Shipping in December 2020

[lyle11]

I ordered a bushing I need for my hydraulic rebuild from TM two weeks ago. It was sent via USPS 2-3 day. After 10 days and no delivery, I contacted TM to make sure they didn’t overlook my order and Ron provided a USPS tracking number. It shows my package has been in Cleveland (40 miles away) since Dec. 13 but it will “arrive later than normal” due to Covid.

I don’t do much online shopping but my wife does and UPS and FedEx delivery seems normal. I also had a recent check mailed via USPS from Wisconsin to Ohio take 16 days from the Postmark date to be delivered.

My point is, if you really need a part or something delivered fast, it’s probably best to use UPS or FedEx if you want to get it in a timely manner. USPS may have a perfectly legitimate reason for the delays, but based on my very limited recent experience the other carriers seem to be operating as normal.

TM gives you shipping options and if you are in a hurry, I’d avoid USPS for now.

[Super A]

Next to a human appendix and mammary glands on a boar hog, a USPS tracking number is about as useless a thing as you'll find!

Al

[Dale Finch]

Jason DuFour (DuFour Tractor Parts) recently advised the same thing on some stuff I ordered from him...so I paid $2 more for UPS and did get it in a couple days. He said as the shipper of many things, he's had too many problems/delays with USPS...plus customer complaints.

[Lt.Mike]

USPS shipping has been really bad. I’m in NJ and the distribution center in Newark seems to be where packages go to die. Whether coming in or out tracking shows it being delivered on time until it falls into that black hole.
Been seeing some complaints about Fedex this year too. Seems they are subcontracting out deliveries with substandard results. One video on Facebook showed a parked Penske rental truck with packages taken out of the truck and tossed haphazardly into a pile like so much trash. This was done to organize the truck as explained by the driver. You could see many packages damaged and some open. I’d say the shipping insurance is something you want this year
As for UPS, they have always had a well deserved reputation for reliability. Their my first choice if I get one.
Back to USPS, our idiot mailman threw our neighbors package in the snow at the street by the mailbox again yesterday. We brought it up to the house for them. I’m sure their not all like that and I’m certain my father in law and wife’s uncle both postmen in their day are wincing in their graves at what this new bunch do.

[lyle11]

I also prefer UPS if possible. I order dog food online and it usually comes in a cardboard box. I’m retired and home most of the time and leave my garage door wide open. UPS drivers use common sense and put it in my garage. For some reason, USPS sets it outside even if it’s raining. The garage door is open and there is a car in the garage, common sense tells you the homeowner is home and most likely prefers that you put the package under cover in the garage.

To be fair, sometimes the vendor that you ordered from has specific rules about where the shipper is supposed to leave the package. Like, place it by the front door. So they are following specific instructions.

[Jim Becker]

Given the increase in online buying this year, I'm amazed that shipping by any of the three seems to have stayed as good as it has. It seems that my wife always has something incoming via USPS, so I have observed a fair number of shipments. The main thing I have seen is that packages reach a distribution center then spend longer at that center before being sent to the next location. I presume this is due to a backup in the sorting etc. at that location that causes the item to miss the truck it would have normally departed on. That miss could then ripple through the rest of the process, accumulating to an added shipping time of a day or two.

The other thing I have seen is an occasional item that gets misdirected. For example, an item that starts in Lees Summit, MO should go through distribution centers in Kansas City, St. Paul, and Minneapolis, then be sent to the post office in Clearwater. Tracking might look normal until it gets to St. Paul, then the tracking stops for several days. When the next tracking entry shows up, it might be come from St. Louis. Later entries are St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Clearwater. Clearly it went on the wrong truck first time out of Minneapolis. I conjecture that when it showed up in St. Louis as a misdirected item it went into some sort of (probably low priority) holding area where it needed to be resorted before being sent on.

Your bushing may be on a side trip of that sort. Or it could have just gone into hiding somewhere in the Cleveland distribution center and is waiting for someone to notice it.

As far as damage goes, my best story is compliments of UPS. I had a bunch of cabinets coming in and one was damaged. The manufacturer shipped a replacement. I happened to see the UPS truck arrive and opened the garage door he had backed up near. I got the door open just in time to see him push the box out the rear door of his truck. It hit the ground accompanied by the clatter of multiple pieces of wood banging into each other. I said something to him and he shrugged and got back in his truck.

