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Insurance is a ripoff if you are an ecommerce company. In my last company we shipped $5,000 a day in product and insured all of it for the first couple of years

Insurance is a ripoff if you are an ecommerce company. In my last company we shipped $5,000 a day in product and insured all of it for the first couple of years. One day I got a postcard that was trying to get me to insure with an outside company when I shipped UPS. I got wondering how they could do that, did some math on what we were spending and then asked my warehouse manager how much we had lost (in actual costs to us) in the last two years and was stunned at the answer - $600 total out of several thousand shipments. At that point we began self-insuring.

kgo 16y ago
This is a little late... But yeah in that case I agree 100%. Different case if you're shipping some scientific equipment worth 1500 dollars now and then. And if that equipment is 50,000 bucks, maybe you start looking at a private courier. I have a friend who used to work as a registrar for a museum, shipping stuff that was worth millions, or even arguably priceless. She'd ride on the planes and ride in the backs of the trucks that transported this stuff. She'd have to document every scratch, every discoloration, etc, and sign off on it, before shipping began so they could compare at the end of the trip. But I was suggesting a hedge. Come up with your own numbers, but if item is worth greater than 2000, insure for 200, costing 70 cents for UPS. That way it gets UPS internal stickers saying it's insured, probably beeps or something every time someone scans it, and provokes an entirely different attitude than marking it "FRAGILE", according to antecdotal evidence.
- gregpilling 16y ago
  As far as 'FRAGILE' markings making a difference I can assure you, since I ship UPS every day, that they treat every box equally (poorly). There is no preferential treatment for any package, and the heavier the packages are the worse they travel. I watched my driver knock over a flat-screen TV three times one day during a pickup. He had it standing on edge and it wouldn't stay upright, but after three tries at knocking it over he put it flat under a shelf.

kgo 16y ago

This is a little late... But yeah in that case I agree 100%. Different case if you're shipping some scientific equipment worth 1500 dollars now and then. And if that equipment is 50,000 bucks, maybe you start looking at a private courier. I have a friend who used to work as a registrar for a museum, shipping stuff that was worth millions, or even arguably priceless. She'd ride on the planes and ride in the backs of the trucks that transported this stuff. She'd have to document every scratch, every discoloration, etc, and sign off on it, before shipping began so they could compare at the end of the trip. But I was suggesting a hedge. Come up with your own numbers, but if item is worth greater than 2000, insure for 200, costing 70 cents for UPS. That way it gets UPS internal stickers saying it's insured, probably beeps or something every time someone scans it, and provokes an entirely different attitude than marking it "FRAGILE", according to antecdotal evidence.

gregpilling 16y ago
As far as 'FRAGILE' markings making a difference I can assure you, since I ship UPS every day, that they treat every box equally (poorly). There is no preferential treatment for any package, and the heavier the packages are the worse they travel. I watched my driver knock over a flat-screen TV three times one day during a pickup. He had it standing on edge and it wouldn't stay upright, but after three tries at knocking it over he put it flat under a shelf.