Things you wish people knew about packages. . .

[govols019]

Had a monitor today shipped in a box twice it's size with only one sheet of bubble wrap to protect it. It looked like someone had dropped it off a 5-story building when they pulled it out of the box.

 

[25yrvet]

When I deliver a double label pkg I always make sure the 'oldest' label is showing so the customer has an idea of how lucky they were.

 

[aspenleaf]

I dont know 25 yr vette, I think I learned how to address an envelope for mailing in 3rd grade, yet people do not know how to address a box. I guess they think it goes into the abyss and some person fondles all 6 sides of it and deciphers where it goes. Ive had pkgs get sent back to from where they were sent with double lables and have the shipper tell me, I didnt cross it out as I thought you would know this one had been used.....That is why God made Sharpie, we cant save the world, just one pkg at a time.

All hail the great Sharpie! Tooner ~ have you seen the Target boxes that get used over and over - they have tons off labels on them. I do have to flip the box to find the correct label.

 

[SmithBarney]

I thought I was the only one with the 'Staples' problem. How pathetic is that--- an office supply retailer that doesn't have a scanable label!! We had a local shipper with unscanable labels that drove me nuts; I informed the CS chick, her reply was, "What do you want me to do about it?" 1 So I informed her

This is as much the pickup drivers fault as it is the shippers fault...
whenever I have a shipper with bad labels(generally still printing bad on the
end of day) I let them know. Generally I'll tell them that if its not fixed
I might not be able to pick up the next day..(of course I would pick up,
but man that lights a fire under them to get it fixed)

Granted Staples might have a slightly different pickup system, the
center that gets these first should be on the phone with the shipping department at staples.. to get it fixed the next day.

 

[over9five]

"..would that make them a send again?"

SOL!

(snort out loud)

 

[25yrvet]

UNscanable label acct is a feeder tlr p/u

 

[25yrvet]

How 'bout having to tell shippers to run some tape perpendicular to the box seems instead of 10 strips going parallel

 

[diadlover]

Cool thread, Aspen! I wish people wouldn't write the word "FRAGILE" all over their box. It isn't going to be treated any differently. IMO, it's just an invite for some $8.50 an hour smart-assed hubrat to pretend he's Roger Clemens and throw that "FRAGILE" box across the 50 footer he's unloading. I tell my friends and family, "do not write fragile on the box."

(btw, I was Randy Johnson)

You see, I wasn't joking. I had this on my truck today. The friend word is clearly visible in the upper right corner.

 

[aspenleaf]

You see, I wasn't joking. I had this on my truck today. The friend word is clearly visible in the upper right corner.

Wow a twofer - a Fragile and a Please do not drop!

 

[LKLND3380]

Cool thread, Aspen! I wish people wouldn't write the word "FRAGILE" all over their box. It isn't going to be treated any differently. IMO, it's just an invite for some $8.50 an hour smart-assed hubrat to pretend he's Roger Clemens and throw that "FRAGILE" box across the 50 footer he's unloading. I tell my friends and family, "do not write fragile on the box."

(btw, I was Randy Johnson)

Unload here is ENCOURAGED by management NOT to use load stands and just pull down walls... (SLOWS DOWN PRODUCTION) Sometime people DO NOT know how to operate a scale and those 69 lbs (really 71 lbs)packages fall on the smaller 20 lbs packages when the wall comes down...

I don't know why anyone would throw across a 50 footer UNLESS the extendo was broke... But the ones WHO DO throw treat all pacKages the same... SOMETIMES they get lucky and it is marked FRAGILE...

 

[diadlover]

Unload here is ENCOURAGED by management NOT to use load stands and just pull down walls... (SLOWS DOWN PRODUCTION) Sometime people DO NOT know how to operate a scale and those 69 lbs (really 71 lbs)packages fall on the smaller 20 lbs packages when the wall comes down...

I don't know why anyone would throw across a 50 footer UNLESS the extendo was broke... But the ones WHO DO throw treat all pacKages the same... SOMETIMES they get lucky and it is marked FRAGILE...

No, this isn't the law of averages as your implying. This is Diad's Law #4. You write "Fragile" on a box and it'll get "Roger Clemenized" like the one in the pic. If there is anyone outside of AZ that would like to test this theory then let me know. I'll ship a box to you on my own $ with "Fragile" written on it and we'll see what happens.

