[grandam1979]

I shipped a cam out on 11/30 3 Priority still has not arrived from Ohio to Michigan.

[grandam1979]

If it’s run by the government it’s f’ed up.

[dataway]

USPS has been total knackered the last couple of weeks.

[poncho-mike]

About ten or fifteen years ago, I shipped a 4-bolt main 421 block to a guy in one of the least populated states in the upper mid-west. I tried quoting a couple of trucking companies before I found a local company that would ship without me having an account, but I had to pay cash. I banded the block to a pallet and built a small cover with 2x4s and thin plywood on the pallet. I always grease and wrap my blocks in plastic wrap, then bag them for storage. Just to be safe, I wrote my address and phone number and the recipient's information on large index cards and taped them to the bag. I carried the block to the trucking company, paid the shipping fees, and left.

A few weeks later, the buyer called to say he never received the block. He called the trucking company and they had no record of me shipping it. I called the trucking company, and got nowhere. I paid them a visit and carried my paperwork and again they said they didn't have any record of the shipment. They tried to keep my copy, but I refused and said they could have a copy of the paperwork, but I was keeping the original.

I finally got some answers. The guy who filled out the paperwork and accepted my cash was either fired or quit that day, and apparently kept my money and never did anything with the paperwork. I paid for insurance, so I filed a claim. I also had the shipper call the recipient and tell them what had happened.

About a month after I thought the matter was settled, I got a call from one of the trucking company's terminals. They had a boxed pallet sitting around with no information other than their terminal that had been sitting around for a couple of months. They opened the box and found the shipping information, so they called me. The terminal was located about an hour and a half away from the recipient. I called him up and told him the block had been found and was close by. We decided it would be safer for him to go get it himself rather than wait for it to arrive. He picked up his block, and luckily it was in the same condition as it was shipped.

I also shipped a 69 Grand Prix fender to a guy via Greyhound. Greyhound's shipping department had bad information on how large a box could be shipped to that terminal. After several efforts to trace the shipment, the fender was lpcated at another terminal an hour or so further away. The customer wasn't happy, but he at least got part of his shipping costs back from Greyhound.

I hate shipping large items. I've used Fastenal with no problems. Amtrak will also ship large items if the ship from terminal and the receiving terminal can handle palletized goods. I had no problems with either of them. I also used Forward Air once, with no problems.

[64speed]

UPS is now cheaper than USPS on heavy items plus I can print the label from my phone in about 5 minutes. You just gotta be real close on the weight

[66sprint6]

This is how I received my shipment of an exhaust system from The Parts Place. It was delivered by UPS, even though I had asked them not to ship UPS. All I got was a notification that it shipped, no tracking number or anything. The carton was completely open at one end and the other end was open as well. I don't know how the heck anything was in there. The pipes and mufflers were there, but three of the clamps were missing. Shame on TPP for shipping this box internationally with no fortification on the corners or taping it up properly. I didn't even bother contacting TPP. We called them the day earlier about the shipment and the guy on the other end was short with us. They never told us that there were actually two shipments, so when the head pipes showed up earlier, unwrapped and unidentified, we expressed our concern. The feeling we got from TPP was that they were not that concerned at all. And UPS? Forget it. Their "customer service" people are expecting your complaint and they've been trained to brush you off.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

I don't know how TPP has remained a functioning entity.
The owner hates everybody, everybody hates him right back, they hate their jobs, they hate the customers. I guess the requisite is if you love to hate, welcome aboard.
Most customers i hear about hate they did business there.
It's gotta be Awesome !!

There was an old saying about if you lined up all the people in China and had them walk off a cliff in single file - it would take over 100 years to get them all over the cliff.
i think that has become a dynamic in 21st Century customer service - at majority of today's businesses.

They just want you to jump off the cliff, so they can hurry up and tell the next jumper to jump.
So many jumpers, so little time.