5 ms·

Of all the shippers, I've found Fedex to be the most unreliable. UPS deliveries via Amazon seem to always arrive without issue but almost every Fedex package ge

by nacs 7y ago

Of all the shippers, I've found Fedex to be the most unreliable. UPS deliveries via Amazon seem to always arrive without issue but almost every Fedex package gets lost en route or is delayed. Always felt like Amazon should drop Fedex.

notyourwork 7y ago
My experience has been the same, FedEx is always a crap shoot. USPS and UPS are always much more reliable.
- sokoloff 7y ago
  For me Fedex was pretty good, straight UPS quite good, and UPS Mail Innovations (with USPS last mile) was a reliable way to get a package a day late, meaning chasing Amazon CARE for a credit that was usually worth more than the inconvenience of the packaging missing Amazon’s guaranteed delivery SLA.
czk 7y ago
The only way I can get my FedEx packages is if I re-route them to a Walgreens or another drop point and drive there and pick them up myself. They never seem to be able to find my address while UPS or USPS never has an issue.
bluetidepro 7y ago
I think it all depends on the context of where you live, personally. I've lived in multiple large cities in the midwest (USA), and can say that UPS was far superior in one of them, while Fedex was way better in another. Even different addresses in the same city had the same result. Doesn't seem like there is any rhyme or reason.
- MegaButts 7y ago
  It's probably specific to the drivers, not the companies.
EB66 7y ago
That's not been the case for me. USPS is by far the worst with UPS and FedEx neck and neck with one another. The only experience I have with DHL is with commercial air freight and they've been quite good as well. Have you ever had to deal with lost packages? Good luck trying to make any progress with USPS. I've had several packages lost by USPS. Every phone call I've made to them results in conflicting answers and bad information. However, I live in Seattle and Amazon's own delivery service is arguably even worse than USPS. They might not lose packages (they now take photographs upon delivery), but the workers aren't very well trained. I've had packages left out by my sidewalk garage or left out on an unsheltered table in my front patio area. A number of times the packages have been rained on. It's a general level of cluelessness that you don't see with UPS, FedEx or USPS.
- inferiorhuman 7y ago
  Meanwhile I've had one lost letter with USPS (that now-empty envelop got delivered with an "apology"), no lost packages, but have had countless problems with FedEx and UPS. My favorite UPS experience was when UPS got a package to the regional sorting center (Oakland, CA) and then express shipped it to the east coast (where it arrived that day) and then told me it would take a week to ship it back to the west coast. Because fuck you, I didn't pay for two week delivery. Oh, how about the time the newbie driver delivered the package to the wrong house? Have you ever tried to get through to a real person at UPS? Careful what you wish for. The only human UPS will willingly let you talk to is in some overseas call center — and they will have zero power to do anything and thus say whatever they need to in order to get you to hang up the phone. After managing to escalate that incident, the supervisor at UPS's San Francisco depot called me back and explained that the package had been delivered correctly. I realize I'm not the customer in this case, but, man UPS has done a good job of ensuring I choose any other carrier. FedEx... bless them. Aside from offering up gun fetishist discounts (yuck) and being hardcore anti-union zealots, FedEx accepted a package from a vendor with two different delivery addresses on it. Yes, the vendor fucked up. But FedEx accepted the package and got it to the regional sorting center and just sat on it because they didn't know what to do. Zero effort made over a few days to call the vendor, myself, or the other person whose contact info was also on the package.
kenhwang 7y ago
My experience is, UPS always arrives on time, Fedex sometimes a day late, USPS rarely arrives late, but if it's late, it's usually not arriving at all. The worst, by far, is Amazon's own delivery service. Often late, frequently damaged, and inconsistent on when they show up during the day, if they can get into the building, and where they leave packages.
Judson 7y ago
We ship 75k shipments/yr across FedEx / UPS / USPS and, while I too have my own bias about preferred carrier, these kinds of preferences are usually pretty specific to locale. Some people love the carrier you hate, and others hate the carrier you love.
- kbenson 7y ago
  If only there was a company large enough, doing business in enough locales, and with enough statistical and engineering experience to be able to find where one shipper worked better than another and recommend the better one for that locale... /s
  - Judson 7y ago
    Not to ignore the '/s', but you brought up a good point. We did add an unobtrusive disclose menu to our shipping tiers during checkout for customers to select their specific carrier if they'd like. This seems to have worked pretty well for folks who have a strong opinion, and avoids the need make lots of guesses about what people like. Generally speaking, the biggest shipping preference people have is 'Free'.
brink 7y ago