 

[DS]

I dont have any pics to back it up but I`ve delivered quite a few completley totalled packages in my day.
I remember this beautiful $6000 keyboard that was wrapped
in a thin layer of bubble wrap and cardboard...heavy MF,all the knobs were falling out of the ends,I think some one rolled it end to end (probobly a female right DL?)a good 10 times
to get it in my truck.
I like to shake the boxes of shattered lights and ask,there
might be something broken in here,do you want to refuse it?
because I know I didn`t do it.
In a way its the drivers fault, in most cases.Its easier and foremost (faster) to just take the pkg and say nothing...
But I speak up now,tell them how to do it right ...if its not properly packaged it will not survive ups,drive it there yourself...or take it to a ups store.

 

[wadep]

I love delivering floursesent bulbs ....SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED!!!!

 

[over9five]

Yes, but nowhere on that box does it specify "Do not crush".

 

[aspenleaf]

Yes, but nowhere on that box does it specify "Do not crush".

I have actually seen a box with Do not crush, break, stomp or harm in any way written on it. . .it too was ruined prior to being tossed in my cage.

 

[gandydancer]

Somebody already mentioned the paper boxes with the glued ends. Not just Staples -- Cascade, etc., etc. I understand that the production lines are set up to produce boxes suitable for palletized shipment... but you'd think volume and recipient dissatisfaction would justify a heavy-plastic shrinkwrap machine, which would work better on the paper boxes than it does for the water bottle shippers. And the shippers who ship bolts and golf balls in boxes with no inner bags. And Avon's lid-and-strap boxes, an improvement over the old fold-ups... but there are still lipstics and mascara bottes and whatnot everywhere every time a slug of Avons passed through the sort, and that's been true for 18 years that I know of. Even if the manufacturing costs are virtually zero (and I assume UPS's contract says UPS doesn't pay), there's the cost in time in dealing with the orders that arrive missing items and tracking all the damages. What are these companies thinking? What is UPS' BD thinking? Answer, of course, is that companies don't think, and the systems in place mean that no one is held responsible even if it's bad for everyone involved, except some managers whose numbers look good because they don't reflect reality.

 

[mattwtrs]

Cases of paper are shipped no claim I've been told. The time that is wasted cleaning up the mess would be worth the tape at the origin sort!

 

[browniehound]

Ditto.
Try to peel it off of the cod amount, it ain't gonna happen. I sometimes wet the pas label and hold it in direct sunlight to try and read the cod amount.
The best part is that I have driven 20 miles to get to the stop and find out there is no way to determine the cod amount.
Maybe, I should look at my edd info and find all cod pkgs in my pkg car and determine if I know what to collect.
How about training the pas crew to never put the label on the same side of the pkg as the original label? Since the preloaders are trained not to look at the original label, it might save the trouble of calling in a tell the center manager that the pkg. can not be delivered.

Sat,
Where I'm from I think the preloaders are told to look at BOTH labels. They are held accountable for misloads that are bad-paled also!

 

[gandydancer]

...Where I'm from I think the preloaders are told to look at BOTH labels. They are held accountable for misloads that are bad-paled also!

You must be (or ought to be!) UPS management if you think that demanding excessive vigilance of preloaders is the answer to bad UPS procedures.

I forgot to mention the small white address correction labels slapped on a package, with the original label not marked in any way to show its zipcode is known invalid.

And the Home Depot labels with two bar codes and the address and zip code in agate type squeezed into the upper right corner of the label, and trying to read it before loading in the front end of a trailer 40' from the dim orange glow of a fading lamp.

Yeah, the over-the-counter shippers are clueless and the effects of their cluelessness spectacular, but the problems that drive you crazy are the ones that cause problems every day and never get fixed.

Did I mention golf balls? I got PCM'd over some loader who was injured stepping on a golf ball, and how he shoulda looked where he was going. And I'm, like, where the was management foresight the last two dozen times one of those boxes were punctured and we had golf balls running all over the concrete for days afterward? And I'm sure nothings been done...

 

[gandydancer]

Cases of paper are shipped no claim I've been told. The time that is wasted cleaning up the mess would be worth the tape at the origin sort!

And the time spent dealing with consignee complaints. But I guess UPS gets paid for the redelivery too. And never has to buy paper for any of its own copy or fax machines...