A rant from the past: UPS

The BBQ Pit
1

I was going through my correspondence yesterday, and stumbled across the following letter I’d written some time ago. Although I’m not usually much of a writer, it made me smile as I read through it, and I thought you guys might like to see it.

The context is that I had to send a car title to the insurance company, and they had sent me a UPS postage-paid envelope to use. I wrote the following letter at the end of a long day, fueled with frustration and caffeine. Lots of caffeine.
15 Nov 04

Dear Whoever at XXX Mutual:

I suggest that you get a new shipping company for these documents. UPS may work great for you guys, who ship hundreds of document packages a day, but it’s the pits for ordinary chumps like me.

You give four options for mailing your UPS reply envelope back:

  1. Return the envelope from your place of employment if UPS picks up on a daily basis.
    The receptionist said that I couldn’t leave it with her because it wasn’t ARS. (It’s RS.)

  2. Drop off at a local UPS pickup box.
    Yeah, right. Where are these boxes located, exactly?

  3. Use a UPS store.
    Yeah, right. Where are these “UPS Stores”, exactly?

  4. Call UPS for a pickup.
    Ah, that’s more like it; that sounds workable; that sounds convenient. After my rebuff at the receptionist, I called UPS this morning and asked for a pickup, here at work, before 3:00, when I go home. I was assured that they’d come and get it, but that there “might be” a $10 fee. (What, they don’t know if there’s a fee or not? What’s that all about? Does it depend on a dice roll, or something?)

Of course, here it is, 2:55 and no sign of them yet. (I say “Of course” because there was never any doubt in my mind that they’d fail to follow through; I’ve become accustomed to broken promises and incompetent service in my life, especially from delivery companies. You at XXX Mutual, with your hundreds of items a day, you can get good service; UPS will happily kiss your feet, promise you anything, and they might even show up on time for you. But a schuck like me they haven’t got time for; I’m just an irritation to them, someone to brush aside so they can get to the really Big Customers.) There’s a daily pickup from the lobby, but heaven forbid that the regular pickup guy could, like, maybe, call me when he gets here (like the gal on the phone said he would; I could just run down from the office and hand it to him. Because I can’t just leave it with the receptionist.). And even then, there’s that “maybe” $10 fee.

To heck with that stuff. I’m sending it US Mail. I know where the post office is (it’s right on my way home), and it ain’t gonna cost me any “maybe” $10 to send it. I strongly suggest that you get some other outfit to do your bulk mailings, because UPS just isn’t cutting it.
(Ah, here’s a prediction: If I were to call UPS tomorrow (but I’m not going to) and ask what happened, they’d say their man showed up, he called, there was no-one here. Liars. I’ve been at my desk all day except for three brief trips to the restroom; and I briefed my cube-mate on the whole thing, so he could cover if they called while I was in the can. You reading this, you know that’s what would happen, don’t you? You’ve had the exact same experience yourself.)
Sincerely,

Rocketeer

PS: And just a suggestion, not to sound snarky or anything, because I’m not mad at you, I’m mad at UPS; so just a suggestion, in the friendliest spirit: You might change the instructions on your pink “FORM INSTRUCTIONS” sheet to make it clear whether Washington owners have to sign the title or not. I guessed “not”.

2

Erg. Very frustrating. Did you ever send that letter? I’m just an average Inigo around here but that kind of dissatisfaction, even if only indirectly related to my department, gives me the leverage to change that whole chunk of the workflow. Experiences like yours are the kiss of death for insurance companies. I settle car totals for The Very Large Insurance Company of America (TVLICOA). We use an overnight service when we deliver to you, but we send you a US mail envelope for you to send stuff to us. For some reason the US Mail gets stuff to us faster than the (so-called) overnight services. And also because most folks have a reliable connection to the US postal service.

3

Oh, yeah; I sent it; I enclosed the letter in the envelope with the car title.

The insurance company was great; they paid promptly with no fuss whatsoever. It’s just that their choice of UPS as a mail delivery service didn’t work for diddley. Like I said in the postscript, I wasn’t mad at them; I was POed at UPS.

4

Most people. :frowning: :mad:

5

Two other things just occurred to me:

  1. There’s a typo in the letter: “schuck” should be “schmuck”. :smack:

  2. USPS is great, one of the real bargains in Our Modern Lifestyle. 39 cents to mail a letter clear across the country? It’d be a steal at twice the price. :slight_smile:

6

http://www.ups.com/dropoff?loc=en_US

You may remember UPS stores as previously called “Mail Boxes, etc.”

7

Last time I was provided an envelope to use an overnight service, it wasn’t FedEx, which has a box outside every US post office, or UPS, which has a store nearby; no, it was DHL, and we like to never find their stupid box. Ridiculous. I realize companies save money by providing paid envelopes, but they lose most of their savings in goodwill in far too many cases.

But I will say that finding boxes and dropoff locations isn’t all that difficult these days; a quick online search gives you the exact location of about the 20 nearest to your location. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to find one, or an endless hold phone call like it used to.

8

Yeah, I read that thread, and I feel bad for people who encounter dishonest carriers or neighborhood mail thieves. After a few thefts, and (more importantly) constant vandalization of mailboxes, our neighborhood all chipped in and got one of the big green locking mailboxes, where everyone has his own locking cubbyhole. And I mail all my stuff at the post office on my way to work. No problems now.