UPS Shipping

[alpha]

I have received hundreds of UPS shipments, but never one like this. I ordered a keyboard from "Daily Steals". They shipped it from Brooklyn NY by UPS and they emailed the tracking number. I followed it so I could anticipate when the item would be delivered. The delivery date never showed up, but the tracking finally said the item had arrived at the local post office. Huh? Yesterday the mailman delivered it? Is UPS now subcontracting the post office for deliveries? Anyone else experienced this?

Bob

[BobSch]

I haven't had it happen but I've heard of many who have. Apparently UPS feels they can save money by having the PO finish the job for them.

[gsmittle]

I haven't had it happen but I've heard of many who have. Apparently UPS feels they can save money by having the PO finish the job for them.

Or is the PO subcontracting UPS to do the major part of the transport? I've heard it both ways.

g.

[sparkeyjames]

Running delivery trucks costs money. The farther from the UPS depot you are the more likely you are to have a package sent to the postal service for final delivery. Since the post office is going to have to run their delivery trucks to your local post office anyway let them do it. Also UPS charges extra for residential delivery so instead of spending it on truck fuel they spend it on postal delivery. I live within 3 miles of our areas major UPS facility they always deliver my stuff directly no matter how small the package is.

[chris64]

Same thing happened to me recently except I thought it was with fedex.

[herb fellows]

while this is relatively new for ups, a similar type of thing has been going on for at least 30 years. I used to work for a overnight delivery firm in NYC.
They would charge about $85 to deliver a package overnight to Boston, Philly and Wash DC. Ninety percent of their business was from the downtown banks and Wall street firms, all document packages usually less than a pound each.
They would dispatch a car to pick up the packages (of course picking up many at a time, mostly in this concentrated area). The packages would be brought back to the station, where I would aggregate them and put them in an Express mail bag. I would then dispatch a driver to take the sacks directly to the Express mail Facility at the airport.
The sacks were addressed to a cab company in the respective cities.
We paid the cab companies to go to the airport, open the sacks and deliver them as addressed for $7.00 a package before noon.

We made about $70 on each package, and rarely had a problem. On an average night, we sent over 200 packages.
The guy who thought this up was a business genius in my mind!

[phrog]

Same thing happened to me a month ago with a package I ordered from Woodcraft.

[Tom Slick]

UPS "Basic" routes the package through the most effecient (cheapest) path, which includes using USPS distribution.

[alpha]

Here are a few more facts. I paid Shipping & Handling charges of $4.50. According to the shipping label, the shipping weight was 1 lb. I live in a subdivision just outside of the city limits of the 3rd largest city in KY and I see the UPS and FedEx delivery trucks in my neighborhood almost on a daily basis (sometimes several times a day).

The shipping label is a UPS label. It has the UPS logo on the lower left corner and has the usual UPS tracking number that starts with "1Z...". The ship to address is the USPS at their address. In the center of the label it says USPS Deliver to: me at my home address. The USPS and the UPS sorting station are within 1/4 of mile of each other.

I am guessing that UPS will handle the shipment any way the shipper specifies as long as they receive payment for it.

Bob

[LCHIEN]

From the 2009 Annual Reports and Wikipedia, respectively:

UPS made $2.15B on sales of $45B

USPS lost $3.74B on sales of $68B

One way to make money is to subcontract the expensive parts of the product or process to someone who is willing (or legislated) to lose money doing it.

[Pappy]

We handle some UPS final deliveries and a lot for DHL. This is actually helping to cut losses for the Postal Service. The companies the packages directly to the stations and the only handling we do is a clerk sorting them to each route's hamper and the carrier making the delivery. We have 3 zip codes in our station and the packages from both companies arrive sorted by zip.

[dbhost]

I have had similar experiences in the past, but it is a rarity for me. I usually get UPS end to end if it ships UPS... The one thing I have noticed, is that UPS seems to have several different levels of shipping, and one must be the Pony Express speed instead of modern Jet service. I have a Grizly G0572 that is scheduled to arrive at home today sometime, that I ordered back on August 20th, yes there was a back order, but it DID ship from Grizzly on September 3rd. Watching the tracking updates through their system is kind of interesting, they seem to have centers where my container is transferred off of one truck and on to another all over the country. Sort of like watching somebody take a road trip from Washington to Texas...

I had something similar happen I guess about a year ago with an order from Amazon, And that one came From Oklahoma, with something like 10 stops...