Stop thinking in crisis, start thinking in opportunities!

[dilligaf]

I have not seen one driver/safety person in our center miss a day on car to stay in the center and work safety issues. They come in early to do, whatever it is they do.

Trpl, you can have my Stevethesafetyguy. He spends every fricking day he can in the office. He thinks he's all that and then some.

 

[Tiny Panda]

I've already had to chase the sales guy who covers my area about 3 customers who were actually asking to open accounts, they get an initial phonecall/visit then hear nothing and it ends up falling to me to chase him to get back in contact with the customer.

Having said that we had a pcm this week where we were told we've just taken a domestic competitors biggest account

 

[trplnkl]

Trpl, you can have my Stevethesafetyguy. He spends every fricking day he can in the office. He thinks he's all that and then some.

huuuuuh...not thanks, somebody would kill him around here and I hate little bitty rooms with bars for a front door.

 

[dannyboy]

If we want to protect our stocks, we have to dig deep, as a Team. Especially during this economy crisis! We need to pull together as ONE UPS and resolve some of our internal problems. We need to find a fair way of keeping our existing volume and obtaining the competitor volume. Every department, in every district has a service failure, at one point or other.

Lets get the house in order first, before we invite guests. Thats the way we do it at my house. Your way is like checking into a hotel room before the maid gets to clean the room.

I think you have a problem dealing with reality.

We know we are hamstrung. The driver deals with it every day. But for some reason, you dont care to address those nasty little "internal problems" before we "dig deep" to get more business.

d

 

[trplnkl]

Lets get the house in order first, before we invite guests. Thats the way we do it at my house. Your way is like checking into a hotel room before the maid gets to clean the room.

I think you have a problem dealing with reality.

We know we are hamstrung. The driver deals with it every day. But for some reason, you dont care to address those nasty little "internal problems" before we "dig deep" to get more business.

d

But Danny



He can't admit to his boss that we have internal problems. He can't tell his boss that getting one more account at the cost of losing 3 existing accounts is not a good idea. In fact, I would be surprised if he can tell his boss "Good Morning" without getting his head knocked off.

 

[wisedragonfly]

Spoke to our sales rep manager today. I think she's a manager, anyways. I told her about a building where I pick up and the secretary pulls my 2 letters from a pile of FedEx letters. I told her to go in and talk to so and so. Tell her STUG sent you and ask her who's shipping these, and would it be alright if I spoke to them. She took down all of the info, and then explained to me that a different rep handled that area. She would have to get with the other rep and give him the details.

I feel like I basically wasted my breath. All of the stuff I said to her will get lost in translation. Not only this, but the fact that he's in Hialeah for a week and...........................blah blah blah. This was just today, mind you. This is the reason I don't like to put in sales leads!

Thank you, stevetheupsguy!! I wish you could see this BIG smile on my face just knowing that you tried.

 

[stevetheupsguy]

Thank you, stevetheupsguy!! I wish you could see this BIG smile on my face just knowing that you tried.

I can, and it's making me sick.

 

[tourists24]

Thank you, stevetheupsguy!! I wish you could see this BIG smile on my face just knowing that you tried.

Is this Richard Simmons incognito?

 

[wisedragonfly]

I get the feeling I am talking to richard simmons...........Where is whats his name.........ah yes, sexy ups man... but I digress

What part of the above story did you guys not understand.

Customer ships DOCUMENTS to courthouses all over the USA with LEGAL papers in them. And we all know that lawyers are long winded SOB's, so some of these letters are thick and heavy. Hell, some of them even weigh as much as a book. And they ship them out in UPS PROVIDED LETTER ENVELOPES.

Now, we do a weight/piece correction on the LETTER because 1, we are not a UPS employee nor do we care about customers, 2, we get paid minimum wage to do the job, 3, we have either been promised a part time job at UPS if we find a lot of stuff to write up, or we get a little bonus if we done good. You pick.

Now, this non UPS employee writes up these letters as being a revenue misfit. They are heavy, so they put them on the scales and wallah, 6 pounds sent out as a letter. Thats puts some ChaChing in the bank on Friday.

