I ordered a fishing reel from Japan - the price is half that of the same reel here, including shipping.

It gets from Tokyo and departs LA, California (including time in customs) in about ten days via ECMS delivery services. With customs, that is reasonable and expected.

FedEx gets it from LA to Cypress, Texas in two days. Cypress is 25 miles northwest of my office. They tell me it will be delivered on Monday, 2 days early. It takes half of Sunday and all of Monday to get to Missouri City, Texas, which is 25 miles from Cypress and about 20 miles southwest of my office. It was to be delivered today, but it is still in Missouri City twelve hours later. No way it gets here today.

Tomorrow? Who knows.

So far, it has been within 25 miles of the delivery place for a little over two days and they can't get it here. Why provide tracking and delivery estimates if they are just going to drive the customer crazy?

And Missouri City seems to be the distribution hub for Houston. So why does it stop in Cypress first?

I think the tracking system is a way to occupy the customer while he is waiting for his package. It is a makeup as you go deal. A postal worker told me he scans all of his packages before his route to save time.

At least the tracking system works.
The FedEx site hasn't worked for several months.

I now have a game camera monitoring the street to see which house they left the package. Last year, they left the package at the wrong house and the neighbor kept it.

My son explains it thusly: FedEx ground is a series of private companies that own the route. You can't blame (you can) for the mal-performance of those owners.

Yes, we have terrible experiences with the one owned locally. I live at 1017, but its normal for the packages destined for us to go to 1007. The girl that lives there is very nice. She also has a nice dog, which I see most days.

Its not unusual for FedEx to make a delivery to me at around 11 AM, then later in the afternoon a different truck and driver make a second delivery.
Thats efficient!

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
I think the tracking system is a way to occupy the customer while he is waiting for his package. It is a makeup as you go deal. A postal worker told me he scans all of his packages before his route to save time.

Their tracking definitely sucks. I have never seen such fantasy. It may show my package already in PHX one day, and then the next day it has never made it to PHX but is rather in another part of the country altogether. They have a monkey that makes up estimated dates of arrival, which bear no resemblance to the actual arrival date. I have had packages arrive days earlier than the estimated date, also some days later. Most of the time, though, I get the parcel before I am expecting it.

quote:

Originally posted by rburg:
My son explains it thusly: FedEx ground is a series of private companies that own the route. You can't blame (you can) for the mal-performance of those owners.

If the package is at the terminal, that's a FedEx-owned facility. You can't fault the contractors for that.

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
Its not unusual for FedEx to make a delivery to me at around 11 AM, then later in the afternoon a different truck and driver make a second delivery.
Thats efficient!

Which service is it? Express and Ground are separate services, so you very well may be seeing different FedEx trucks but they're coming from different terminals.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Orguss,

Yep. Its both Express and Ground making the deliveries. But it would seem to make sense to have just one truck do it with a single delivery.

They're different services. They don't interact, although Ground delivers the occasional Express package along with USPS and UPS packages. Express solely delivers Express packages.

FedEx is nicknamed Fed Up around here, esp Ground,

they have gotten better in the past few months, I think some bought the route(s) and is running it better,

I have posted horror stories in the past on the terrible service ,


ground, mind you, Express is a separate company and is ok,


in a story similar to the OP, I bought a pile of 1903 small parts from a guy in NZ, they sold US made spares we (US) had supplied years ago for a reasonable price (I had to buy them all, maybe 40 lbs or so,

shipping was difficult since no one in NZ would ship Firearms parts, so they became Typewriter parts,

left NZ, was in LA (USA) inside 48 hrs,

took almost 2 weeks to get from west coast to east coast,,,, and it cleared customs in a day,

Fed Ex Ground now seems to have lost this package, confirming my impression that they are the worst of the delivery services.

What is worse is that the people at the facility where it is supposed to be have told me they can't find it. But Vijay from Bombay who has started a trace tells me that it is most definitely located at the facility (the one where the boots on the ground can't find it) and that the good news is that he expects it to be delivered tomorrow. Yeah, right, Vijay.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: jhe888,

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
I think the tracking system is a way to occupy the customer while he is waiting for his package. It is a makeup as you go deal. A postal worker told me he scans all of his packages before his route to save time.