[Don McCombs]

Our USPS packages normally come through either Pittsburgh or Baltimore. Doesn’t seem to matter which direction they are coming from. Recently, I had an inbound package that I kept close tabs on online. It was coming from the West coast and was directed through Baltimore. In the course of it’s travels, it was in Laurel, MD on three occasions. Laurel is between Baltimore and DC. The only explanation I can see for USPS’s problems is gross mismanagement.

[radioguy41]

The one near perfect constant through all this has been Amazon. We've been relying heavily on them for all sorts of things and with just one exception everything has been on time, often next day. There are several tractor parts vendors with a storefront on Amazon, including Amazon itself. If it's a small package the driver walks it all the way up onto the porch, if it's large it's set against the corner of the garage door and within a minute I get an email telling me it's out there.

USPS is a joke. They are the only shipper who ships cremains (cremated remains). I needed to ship to the Navy base in VA so I ordered a cremains shipping kit from the post office. It took 5 weeks from the time they said they shipped it for it to arrive and the Navy wanted to know why I had not shipped yet. Ridiculously bad service.

Fedex ground is hit or miss. The drivers are not Fedex employees but independent contractors. Sometimes I get a good one, one time the dope turns around in my driveway within 3 feet of a mailbox with 6 inch address numbers on it and drives off. When I called in the super told me the driver said he couldn't find my place. Seriously!

The UPS guys that deliver to me are really good. Maybe I'm just lucky but in 16 years at this location they've never failed me. I can print a label on-line and flag him down when he comes by and just hand him the package, no muss, no fuss, off it goes saving me a trip to town.

[RonT]

I sent in a DNA test sample USPS two weeks ago from Crystal River FL to Utah. I checked the tracking when they had not received it within a week. It went promptly to St Louis. MO then on to Ponce and then San Juan PR. After five days there (sampling local rum I presume), it made it to Ancestry without any more wandering. I had always heard that your DNA can document your family history but I didn't know it traveled around to gather the data.
My wife has been waiting for a USPS package from Port Clinton, OH for over three weeks. It must be quarantined somewhere.

Merry Christmas to all and best wishes for a much better 2021.
Ron

[tst]

The word shipping is now used only if I am swearing, nothing is delivered on time or close to it or shows up at all

[Bob McCarty]

I sent a small flat rate box by USPS that took eleven days to get from Longmont to Denver (40 miles). It's still in transit and was mailed on Dec. 3rd. If USPS didn't anticipate heavy shipping volume due to Covid, it's no wonder they never operate in the black.

[ntrenn]

Quite entertaining stories....

I sent an eBay item to Hawaii. $5.00 and 4 days. I sent another item to Detroit...it took the local collector truck 4 days to go the 25 miles to the sorting hub. 11 days total to Detroit.

Usps can’t find my front porch either, but a rainy driveway is their preference. FedEx ups and Amazon all know where the front porch is at...

[Lt.Mike]

Reading above I’ve two things to add, first beware of the “hand off”. That’s where ups or fedex delivers your package to your local post office and usps delivers it to your house. I’ve lost packages where one says they passed it off and the post office says they never got it. So Then I never get it
The other is with Amazon. They offer free shipping but automatically check the box for expedited shipping. If you catch it and check off free shipping they put you in the penalty box and sit on your order for a week before they actually ship it and then it arrives in 24-48 hours.
Kind of a scam.

[Jim Becker]

. . . at this location . . .

Funny you mention that. I have better delivery people here, no matter which company they work for, than any I had at my previous location. Maybe we have a better work ethic here.

[radioguy41]

The other is with Amazon. They offer free shipping but automatically check the box for expedited shipping. If you catch it and check off free shipping they put you in the penalty box and sit on your order for a week before they actually ship it and then it arrives in 24-48 hours.
Kind of a scam.

With over 200 orders in the past 2 years I have never had that happen. It always defaults to the free shipping option and none of those orders were unnecessarily delayed. Many arrived the next day and twice items I ordered in the morning get delivered that afternoon.