Customer gets bill for 6 grand more than she was expecting. After all, the long winded lawyers need a pencil pusher to keep track of every minute and penny. After a few phone calls, she is put off by the way she has been treated, after all we promised her a flat rate, and now surprise, we charge by the pound.

Now, was that clear enough? Or do I really need to get sarcastic to penetrate your ivory tower, the one right above the rainbow filled world?

The way I see it is that we have sales reps,..... sorry Business Development Specialists that go out there and get the customers signed up. You make certain promises to get the business. And at least for a short time, local management makes a commitment to follow through on that promise. But only for a while, until some faceless guy pushing a pencil in IE figures out that it costs UPS 28 cents extra every day to do it that way. Then the order comes down the line to change the promise. And we lose the customer. Again. And again.

Over my 33 years, seen it too much. Nobody is on the same team. Everybody is looking out for their small segment of the business, regardless of what it does to the other segments.

And the attitude of so many others on this site reflects that frustration at a system where we work our asses off to grow the business, only to watch people that dont even have names or faces make changes that undo a world of effort.

It makes me frusterbated. And yes, that is an official UPS term.

d

Hi dannyboy. I'm going to take a stab at this one. The information may or may not apply to your customer's document scenario. It depends on how long ago your customer had the issue with additional charges placed on their documents.

Every year UPS has a rate change and adds new products and service enhancements. There was a time when NDA Letters were Red and White, and the 2DA Letters were Blue and White. Do you remember? During this period, our rate structure was based on a flat letter rate, then the rate increased for each additional pound. When the Red or Blue Letter were used, there was no weight restriction on the Red, NDA Letters. However, the Blue 2DA Letters did have a weight restriction.

If the document shipment adjustment was made during our Red and Blue Letter days, and if the customer shipped SDA, the customer would have received a weight adjustment on the SDA Letter, if they stuffed the SDA Letter. The is also a difference between a Letter Envelope rate and a Pak rate. The Pak is charge by weight per pound.

 

[wisedragonfly]

Lets get the house in order first, before we invite guests. Thats the way we do it at my house. Your way is like checking into a hotel room before the maid gets to clean the room.

I think you have a problem dealing with reality.

We know we are hamstrung. The driver deals with it every day. But for some reason, you dont care to address those nasty little "internal problems" before we "dig deep" to get more business.

d

LOL dannyboy, oh dannyboy... You are a very funny man!

Actually, I am a very opened minded person and always willing to hear a new idea to make a plan come together. What is it that you're saying that I'm not listening too? Open your eyes, man!! Can't you see that I'm trying to clean house before we invite the guest over? I've got the vacuum out! Now, if you would be so kind and move the heavy furniture out of my way so I can vacuum under it. Your doing so, would make me almost as happy as stevetheupsguy made me when attempted to get a sales lead today.

The reality check is that UPS volume is down compared to this time last year.

 

[wisedragonfly]

Just for kicks, let me throw a question out there.

What if sales was made part of the drivers job?

Drivers are out in the field every day.
Drivers get to the docks and back rooms where they can tell a lot about what is going on in the business.
Drivers know what is possible service wise.
Most drivers are good communicators.
Drivers are very familiar with the product (service).

At first thought we say that the drivers already don't have time, but what about a system that allows a driver that has proven commitment to the sales process, extra time for finding business. With telematics they know where the driver is, so the system would have safeties built in against abuse.

If we could ever get buy in from the drivers we would have the largest sales force of any company in the world.

Whats your thought on it?

Hmmm... You know, sano... I think you might be on to something!!

