Petty rant

The BBQ Pit
1

But since we’re in the pit I’m going to rant anyway.

Goddamn it! I absolutely hate it when UPS/FEDEX/You name it delivery knocks on my door with three big-ass boxes and says, “These are for your neighbor down at house number 1234, and they aren’t home. I’ll just leave these here with you so you can get them to your neighbor when they get back home.” Delivery guy proceeds to thrust the clipboard at me to get my signature. Hell, no.

Delivery man then points at the last house down on the far end of the block. “It’s not far,” he says. Well, thank you for stating the obvious, sir.

Gee, you don’t want to reload these heavy boxes back onto your truck, so you thought you’d leave them here with me so I can finish up your job for you.

My schedule doesn’t include taking deliveries and waiting until the people who live in that house get home to trot the packages over. I’m also not going to adjust my schedule or cancel my plans to wait for them to get home so I can be here to give them their packages.

Delivery guy would have no doubt left a note on the recipient’s door saying, “Hi! You weren’t home when I tried to deliver your packages so being the lazy asshat that I am, I left your packages with someone you don’t know but who happens to live on the same street. Toddle on over to 4321 street and knock on their door if you want your stuff. If they aren’t home, tough shit. You’ll have to wait until they are.”

I’m sure as hell not signing for the packages, either. Package isn’t addressed to me. It doesn’t belong to me. I can’t open it. If something’s wrong with it and neighbor discovers such upon opening the package, guess who they’re going to ask first?

“Uh, you signed for my package yesterday because I wasn’t home, and I picked up the package from you last night, and I opened the box and the monitor was in pieces, what the fuck?”

Uh-uh. No way. I’ve done it before and I won’t ever do it again. I’m not signing for anyone else’s packages.

When I’m expecting an important delivery that has to be brought to the door, I either waive the signature requirement allowing them to leave it on my doorstep at my own risk, or I make damned sure I’m home to accept delivery if it’s that fucking important.

So why the fuck do these delivery people act all shocked when I refuse? One delivery guy was actually going to pick a bone with me about it!

Hey! This is MY house and if I say no ONCE then trot your ass back to your truck and take the goddamned packages with you! Don’t stand there and try to convince me to just take the package because it’s not going to happen.

After ranting about this to a friend she comes back with, “Sounds like someone’s a bad neighbor.”

Hey, fuck you and the donkey you used to ride into town. Some friend. I mean, she could have at least given some coherent argument as to why she disagreed or what constitutes a “bad neighbor”.

End of rant. :slight_smile:

2

I had a FedEx guy try that with me one time. I said no and shut the door.

3

Not petty at all. I hate it when our local FedEx guy does this. I helped him once on a day off (since I was going to be home anyway) and now he wants my help when anyone in my complex isn’t at home (last week he wanted me to drop a letter for someone over a quarter mile away!)

4

That’s a really stupid plan on FedEx’s part-how do they know they’re not going to pick the crazy neighbor who hates your guts who will then destroy your package?

5

I don’t think they’re supposed to do that. Sometimes when I worked in tech support we’d get calls about how a customer’s package was left with a neighbor and it disappeared, so we’d have to send a replacement and get on the delivery company’s ass about it.

6

I was thinking the very same thing. A few weeks ago a UPS delivery person attempted to leave a large computer box with me. He banged on my door at 9:30 am on a Saturday and said that since my neighbor wasn’t home, could he leave it with me. I said no. With an “eat-shit” look, he picked up the box and I promptly shut the door.

Why do they think it’s okay to leave these kinds of things with neighbors? What if they do pick the neighborhood nut job who destroys the package or the neighbor who goes on a three-week vacation just after accepting delivery of the parcel?

What if said neighbor has to leave the house for whatever reason and deposits the package on your doorstep anyway? Of course, that would mean that the most destructive thunderstorm in the city’s history would choose that moment to strike. :rolleyes:

Maybe not very likely, but not impossible. That’s why I don’t take anyone else’s packages and I make sure I’m home to accept my own.

7

Once when I was around 12(!), the delivery guy conned me into signing for a package for my neighbor. Yeesh, I was 12, I wanted to be helpful.

It turned out that my neighbor was pissed because she was in a dispute with the company and had been refusing delivery on the package.

At least I learned that one young. Never again.

8

But there are some times when I want delivery companies to give my packages to my neighbors, or better yet my landlord. I’m rarely home during the daytime, and somebody has to sign for the things. And my landlord is nice enough to take my packages upstairs and leave them by my door.