Tracking has nothing to do with helping customers do anything, it has everything to do with having machines do everything, and not rely on people who know how to do anything more than zap a barcode. I scan every package before I start my route too, I have to, it's part of the tracking system. If you mean he scans them "delivered" there's no way you can do that now.
10+ years ago I used to do that, but it wasn't "tracking" it was "delivery confirmation", none of the data was transmitted until after I completed the route and I docked the scanner. This is/was a big part of "the Post offices tracking sucks", because it wasn't "tracking".

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
All I know is that I pay more for less. PO box was 220 dollars for annual renewal. The time for boxing the mail has crept from 7:30 am to near noon. Stamps are up and home delivery times are erratic. I am not a happy customer. I stopped looking at tracking years ago because it was inaccurate. When I get accurate tracking for UPS and it goes to Surepost I just figure adding two additonal days for delivery.

The service after this package being lost is almost worse than loosing it. They won't admit it is lost yet, even though it has supposedly been at the local distribution hub for 6 days. How is Vijay from Bombay going to track it down? Someone has to actually walk around and look for the damn thing. Check the truck - the bin where it was supposed to be put - the floor around the conveyor belt. Plus, Vijay doesn't call back and tell me anything about the status anyway.

FedEx was always my least favorite, but now they have made themselves unusable.

Albeit rare - I have had at one time or another a delivery problem with everyone - it's inevitable - odds and all of that.

Ironically, Amazon deliveries are remarkably pretty great.
Yes, they use the big 3 from time to time but the other stuff delivered by the kids are pretty good, pretty fast, communicated well including pics of delivery.

quote:

Originally posted by smschulz:
Albeit rare - I have had at one time or another a delivery problem with everyone - it's inevitable - odds and all of that.

Ironically, Amazon deliveries are remarkably pretty great.
Yes, they use the big 3 from time to time but the other stuff delivered by the kids are pretty good, pretty fast, communicated well including pics of delivery.

Agreed. It is going to happen. But I get more delays and unexpected weirdness from FedEx Ground than from UPS, USPS, or Amazon.

Current FedEx shipment (Bilstein 4600 front struts):

Expected Delivery Date: Nov 11

Shipment tracking:

Dropoff Nov 10, Memphis > Arrived at FedEx facility, Memphis, Nov 10, 1:00 am > Departed for delivery Nov 11, 4:00am > Out for Delivery, 2:00pm > Sent back to Sender, Nov 12, 4:00 pm > Signed for by <notme>, Memphis, Nov 13, 1:00pm.

Called, AutoZone says no idea, but gave me a $15 gift card and refunded me the cost of original shipping (but NOT for the items that arrived on time). Still no word on when I will get the replacement struts.

Did I mention I had the front end disassembled to install said struts?

Or that I'd paid Autozone an additional $60 in shipping to get brakes, front struts, and rear shocks delivered on the same day?

I feel your pain.

I shipped coffee off to customers.
4 all at once.
I use my stamps account to get the cheapest shipping to pass on the savings...

One went USPS, two UPS three day, and one FedEx ground.

All were there in 4 days.

EXCEPT FedEx ground.
It took 10 days.

And look like a truck ran over the package.

Last month Fedex ground had a package to deliver to our business. On the truck since 331AM, I stayed until 30 minutes after we closed. No delivery. 45 minutes later, when I'm miles away, I get a feeling. I check the tracking. It not only said it was delivered, it said that I personally signed for it. I drove back over and it was left outside our door.

quote:

Originally posted by 41:
Last year, they left the package at the wrong house and the neighbor kept it.

There was an episode of On Patrol Live (Live PD) where a neighbor did just that. The lady the package was supposed to go to called the police. The police went to the house and they swore up and down that they had not taken the package. The police stepped over to the trash bin 2 feet away and opened the lid - "what is that open amazon package on the top there with your neighbors address?" The guy just stood there staring at the packaging while being broadcast nation wide. Package thief exposed!! All for $4 worth of chia seeds.