Fedex Problem because of Hurricane. Their fault or not?

I sent a package overnight last night, that had to be in Connecticut by noon today. I call this morning to find out if it had arrived and was told NO, it hasn’t. :eek:
This is not good, the package contained some extremely important info on selling our east coast home.
I called fedex and they told me it was hung up in Tennessee due to the Hurricane, and that it was an act of God. :mad:
Okay I said, then refind the 30 bucks I spent to get it out there and I’ll be just mildly appeased.
Nope, sorry the contract is null and void if an act of god happens…
:mad:

Do I have any ground to stand on here for getting my money back or am I SOL? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I doubt it. Many such contracts have an Act of God clause. This is likely one of the biggest and costliest disasters in U.S. history. Katrina affected the FedEx hub in Memphis too. It wasn’t their “fault”. That is just the way that their network is laid out. Would you be mad if you sent something to the New Orlean’s French Quarter and it didn’t arrive? It is just a smaller version of the same thing. The effects of this storm will be felt all over the nation.

IANAL, but from a legal standpoint, I expect fedex is in the clear.

On the other hand, while a hurricane is an “act of god”, it’s a slow moving and fairly predictable one. They (meaning anyone who bothered to check) knew in advance when the storm would hit and what its probable path would be. For a storm as big as Katrina on the path that was plotted, fedex should have expected interruptions several days out and not accepted your package, or at least warned you of potential delays. You might make the argument that they entered into this contract knowing full well that they could not fulfill their side of the agreement.

I’ve always wondered about the ole Act Of God clause. For the very conservative theist, isn’t evrything an “Act of God”? :wink:

You have no legal legs to stand on. FedEx is 100% in the clear on this one. Sorry. As another poster said, I can assure you there is an Act of God clause in there somewhere in 2 point font.

Yeah I’m reading the 2 point font right now…it mentions acts of God, Perils of Air, weather conditions, acts of public enemies, war…

Sh*t… they are covered!

Not only do they have a CYA on the airbills but if you call any courier to shedule pickups and whatnot, they usually will have a message when their is some weather related malady stating that delivery dates cannot be guaranteed at that time. After 9/11 and during snow storms I have had DHL packages arrive days late to their destination. There is no recourse and really, how could you fault them in those instances?

i called fed ex yest. before the storm was even near memphis. i asked if they were going to reroute around memphis.

they said no. they expected weather delays but they were not rerouting.

Expecting them to plan reroutes at that stage is silly. Storms can change direction very quickly - and today there’s been major delays at airports all over the place. They simply cannot predict where the disruption will occur, and if they did, they would do so.

fed ex’s main hub is memphis.

they have many “sub hubs” in other locations, ie indianpolis, newark, philadelphia, etc. that they could have routed to.

Except the “sub-hubs” can only handle so much traffic.

I saw “hurricaine warnings” on the websites of all the overnight delivery services starting last Friday. Granted, they didn’t mention Memphis, but they did note possible weather delays.

Heck, I once got a call from FedEx that the package I had sent the night before had been on one of their planes that crashed in Memphis (I think it was Memphis) some years ago. The package did survive the experience, but when it showed up (a few days late) it was MUCH the worse for wear. And no, we didn’t get a refund or anything like that.

Anyhow - I think they’re in the clear on this one. Katrina was clearly worse than expected.

To be blunt, I’d just be damned thankful I wasn’t selling a house in New Orleans, and give FedEx a break, here.

I’d be interested to know what “perils of air” covers outside of Acts of God and weather conditions.

Maybe if the pilot came down with “the vapors”…

Well, there actually is a precedent in this case.

Back in 1994 a disgruntled FedEx employee (a pilot, in this case) was about to be fired because the company found out that he lied about his flight times prior to being hired. He boarded a DC-10 leaving Memphis bound for California (I don’t remember where specifically in CA - LAX?). He also had sent a speargun :eek: as cargo along with himself.

After takeoff this guy (Auburn Calloway) stormed the cockpit and tried to kill the flight crew. His plan was to take over the airplane and crash it into FedEx headquarters. Sound familiar?

Anyway, he stormed into the cockpit and hit the flight engineer in the head with a hammer, knocking him out. He then attacked the Captain and First Officer, and they attacked back. The struggle in the cockpit was epic, with fists, feet, the hammer and the crash axe eventually coming into play. The spear gun never made it into the fight, luckily.

At one point both pilots were out of their seats while fighting this lunatic, and the autopilot was not connected - there was truly no one at the controls of a fully-laden 400,000 lb jet over Memphis while a close-quarters fight to the death was being waged in the cockpit. There are some audio recordings available that have transmissions from the airplane during this time - somewhere on the flightdeck someone keyed the mic and ATC recorded screams and grunts.

The flight engineer regained consciousness and helped the FO restrain Calloway, and the captain got back in the seat to land the airplane. He took the first runway available at MEM and almost didn’t make it (it was a short runway and the plane still had all the gas required to fly to CA onboard, making it much heavier than planned).

The airplane stopped and airport rescue personnel rushed on board only to find the fight STILL going on - fists and kicks still flying as Calloway refused to give up. I’ve seen pictures of the flight deck and it looks like someone threw buckets of blood around - it’s everywhere.

All three pilots survived but sustained injuries that no longer allow them to fly. Calloway is (I believe) serving a life sentence without parole.

This is probably more info than casual readers of a “My package didn’t arrive!” thread want to hear, but there are threats to flights other than weather.

And CynicalGabe I appreciate your pun - good stuff! Don’t let my serious reply diminish your future pun-making ability!

i must mention ( being that i mentioned the reroute issue) that fed ex does use its vehicles for rescue and sends huge amounts of cargo free through out the world for natural and unnatural disasters.

not many people hear about it.

fed ex will be and no doubt has been, sending planes to as close as they can get to katrina’s wake.

yes, they have an “act of god” clause, yes, they will take the weather delay rather than reroute.

and most important…yes, they are there ready and willing to help when they are needed.

Shit happens, and it was definitely happening in Memphis on Monday night.

Now, can a LawDoper tell me if that occurence constitutes an Act of God?
My recollection from threads from around the time of September 11th leaves me unclear.

that was an example of perils of the air.

on cnn they were showing fema trucks and their convoys heading to the coast. fed ex trucks were right behind the fema trucks.