Revolt growing at UPS

United Parcel Service Inc. is facing a revolt within its shipping network as a growing number of store franchisees, including several in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, are joining forces to sue the company.

The situation has become so acrimonious that more than 100 UPS Store and Mail Boxes Etc. franchisees from around the country are expected to picket outside the package delivery giant's annual shareholder meeting today in Wilmington, Del.

Really. What's changed, exactly?

They don't know their own policies for one. I was shipping a Glock 17 pistol to an FFL in Minnesota (I live in Kansas) and 3 Fedex/Fedex Kinkos locations refused my shipment despite me having a copy of their policy from their website with me. I finally said the heck with it and the 60 minutes I'd wasted and got my always reliable local gun shop to ship it for me.

For one pound and under, I agree that USPS Priority is best. I use them also for 5-8 pound shipments to HI and AK, as it is faster and way cheaper than UPS.

But my average domestic lower 48 shipments are 9-30 pounds per box and my major shipments are all 2-3 or even 4 boxes. UPS is the best deal for my customers and for me. I can afford to give my volume accounts 1/2 freight if they are within the two day delivery zone and keep their account current.

I am no fan of daily pickup from UPS, though. When I cancelled the service, they told me I couldn't actually cancel, but could only suspend for 12 months. Exactly 12 months later, I got a bill for the daily pickup fee, when I had not called for a pickup and had no intention of doing so. I finally got them to actually cancel the account. They were terrified I would somehow be able to use the shipper number stamp and the UPS shipment book and spent nearly five minutes making sure I knew I could not. Exasperating. At some point in that conversation I mentioned that I was shipping through the MBE UPS Store and that I was billed monthly. I was haughtily informed that was impossible. So, I agreed with her that it was impossible and made sure I destroyed the stamp and the shipment book. Strangely enough, the MBE UPS store happily gives me an entire pack of shipping order forms whenever I need them.In fact, once or twice I have made a mistake on the shipping label...wrong zip sort of thing...and the store simply calls me up and tells me what happened and that they have typed a new, correct one for the package, affixed it and it will now match the order.

I love them!

Oh, BTW: since we are rural, we know most of the UPS drivers, all of whom noticed when we switched from pickup to using the store. They told me that UPS was trying to get rid of the pickups from rural manufacturers and that it wasn't my imagination that they made it difficult.

I use the Post Office's Priority and/or Express Mail Service. T

I agree.

My business uses nothing but the Post Office, unless I want to ship an anvil, or something like that, to give the UPS gorillas a hernia. The Post Office's flat rate service, and their free shipping stuff, makes it a no-brainer.

For a one man business, I do about $2,000 per month shipping, and the post office rarely messes up. And when they do, I always get treated like royalty as I'm the largest shipper in my town.

I hate UPS and FedEx both. Try filing a damage claim with either and it's a bottomless abyss of frustration.

The problem with UPS is their brokerage people are sloppy as hell and will often service everything.

That would be fine were it not for the fact that certain shipments are NOT taxed. Such as warranty service parts.

You should hear the sob stories from our Edmonton maintainence shop. Fighting with UPS is literally someones full time job.

It's FedEx that is not permitting UPS store franchisees to ship via FedEx.

Yep. Once UPS hung their name on the sign FDX decided NOT to provide services to them. That applies to pick-ups. I don’t know what would happen if you had a delivery addressed to a The UPSS mailbox.

My guess is that they'd deliver them. No pickups though.

I'm into motorcycling, and a lot of good deals and certain things are only available from the States. But if they insist on UPS shipping (and, I've heard, standard FedEx, also) by the time you've paid the $50 brokerage fee on a $100-$200 item, your savings are pretty much gone. For a lot of things that are available from many sources in the U.S. (so competition is a factor) there is only one exclusive supplier in Canada, and they use their monopoly in this country to full effect.

At least with UPS, it's all one operation so that every employee has an obligation (on some level, anyway) to help you if you have a problem.

Dealing with UPS is like dealing with a bureaucracy. And if you have trouble with a package on a local route basis, taking the issue upline with UPS does not resolve the problem, the company just gets more entrenched. It is the UPS driver that is your only hope of resolving an issue and they can do very, very little to help.

With FedEx, if you have a problem with a local route driver, FedEx will step in and correct it.

Between the two companies, the overall service level of FedEx is far better than UPS. Far better. UPS has a horrible customer service reputation - deservedly so.

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