# The horsefly in Amazon's delivery ointment
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [August 17, 2024, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840 "2024-08-17T18:34:53Z")
**Posts on this page:** 12
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)
#### Post date: [August 17, 2024, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/1 "2024-08-17T18:34:53Z")
I’ve posted a few times about the saga of The Poky House. We bought a little house in Colorado, and are spending the summer up there fixing it up. We had to come back to Phoenix to pick up a countertop, and while we were here, I decided to buy so supplies on Amazon. I placed the order, and received 2 of the items, but the other two never showed up. Turns out that Amazon uses USPS for some of their “last mile” deliveries, and since I have mail forwarding turned on, those items ended up getting re-directed to Durango. It’s pretty annoying, since there’s no way to choose the delivery service. So, I can’t order anything to be delivered to Arizona, until I cancel my mail forwarding order.
Arrghhh…
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### Author:  [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)
#### Post date: [August 17, 2024, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/2 "2024-08-17T21:27:08Z")
Yours is a fairly unusual circumstance, though, surely you would agree.
I have noticed this more lately, products arriving at my mail slot (when they are small enough to fit) rather than my door. On the whole, I think it’s not a bad thing, USPS can use the business, and if it’s cheaper for Amazon than their own trucks/drivers/fuel, I don’t have a problem with that.
There are also sellers on Amazon that choose to use USPS all the way, and they don’t qualify for Prime delivery schedules, although they have to eat the shipping cost for Prime customers. So they choose the cheapest possible USPS rates. I recently waited two weeks for something that I could have driven 10 miles to pick up something similar, because I wasn’t paying attention at checkout.
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [August 17, 2024, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/3 "2024-08-17T22:01:22Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#):
>
> On the whole, I think it’s not a bad thing, USPS can use the business, and if it’s cheaper for Amazon than their own trucks/drivers/fuel, I don’t have a problem with that.
Both of those are not true at once. The Post Office delivers everywhere, to the convenient locations and the inconvenient locations alike, because they’re a government service, not primarily driven by profit. They lose money on the inconvenient locations, but they make it up on the convenient locations. Or at least, they do when they’re doing both. But when Amazon delivers to all of the convenient locations on their own, but then hands off the inconvenient ones to USPS, that’s pure loss for USPS.
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### Author:  [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)
#### Post date: [August 17, 2024, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/4 "2024-08-17T22:54:34Z")
> [@Chronos](#):
>
> when Amazon delivers to all of the convenient locations on their own, but then hands off the inconvenient ones to USPS, that’s pure loss for USPS.
And how often does that happen? (largely rhetorical, I don’t think anyone knows) I live in a convenient location, I get plenty of deliveries from Amazon, but more and more, it seems, from USPS. So the Amazon deliveries USPS makes to me must be profitable for USPS, by your calculus.
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### Author:  [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2024, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/5 "2024-08-18T23:36:13Z")
It’s really a defect in the system as a whole. Sometimes you want to deliver to a person, and sometimes to a location. Forwarding should only take effect when you are delivering to a person–and really, it shouldn’t even be forwarding, just a lookup in some database of what the proper address is. Why can’t we have things delivered to BobSmith12345, with no address at all, and Amazon/USPS/UPS/etc. will simply perform the lookup? If you want to deliver to a _location_, then you specify the address.
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### Author:  [@GaryM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GaryM)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2024, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/6 "2024-08-19T00:00:20Z")
I ordered two items yesterday. Some CoQ10 and a book. Both arrived today. The book via Amazon delivery driver, and the CoQ10 via USPS into my mailbox.
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### Author:  [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2024, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/7 "2024-08-19T00:25:04Z")
> [@Chronos](#):
>
> But when Amazon delivers to all of the convenient locations on their own, but then hands off the inconvenient ones to USPS, that’s pure loss for USPS.
The rationale is that they’re going there anyway so they might as well make a buck off taking your package on their way to drop off your political fliers and Penny Saver. Unless the Amazon package is the only reason they’re going, they should be benefiting from making the trip _more_ worthwhile by delivering more paid mail.
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### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2024, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/8 "2024-08-19T00:36:49Z")
Amazon way, way overcharges for delivery, presumably in a deliberate attempt to either get you to buy enough stuff to qualify for free shipping or to try to goad you into signing up for Prime. $6.99 seems to be the minimum that they’ll even consider sending anything to you, no matter how small or light. I recently ordered a small light item from Temu and they stuck it in a USPS envelope for $0.99.
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### Author:  [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)
#### Post date: [August 22, 2024, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/9 "2024-08-22T03:39:16Z")
And now for the rest of the story…
We just got back to Poky House, and I found two postage-due cards for those Amazon packages.
Total over $15.
Talk about adding insult to injury.
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### Author:  [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)
#### Post date: [August 22, 2024, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/10 "2024-08-22T06:27:47Z")
> [@Lumpy](#):
>
> Amazon way, way overcharges for delivery, presumably in a deliberate attempt to either get you to buy enough stuff to qualify for free shipping or to try to goad you into signing up for Prime. $6.99 seems to be the minimum that they’ll even consider sending anything to you, no matter how small or light.
Books are just $3.99 or $3.98.
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### Author:  [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2024, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/11 "2024-08-23T01:48:18Z")
Why do you call it Poky House?
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### Author:  [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2024, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-horsefly-in-amazons-delivery-ointment/1005840/12 "2024-08-23T01:49:20Z")
Because it’s really small.
The “official” name is “The Cottage."