It is a fact, that drivers are the eyes, ears and voice of UPS. They are more aware of where the competitor makes pickup, more so than any other UPS employee. The driver is aware of the operations function; that BD will never be able to comprehend, as the drivers see it. When the drivers glance at the customers packages they will automatically know exactly how the packages will fit on the package car and on the feeder. They know what quality packaging is and will be able to ensure every package is properly packed to prevent damage, no matter how many times the package is bounced around in the hub during the sort process. The driver knows what pickup times work and what does not, so they should be able to negotiate the best deal for the demanding customer, at a reasonable rate and still make profit. Each driver can be equipped with a cell phone so immediate contact can be made with a customer who called the 800 # to request a UPS account. The DIAD can be redesigned to allow to driver to calculate potential volume and revenue, have access to instant credit checks and obtain an instant account number for the customer. The package car can be redesigned to make sure there is space to carry UPS supplies for the customers to ensure every customer has a start up kit and be able to refill the existing customer supplies when they make their pickups.

If the drivers take care of the delivery and new volume sales, then it will free up BD to service all of our existing customers who are suffering from service failures, such as; mis-sorted packages, mis-loaded packages, packages left in building, send agains, lost and damage package, mis-delivered packages, and missed pickups. BD might even have enough time to make sure that everyone is properly trained so exception errors would be eliminated altogether. Drop Boxes would be clean and constantly filled with supplies, so customer will able to obtain supplies with ease, when they need to ship.

Of course, we would need hire more drivers, so they can take smaller routes. At the end of the day, it would pay for its self because GSR's, Claims, and Good Will payments would automatically decrease.

Customers would be happy, volume will be up, stocks would look awesome and we can all retire with fat pensions and our 401K.

Dang, we might be able to get rid of IE altogether, since the time studies do not seem to work anyway. I don't know... but it sure is worth consideration. It could work!

 

[trplnkl]

LOL dannyboy, oh dannyboy... You are a very funny man!

Actually, I am a very opened minded person and always willing to hear a new idea to make a plan come together. What is it that you're saying that I'm not listening too? Open your eyes, man!! Can't you see that I'm trying to clean house before we invite the guest over? I've got the vacuum out! Now, if you would be so kind and move the heavy furniture out of my way so I can vacuum under it. Your doing so, would make me almost as happy as stevetheupsguy made me when attempted to get a sales lead today.

The reality check is that UPS volume is down compared to this time last year.

Actually STUG did more than attempt to get a sales lead. He got one with half the sales job done and YOUR partner dropped the ball.
Here's a reality check for you, we are in an economic recession.
Instead of looking only at volume levels, lets see how many pickup accounts we have compared to last year. I would nearly bet we have more, shipping less pieces.
Look, our volume is down, FedEx's volume is down, DHL's volume is down to zero and I bet the post office's parcel volume is down. So who is getting all these packages? Oh, yeah....they don't exist.
That's why we should be focusing more on retention of what we have. Sure we should try to gain new business, but throwing the baby out with the bath water will end up killing us.

 

[dilligaf]

Hmmm... You know, sano... I think you might be on to something!!

It is a fact, that drivers are the eyes, ears and voice of UPS. They are more aware of where the competitor makes pickup, more so than any other UPS employee. The driver is aware of the operations function; that BD will never be able to comprehend, as the drivers see it. When the drivers glance at the customers packages they will automatically know exactly how the packages will fit on the package car and on the feeder. They know what quality packaging is and will be able to ensure every package is properly packed to prevent damage, no matter how many times the package is bounced around in the hub during the sort process. The driver knows what pickup times work and what does not, so they should be able to negotiate the best deal for the demanding customer, at a reasonable rate and still make profit. Each driver can be equipped with a cell phone so immediate contact can be made with a customer who called the 800 # to request a UPS account. The DIAD can be redesigned to allow to driver to calculate potential volume and revenue, have access to instant credit checks and obtain an instant account number for the customer. The package car can be redesigned to make sure there is space to carry UPS supplies for the customers to ensure every customer has a start up kit and be able to refill the existing customer supplies when they make their pickups.

If the drivers take care of the delivery and new volume sales, then it will free up BD to service all of our existing customers who are suffering from service failures, such as; mis-sorted packages, mis-loaded packages, packages left in building, send agains, lost and damage package, mis-delivered packages, and missed pickups. BD might even have enough time to make sure that everyone is properly trained so exception errors would be eliminated altogether. Drop Boxes would be clean and constantly filled with supplies, so customer will able to obtain supplies with ease, when they need to ship.