Mine has been the opposite.. UPS was supposed to pick up a package for return once. They showed up, wrote "I'll pick up this package tomorrow." on the package's box, and never came back. I called UPS customer support 3 days in a row, trying to get them to pick it up, until they finally showed up on the 4th day. They've also delivered my packages to both of my neighbors on multiple occasions. Thankfully my neighbors were nice enough to correct the mistake rather than just keeping the items. I've never had an issue with FedEx.
- arprocter 7y ago
  Same thing happened to me with UPS collecting a package Someone stayed home from Tuesday evening onward, and they didn't manage to come and get it until Friday, despite calling them every morning asking what was going on The person who eventually collected suggested our bell was broken and generously offered to test it for us - we had food delivered on Thursday evening so knew it was fine And then before that there was the time I paid for 'guaranteed next-day delivery' on an envelope containing incredibly important documents which was only going to an adjacent zip code. Sent on Thursday and didn't show up until the week after, while UPS pretty much shrugged the whole weekend and said 'maybe we lost it?'
data_spy 7y ago
Lately, one Amazon delivery person (works for Amazon) I have has been terrible. Usually, they are fine but this one guy calls me with every package delivery he has for our building saying he can't get in the building and there is no one at the front desk. There is always someone at the front desk. This isn't really Amazon's fault but I imagine they track delivery success rate and this person will be gone eventually. Again, the other Amazon delivery people are fine but one specifically is bad.
- kevin_thibedeau 7y ago
  Teach him to fish and meet him at the front desk.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago
For me, Amazon Logistics has been the most unreliable.
zepearl 7y ago
My personal experiences with FedEx in Switzerland: very positive: a laptop from Lenovo from China + replacement keyboard from US + CD from Japan (because of some VAT-war I cannot buy anymore mp3s from amazon.com) during the last 6 months have all been delivered extremely fast and in perfect conditions. I love FedEx' feature to be able to tell them in advance not to deliver the package at home (I work so I'm never around when they would come by) but at some shops nearby my home or nearby where I work or to just hold it back. The last time I used UPS it did not have these features (might have improved now).
PascLeRasc 7y ago
My younger brother is a professional musician, and last year he bought a boutique trombone case handmade by one guy in a cabin in Wisconsin, after over a year on the waiting list. Fedex got to his apartment building in Manhattan, realized they didn't have a code to get in, and left it on the sidewalk. My brother was waiting at home all day for this package, saw them drop it off, ran down, and it was gone when he got outside. Fedex wouldn't do anything about it, no refund, nothing. And if he had done a chargeback on the manufacturer, who wasn't really at fault, he wouldn't have been able to buy from him ever again. So I wouldn't choose Fedex for anything valuable.
- taborj 7y ago
  I believe the shipper can require a signature upon delivery. Then, at least, if FedEx left it without getting a signature, they'd be on the hook for it.
  - tyingq 7y ago
    Where "on the hook" is shipper files a claim through a byzantine manual process to get some subset of the wholesale, not retail, value. You can't file the claim until after a multi-day "investigation". So if you ship a replacement right away, and they find the original item days later...too bad.
- fooey 7y ago
  Anything that expensive or irreplaceable should have been insured by the shipper and required a signature If you don't get what you buy, it's absolutely on the seller to make it right. It's on them to get reimbursed by the shipper for a failed delivery.
  - benatkin 7y ago
    Insurance is not a panacea. It wouldn't have gotten him moved up in the waiting list to receive a replacement quicker, and the claim likely would have been denied, and they'd have expected him to go through an appeals, which would be a pain, and might not get the result he wanted. A police report will probably be required. Even if successful, when insurance claims are made they often go to the CLUE insurance report, and make many forms of insurance more expensive or harder to get. https://www.carinsurance.com/clue-report.aspx https://www.carinsurance.com/clue-report.aspx The other thing is that you're assuming there was no insurance. Maybe you're right but I doubt it, it was probably insured by Fedex and the uselessness of the insurance was included in "Fedex wouldn't do anything about it". The "requesting a signature" part is something they often neglect to do, or do carelessly. At any rate if the person making the trombone case can't be bothered to ship it properly, it's still Fedex's fault from the musician brother's perspective, because he knew firsthand that the driver failed to deliver the item directly to him.
halfmatthalfcat 7y ago
Not Lasership? The amount of packages (I've had) lost by them is unfathomable.
- makerofspoons 7y ago
  Similarly I'm still waiting for the first time I have an OnTrac order actually show up.
- burnte 7y ago
  Lately if I see a package is Lasership and marked as "delayed in transit" I know I'm never getting it.
fooey 7y ago
Fedex and USPS and UPS have all been fine for me OnTrac though, every single time they tried to use OnTrac, OnTrac messed it up. Always multiple days late, and always a challenge to track it down and get it. Haven't had them in quite a while though, so maybe they got fired already.

