I probably send an average of one UPS shipment per month. I receive shipments from them 3-4 times per week.
Of course, this entire thread is based on each of us extrapolating our own personal experiences to the company at large. The only things we can say for sure are that they do have the capability to contact drivers en route, they do have realtime tracking, and there are a bunch of people who have had negative experiences with them.
Granted, this (“there are a bunch of people who have had negative experiences with them”) is hardly unexpected, given how many millions of shipments are made by UPS each day. The other thing I think we can say for sure is that, as I said, UPS charges to redirect a shipment to a UPS Store but Fedex will redirect to a Fedex Office store for free.
As a receiver and not a shipper, I guess I haven’t yet gotten involved with the potentially dark side of UPS. It seems extremely localized whether you get good delivery service. In my neighborhood, UPS is awesome and FedEx just wants to leave sticky notes on your door without checking to see that I am home and working ten feet from said door.
I believe that UPS routes are bid on by the drivers, and apparently my neighborhood has a density/traffic balance that makes it a desirable route, and has gotten us a conscientious and resourceful driver.
Did UPS go down to the quarry and throw your packages in there?
These are some interesting (and quite shocking) stories to me. Maybe it’s just me but it’s my experience that UPS seems to go out of their way to NOT deliver packages to me.
I don’t think you are nuts for switching service providers after being unhappy with this one. But really, I think the person sending you the package could have realized that ‘P.O. Box’ stands for ‘Post Office Box’, something that only the Postal Service deals with. It seems to start with ‘operator error’.
And, if this strikes you as too Orwellian, watch out that you don’t lose your marbles when you really start to notice how things go down in our modern world.
What I don’t understand is why UPS or another carrier can’t just take the package, put it in a bigger box and mail it to your PO box ( and charge the shipper)
Both UPS and FedEx have shipping methods that start with them and then they hand it off to the USPS. One reason people use these services is to be able to ship to PO boxes and APO/FPO.
I’m confused. Everyone is talking about being able to send things via USPS to PO boxes, even saying that UPS should have done this to get the package to the recipient. So how why would you pay more to send the service by an organization that absolutely can’t deliver to said addresses?
Or have I misunderstood you?
Wouldn’t that be Klannish? Or better yet KKKlannish 
There are a variety of reasons these services exist within UPS and FedEx and that businesses use them.
One reason is existing interfaces and automation that UPS and FedEx support, electronic interface, scheduled pickups and billing after the fact - USPS is a different animal in this respect. It can be easier/simpler to just route it through the preferred carrier.
If I have a conveyor dumping packages directly into a a UPS or FedEx truck, I’m going to have to re-direct packages and pay for manual labor to process the USPS packages and possibly even drive them to the post office - that’s inefficient.
If USPS is your preferred carrier for whatever business reasons, then there would be little reason to use UPS or FedEx for PO box or APO/FPO.
The other thing I didn’t mention is that these services can be cheaper than going directly through USPS.