okay.

As I’ve mentioned before, these guys are on strict time limits and anything that throws it off can effect pay, bonuses and even cost them their jobs so even having to to take it back in a destroyed box doesn’t make too much of a difference to him as it would have been packaged by some one else for return

 

That's bizarre.....so the item is delivered to you.

He gives it to you...so it's now in your possession.

Then tells you what to do?

Something about that doesn't add up

 

That's my feeling - take a hike!


I'm thing second he gives it to me. Thanks. Close door....and that's that.

 

Honestly, it seems like there’s such a high degree of variability between singular dropoff locations, shipping centers, and individual delivery-people -even amongst the different carriers- that it’s hard to count on a whole lot of uniformity. I’ve heard totally different policies existing at my local UPS than are at a UPS on the opposite coast. And my FedEx driver would never do something like the above, but it’s not terribly surprising for me to hear it happen to someone else.

I think there’s simply a lot of latitude afforded to certain localities and stores (or unclear/unenforced policies in place at large).