by nacs 7y ago

notyourwork 7y ago

My experience has been the same, FedEx is always a crap shoot. USPS and UPS are always much more reliable.

sokoloff 7y ago
For me Fedex was pretty good, straight UPS quite good, and UPS Mail Innovations (with USPS last mile) was a reliable way to get a package a day late, meaning chasing Amazon CARE for a credit that was usually worth more than the inconvenience of the packaging missing Amazon’s guaranteed delivery SLA.

czk 7y ago

The only way I can get my FedEx packages is if I re-route them to a Walgreens or another drop point and drive there and pick them up myself. They never seem to be able to find my address while UPS or USPS never has an issue.

bluetidepro 7y ago

I think it all depends on the context of where you live, personally. I've lived in multiple large cities in the midwest (USA), and can say that UPS was far superior in one of them, while Fedex was way better in another. Even different addresses in the same city had the same result. Doesn't seem like there is any rhyme or reason.

MegaButts 7y ago
It's probably specific to the drivers, not the companies.

EB66 7y ago

That's not been the case for me. USPS is by far the worst with UPS and FedEx neck and neck with one another. The only experience I have with DHL is with commercial air freight and they've been quite good as well. Have you ever had to deal with lost packages? Good luck trying to make any progress with USPS. I've had several packages lost by USPS. Every phone call I've made to them results in conflicting answers and bad information. However, I live in Seattle and Amazon's own delivery service is arguably even worse than USPS. They might not lose packages (they now take photographs upon delivery), but the workers aren't very well trained. I've had packages left out by my sidewalk garage or left out on an unsheltered table in my front patio area. A number of times the packages have been rained on. It's a general level of cluelessness that you don't see with UPS, FedEx or USPS.

inferiorhuman 7y ago
Meanwhile I've had one lost letter with USPS (that now-empty envelop got delivered with an "apology"), no lost packages, but have had countless problems with FedEx and UPS. My favorite UPS experience was when UPS got a package to the regional sorting center (Oakland, CA) and then express shipped it to the east coast (where it arrived that day) and then told me it would take a week to ship it back to the west coast. Because fuck you, I didn't pay for two week delivery. Oh, how about the time the newbie driver delivered the package to the wrong house? Have you ever tried to get through to a real person at UPS? Careful what you wish for. The only human UPS will willingly let you talk to is in some overseas call center — and they will have zero power to do anything and thus say whatever they need to in order to get you to hang up the phone. After managing to escalate that incident, the supervisor at UPS's San Francisco depot called me back and explained that the package had been delivered correctly. I realize I'm not the customer in this case, but, man UPS has done a good job of ensuring I choose any other carrier. FedEx... bless them. Aside from offering up gun fetishist discounts (yuck) and being hardcore anti-union zealots, FedEx accepted a package from a vendor with two different delivery addresses on it. Yes, the vendor fucked up. But FedEx accepted the package and got it to the regional sorting center and just sat on it because they didn't know what to do. Zero effort made over a few days to call the vendor, myself, or the other person whose contact info was also on the package.

kenhwang 7y ago

My experience is, UPS always arrives on time, Fedex sometimes a day late, USPS rarely arrives late, but if it's late, it's usually not arriving at all. The worst, by far, is Amazon's own delivery service. Often late, frequently damaged, and inconsistent on when they show up during the day, if they can get into the building, and where they leave packages.

Judson 7y ago

We ship 75k shipments/yr across FedEx / UPS / USPS and, while I too have my own bias about preferred carrier, these kinds of preferences are usually pretty specific to locale. Some people love the carrier you hate, and others hate the carrier you love.

kbenson 7y ago
If only there was a company large enough, doing business in enough locales, and with enough statistical and engineering experience to be able to find where one shipper worked better than another and recommend the better one for that locale... /s
- Judson 7y ago
  Not to ignore the '/s', but you brought up a good point. We did add an unobtrusive disclose menu to our shipping tiers during checkout for customers to select their specific carrier if they'd like. This seems to have worked pretty well for folks who have a strong opinion, and avoids the need make lots of guesses about what people like. Generally speaking, the biggest shipping preference people have is 'Free'.

brink 7y ago

Mine has been the opposite.. UPS was supposed to pick up a package for return once. They showed up, wrote "I'll pick up this package tomorrow." on the package's box, and never came back. I called UPS customer support 3 days in a row, trying to get them to pick it up, until they finally showed up on the 4th day. They've also delivered my packages to both of my neighbors on multiple occasions. Thankfully my neighbors were nice enough to correct the mistake rather than just keeping the items. I've never had an issue with FedEx.