Slight hijack, since I can’t find any other place to put this tale of cluelessness. My girlfriend (who lives in the same building I do) was given a nice sweater by her friend. The friend then got mad because my girlfriend never thanked her for it. Turns out she never got the sweater. Turns out the friend left the sweater downstairs. In the (unlocked) vestibule, not in a box or bag, on the floor, with no name, card, or any identifying information. In a city apartment building with approximately 250 tenants. Turns out my girlfriend “just should have known” it was there.

9

I always get my packages left on my doorstep and I’ve never been asked to accept a neighbor’s package. Although, I once had a neghbor’s package left on my doorstep. It wasn’t even a close neighbor, it was over a block away.

10

My FedEx delivery person likes to leave stuff on my doorstep and then forge signatures of “proof” of delivery. I’ve complained numerous times, but I guess it isn’t enough.

He did this once when the entire building was being termited - a whole row of condos covered in circus tenting, and he just left the box on the doorstep. The doorstep of a house full of poison that nobody will be living in for another couple of days. My neighbor down the street that we’d asked to pick up our papers saved the package, but damn that irks me.

11

I might have been hasty with when I said “forge.” He didn’t fake my name, but used a fake name that nobody in the neighborhood has and was probably just a random scrawl on his computer signature pad that got turned into a random jumble of letters by the machine.

12

In that case, you should put a note on the door telling delivery people who to give your packages to when you’re not home. Just giving your packages to somebody else is a risky proposition, since they have no clue whether they even know you and will give it to you.

13

I had my wedding dress cleaned and preserved by a company that shipped FedEx. I specifically marked “No neighbor signatures.” A month later, I get a phone call from a neighbor who I’d never given my number to (turns out is was placed on the outside of the box), telling me she had my wedding dress. I felt very lucky that she was a sweet lady who called me the very day it came in.

I was unthrilled by her having it though.

14

This i just flabbergasting. I’ve never had a delivery person ask me to do this, and if it ever does happen they will be told to take a hike.

15

Well now if he was that clueless, you could have just signed, ‘M. Mouse’ (he likely would not have caught it anyway), and just keep the packages for yourself.

16

That’s called theft, dumbass.

17

Day-um. You mainlanders sure have some seriously weird crap.

This has never happened to me or anyone I know, and frankly, it’s flat-out unthinkable. Anyone who deliberately gives someone’s property to a complete stranger is just begging for trouble. If this is company policy, it’s moronic company policy (something I’m no stranger to, unfortunately).

Tentative prediction: Companies that do this regularly get inundated by complaints and a number of lawsuit threats, resulting in this idiotic practice getting hammered to splinters.

18

Wow, OP, you’re a heinous bitch. You’re part of the reason society is breaking down. Everyone is all “me me me and fuck the rest of the world” people like you contribute to the death of our communities and the general assholishness that has overran the world.

Me and my neighbors are friends, I’d take the packages as a favor for them and a favor for the UPS guy. Why? Because I really don’t think they are lazy, or any lazier than am. And as fellow human beings I just feel it’s an all around good thing to help out.

But people that like to help out just aren’t ment for this modern society where everyone is an asshat that should be absolutely self-sufficient, have no friends, no friendly neighbors, etc.

You’re the type of neighbor I’d have my friends in local government seize your property via eminent domain and build an alley in place of your home or something of that nature.

Also if I was a UPS guy I’d recognize the fact that you’re a heinous bitch, and as a heinous bitch you don’t deserve the common decencies of society. Any packages sent to your house? Well first I’d open them up, hopefully it’d be something of a private nature, like psychiatric pills ordered online to deal with chronic assholism, I’d then fuck up said belongings, repackage it and throw it onto your porch.

Sure, there’d have to be a replacement sent, but making you wait a few extra weeks for your pills would give me sick pleasure.

19

Year 50 of this common practice says you’re wrong. This kind of thing has been going on since I was a wee kid.

In some neighborhoods I’d say it never happens. In others I’d say it’s a common societal practice and people just accept it.

Interestingly enough I get many packages from UPS and Fed-Ex every month. Only once when I ordered a new computer did I have to sign for anything. I’m not sure if my delivery guys just forge the signature or what, but I almost never have to sign for things, they just get dropped off anyways.

20

Of course I wasn’t serious. The main point of my statement was to point out how stupid this guy was to think you should handle your neighbors packages.