Adding something from a person who has run a warehouse:
There are a lot delivery services out there that operate by using the USPS. Their logistics are rather tricky, and they depend on high volume shippers (small mom-n-pop stores need not apply, basically) and they are very inexpensive for the shipper. This low cost is how many internet companies are able to offer free shipping to their customers as the overall cost is even lower than regular postal rates (parcel post or priority mail). The way they do it is that they are actually mailing/shipping them to their various stations, shipping bulk between the stations and then send them to the local USPS station for actual delivery. The final delivery is where much of the ‘real’ costs in delivery can come in As a result they are much more able to track the package through these stations and give the customer an idea of where the package is since they are scanning them in their various depots. The post office probably doesn’t know where the package is as they are not using the bulk packager’s scanning system (its not theirs, after all).
I admit I’m not 100% sure of how these (relatively) new delivery systems will work out for profitability. FedEx and UPS have been trying to co-opt similar systems themselves. So far it seems to be working for the really big internet sales guns. Amazon has taken to it quite well after they had years of disastrous results with delivery companies that were not UPS or FEDEX. Anyone who had to deal with Amazon deliveries from the now defunct DHL or ‘A Plus Couriers’ (shudder…) may know how much Amazon does delivery experiments with their customers as the guinea pigs.
While USPS may not have been paid for the tracking services in this case - it is still true that the options for tracking a package with USPS are more limited than the other parcel carriers.
Both FedEx and UPS include tracking on all of their shipments, whereas USPS requires it to be shipped Express which is a next day delivery service.
Amazon lies on their tracking. They’ll say an item’s been shipped via UPS, and UPS shows only billing information received. This is confirmed with either Pick Up Scans or Origin Scans that are later than Amazon’s “Shipped via UPS” updates.
Do you mean those notifications that Amazon sends you to say your order has shipped are premature? I’m not sure I’d consider that lying - those emails are really just to tell you it’s too late to cancel or modify your order. That the item is still sitting on a dock at Amazon’s warehouse instead of being on a UPS truck is immaterial. Or did I misunderstand what you’re saying?
Amazon’s tracking shows the item has been tendered to UPS when in fact what they mean is that its been put in a trailer on their dock, and will have UPS come to pick up that trailer (or perhaps Amazon will have its own contract driver move the trailer to the UPS hub) at some appointed time. In any event, I don’t see it as being tendered to UPS (or anyone else for that matter) until its actually tendered and risk of loss has transferred to the carrier.
From my experience, I’ve dealt with some people on Ebay that would send send me a USPS tracking number and the actual merchandise wouldn’t show up for a couple of weeks after a couple of phone calls. I suspect the tracking number proves nothing but they bought some postage, but nothing about whether a package actually exists. With Amazon, I’m pretty sure the package actually exists, even if it is still sitting on their loading dock.
An interesting counter point is Netflix, where they ship USPS and I get my DVD the next day from 98 to 99% of the time.
I don’t understand why the FedEx system and the USPS system aren’t integrated. When Fedex drops off the package, then the USPS database should be updated automatically without double scanning.