arprocter 7y ago
Same thing happened to me with UPS collecting a package Someone stayed home from Tuesday evening onward, and they didn't manage to come and get it until Friday, despite calling them every morning asking what was going on The person who eventually collected suggested our bell was broken and generously offered to test it for us - we had food delivered on Thursday evening so knew it was fine And then before that there was the time I paid for 'guaranteed next-day delivery' on an envelope containing incredibly important documents which was only going to an adjacent zip code. Sent on Thursday and didn't show up until the week after, while UPS pretty much shrugged the whole weekend and said 'maybe we lost it?'

data_spy 7y ago

Lately, one Amazon delivery person (works for Amazon) I have has been terrible. Usually, they are fine but this one guy calls me with every package delivery he has for our building saying he can't get in the building and there is no one at the front desk. There is always someone at the front desk. This isn't really Amazon's fault but I imagine they track delivery success rate and this person will be gone eventually. Again, the other Amazon delivery people are fine but one specifically is bad.

kevin_thibedeau 7y ago
Teach him to fish and meet him at the front desk.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago

For me, Amazon Logistics has been the most unreliable.

zepearl 7y ago

My personal experiences with FedEx in Switzerland: very positive: a laptop from Lenovo from China + replacement keyboard from US + CD from Japan (because of some VAT-war I cannot buy anymore mp3s from amazon.com) during the last 6 months have all been delivered extremely fast and in perfect conditions. I love FedEx' feature to be able to tell them in advance not to deliver the package at home (I work so I'm never around when they would come by) but at some shops nearby my home or nearby where I work or to just hold it back. The last time I used UPS it did not have these features (might have improved now).

PascLeRasc 7y ago

My younger brother is a professional musician, and last year he bought a boutique trombone case handmade by one guy in a cabin in Wisconsin, after over a year on the waiting list. Fedex got to his apartment building in Manhattan, realized they didn't have a code to get in, and left it on the sidewalk. My brother was waiting at home all day for this package, saw them drop it off, ran down, and it was gone when he got outside. Fedex wouldn't do anything about it, no refund, nothing. And if he had done a chargeback on the manufacturer, who wasn't really at fault, he wouldn't have been able to buy from him ever again. So I wouldn't choose Fedex for anything valuable.

taborj 7y ago
I believe the shipper can require a signature upon delivery. Then, at least, if FedEx left it without getting a signature, they'd be on the hook for it.
- tyingq 7y ago
  Where "on the hook" is shipper files a claim through a byzantine manual process to get some subset of the wholesale, not retail, value. You can't file the claim until after a multi-day "investigation". So if you ship a replacement right away, and they find the original item days later...too bad.
fooey 7y ago
Anything that expensive or irreplaceable should have been insured by the shipper and required a signature If you don't get what you buy, it's absolutely on the seller to make it right. It's on them to get reimbursed by the shipper for a failed delivery.
- benatkin 7y ago
  Insurance is not a panacea. It wouldn't have gotten him moved up in the waiting list to receive a replacement quicker, and the claim likely would have been denied, and they'd have expected him to go through an appeals, which would be a pain, and might not get the result he wanted. A police report will probably be required. Even if successful, when insurance claims are made they often go to the CLUE insurance report, and make many forms of insurance more expensive or harder to get. https://www.carinsurance.com/clue-report.aspx https://www.carinsurance.com/clue-report.aspx The other thing is that you're assuming there was no insurance. Maybe you're right but I doubt it, it was probably insured by Fedex and the uselessness of the insurance was included in "Fedex wouldn't do anything about it". The "requesting a signature" part is something they often neglect to do, or do carelessly. At any rate if the person making the trombone case can't be bothered to ship it properly, it's still Fedex's fault from the musician brother's perspective, because he knew firsthand that the driver failed to deliver the item directly to him.

halfmatthalfcat 7y ago

Not Lasership? The amount of packages (I've had) lost by them is unfathomable.

makerofspoons 7y ago
Similarly I'm still waiting for the first time I have an OnTrac order actually show up.
burnte 7y ago
Lately if I see a package is Lasership and marked as "delayed in transit" I know I'm never getting it.

fooey 7y ago

Fedex and USPS and UPS have all been fine for me OnTrac though, every single time they tried to use OnTrac, OnTrac messed it up. Always multiple days late, and always a challenge to track it down and get it. Haven't had them in quite a while though, so maybe they got fired already.