Of course, we would need hire more drivers, so they can take smaller routes. At the end of the day, it would pay for its self because GSR's, Claims, and Good Will payments would automatically decrease.

Customers would be happy, volume will be up, stocks would look awesome and we can all retire with fat pensions and our 401K.

Dang, we might be able to get rid of IE altogether, since the time studies do not seem to work anyway. I don't know... but it sure is worth consideration. It could work!

You know Dragonfly.................you might be on to somethin'.

But I see 1 problem with this,

We will never be given the time to take care of our customers. We will never get Acct Rep's to do their job 100%. And we will never get rid of IE.

Ok, ok so that was more than 1 problem. I got carried away, sue me.

 

[dilligaf]

Actually STUG did more than attempt to get a sales lead. He got one with half the sales job done and YOUR partner dropped the ball.
Here's a reality check for you, we are in an economic recession.
Instead of looking only at volume levels, lets see how many pickup accounts we have compared to last year. I would nearly bet we have more, shipping less pieces.
Look, our volume is down, FedEx's volume is down, DHL's volume is down to zero and I bet the post office's parcel volume is down. So who is getting all these packages? Oh, yeah....they don't exist.
That's why we should be focusing more on retention of what we have. Sure we should try to gain new business, but throwing the baby out with the bath water will end up killing us.

I agree Trpl.


Our volume is down. However, our (at least here) stop counts are not down. People are still ordering and shipping they are just being more judicious in what they order and how much.

 

[UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)]

Judicious?

 

[Catatonic]

Judicious?

discerning?

 

[Catatonic]

Judicious?

persnickety?

 

[MechanicForBrown]

Sales should be handled by the Salesrerp. The drivers should mention switching over to UPS to everybody. However, it is the customer preference to Brown or the other colors. Plus the salesreps are there to dress nice and come into a company and explain the entire UPS plan. I do not want a driver trying to convince me the reasons to use UPS. Are the drivers going to have my discount percentages? Are they going to be able to help me with Supply Chain Solutions when I have a package stuck in Brazil? No, I contact my rep at least once a week if I have any problems. I depend on my driver for the delivery of my packages and do not want them to worry about getting enough sales leads to meet the sales quota. Not all UPS drivers went to college and got degrees in package delivery. My rep is a college graduate and he got the job because he met the UPS requirements. Most (not all) drivers are High School or GED graduates. I am not knocking them for that but their life is devoted to that profession. No degree required. Sales reps have an education background for sales and marketing. UPS is the best so I really have no problem.

So what you said in layman's terms was that a driver is less educated, because they only have a diploma or GED, and a sales rep because he wears a suit has a higher education?
I think you have poor judgment and should be ashamed, to make such an assumption means your an *** and don't know squat!!! I take this comment personally because I've been stereotyped as a GREASE MONKEY, when in fact I spent 26k on a one year course at a nationally recognized school just to learn how to be an automotive technician!!!!
Those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones!

 

[brownmonster]

So what you said in layman's terms was that a driver is less educated, because they only have a diploma or GED, and a sales rep because he wears a suit has a higher education?
I think you have poor judgment and should be ashamed, to make such an assumption means your an *** and don't know squat!!! I take this comment personally because I've been stereotyped as a GREASE MONKEY, when in fact I spent 26k on a one year course at a nationally recognized school just to learn how to be an automotive technician!!!!
Those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones!

An educated grease monkey.

 

[Salesguy]

Wow...+4000 views..
What better proof of leads bringing us closer together..
Thank you all...some comments are actually great!

We CAN overcome this crisis if we all start contributing.
You are a proud UPS member and are privilaged to work for such a great company.
In days of need they are there for us and now its time to do something in return.

All departments are alike, there is no difference in being a driver or a salesrep or HR guy, we are all alike and nothing more than a number, so stop herrasing other departments and keep asking yourself..does this comment actually contribute to growth?

Stop wasting time making excuses when you have the opportunity to enter a lead
in the same time. Think about your contribution to the next generation.

Our future? Great things can happen..you decide....