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Would you feel better if the person said "Hi, I work for UPS; are you home right now?"? There's no authentication built into the phone call. Perhaps Amazon shou

by jonlucc 11y ago

Would you feel better if the person said "Hi, I work for UPS; are you home right now?"? There's no authentication built into the phone call. Perhaps Amazon should use their apps to facilitate that kind of communication with something like a push message?

mindslight 11y ago
UPS/Fedex/USPS have figured out how to reliably enter apartment buildings on their own (USPS uses a key, I presume UPS/Fedex use some numeric code convention). Amazon randos call you and make it your problem, as if they have never delivered a no-signature package before. Nearly every time I've used Amazon, they've surprised me with something crappy and I'm left wondering how they're so popular. Recently, they displayed a "guaranteed delivery by this day if you order within the next 45 seconds" on the checkout confirmation. I had been paying attention to the cutoff time and the time had just previously said 40 minutes. All the digging I did supported the conclusion that both times were a fictional dark pattern to drive order completion. Never mind the clingy stalker follow up spam when you price check an item outside of incognito mode.
- Obi_Juan_Kenobi 11y ago
  > they've surprised me with something crappy What are they surprising you with? I've done loads of orders with Amazon and it's basically always what I ordered. Once I got some cheap knockoffs, but was able to easily return it. That's out of a few hundred orders. As for the timeout stuff, they should definitely stop calling it a guarantee. Most of the time it's correct, and fairly often I'll get a package much quicker than it indicates, but I'd say about 10-15% of packages are later than the 2-day guarantee.
  - mindslight 11y ago
    The surprise is about their behavior, not about items received. In the situation I described, the discrepancy between the two times caused me to investigate further. 12 hours later, the same delivery schedule was still available. In other words, they deliberately misstated cutoff times to create a sense of urgency and discourage shopping around or having second thoughts before hitting submit. WTF? In another instance - they canceled one item from an order, sent no notification of such, and completely erased that item from the order history. I was left scratching my head, until I reviewed emails to see if I really had ordered that item. Again, WTF? I'm sure they're alright if you're constantly ordering things from Prime or whatever because there are more good instances to outweigh the weirdness, combined with their policy of crediting people to keep them happy and avoid breaking the illusion.
randx838 11y ago
But if I'm expecting a UPS package... How do you authenticate that everyone you email or text hasn't had their computer hacked or stolen?
chrisBob 11y ago
No, that wouldn't be better, but I have also never gotten such a call from a UPS driver. The UPS driver will just leave the box and go. There was absolutely no reason why this box of baby socks needed them to check with me before leaving it on my front steps.
knorby 11y ago
You are totally correct, but somehow Amazon couriers just opt for the maximum creep factor. UPS will call my apartment call box if I'm one of the people getting a package delivered, and they have the phrasing down. Amazon couriers will often call from their personal cell phone, and just say that it is Amazon and that they have my package. Given the callbox, the call is worthless anyway unless I'm home, but I never answer since it is a rando phone call! Their drivers just need training...

by jonlucc 11y ago

mindslight 11y ago

UPS/Fedex/USPS have figured out how to reliably enter apartment buildings on their own (USPS uses a key, I presume UPS/Fedex use some numeric code convention). Amazon randos call you and make it your problem, as if they have never delivered a no-signature package before. Nearly every time I've used Amazon, they've surprised me with something crappy and I'm left wondering how they're so popular. Recently, they displayed a "guaranteed delivery by this day if you order within the next 45 seconds" on the checkout confirmation. I had been paying attention to the cutoff time and the time had just previously said 40 minutes. All the digging I did supported the conclusion that both times were a fictional dark pattern to drive order completion. Never mind the clingy stalker follow up spam when you price check an item outside of incognito mode.

Obi_Juan_Kenobi 11y ago
> they've surprised me with something crappy What are they surprising you with? I've done loads of orders with Amazon and it's basically always what I ordered. Once I got some cheap knockoffs, but was able to easily return it. That's out of a few hundred orders. As for the timeout stuff, they should definitely stop calling it a guarantee. Most of the time it's correct, and fairly often I'll get a package much quicker than it indicates, but I'd say about 10-15% of packages are later than the 2-day guarantee.
- mindslight 11y ago
  The surprise is about their behavior, not about items received. In the situation I described, the discrepancy between the two times caused me to investigate further. 12 hours later, the same delivery schedule was still available. In other words, they deliberately misstated cutoff times to create a sense of urgency and discourage shopping around or having second thoughts before hitting submit. WTF? In another instance - they canceled one item from an order, sent no notification of such, and completely erased that item from the order history. I was left scratching my head, until I reviewed emails to see if I really had ordered that item. Again, WTF? I'm sure they're alright if you're constantly ordering things from Prime or whatever because there are more good instances to outweigh the weirdness, combined with their policy of crediting people to keep them happy and avoid breaking the illusion.

randx838 11y ago

But if I'm expecting a UPS package... How do you authenticate that everyone you email or text hasn't had their computer hacked or stolen?

chrisBob 11y ago

No, that wouldn't be better, but I have also never gotten such a call from a UPS driver. The UPS driver will just leave the box and go. There was absolutely no reason why this box of baby socks needed them to check with me before leaving it on my front steps.

knorby 11y ago

You are totally correct, but somehow Amazon couriers just opt for the maximum creep factor. UPS will call my apartment call box if I'm one of the people getting a package delivered, and they have the phrasing down. Amazon couriers will often call from their personal cell phone, and just say that it is Amazon and that they have my package. Given the callbox, the call is worthless anyway unless I'm home, but I never answer since it is a rando phone call! Their drivers just need training...