I worked from home today to accept several Amazon deliveries (partly because my home server killed its power supply on Monday). Imagine my not inconsiderable lack of amusement when the doorbell rings, and I go to answer it, to find...
- An Amazon parcel on the step, in full view, on a public road.
- A UPS van parked at the bus stop 20 yards away with the driver just getting in and moving off.
I was sufficiently speechless, I didn't even yell at him. I did, however, tweet @UPS
@ups just rang bell and left parcel on step in full view of bus stop/main rd, not waiting for reply. Lucky I was in. He didn't check.I got a reply:
@fleetfootmike Not good! Please email us your tracking + contact information to twitter@ups.com. ^MN @UPSSo I did, as requested, and got the following:
Thank you for reaching out to us for assistance with this issue. I do see that with this particular package the shipper did not request that we require a signature for delivery. For this reason at the driver’s discretion the package can be left. If you have further concerns please let us know.My reply:
Left, maybe - but he made NO effort to conceal it, and frankly I'm appalled that he or apparently you consider the approach he took to be a satisfactory or responsible one with a *large* parcel clearly labelled Amazon, on a front doorstep clearly visible to the passing public.
I expect ringing the doorbell and running away from bored teenagers, not UPS staff.To give them their due, I did get a reply:
I can definitely report that this is not a safe location and that the driver should not be leaving the package in the public view. Please provide your phone number so I can ensure the management at your local delivery center follows up with you.Well, duh. "not a safe location". 2' from the pavement, in full view, 20 yards from a bus stop. I'll say.
I did. They did. It wasn't a very intelligible phone call (due to the non-native accent) but basically the gist of it was that the driver would get specific instructions not to leave stuff on my doorstep,
I've just sent the following to my support contact:
Thank you for arranging that. The call caught me with my hands full and went to voicemail, which, usefully, did allow me to listen it several times to understand the staff member's accent.
However, all she appears to have done is promised to instruct the driver not to leave stuff on *my* doorstep. Which is all well and good, but the point of my raising this issue was not just for myself, but to flag the fact that you have a driver who is, to my mind, not doing his job properly, and being extremely careless with other people's property. How many other parcels were left on doorsteps this morning? Do you really consider that adequate?Hrmph, as they say.
Count yourself lucky it wasn't raining. Amazon have twice had to replace books left outside the house by UPS.
ReplyDeleteCan't speak moer highly of my postie by contrast!
We have had the same experience as Steve.
ReplyDeleteIf Amazon don't sort this out with UPS it will damage their business
Another 'little extra' from Bastard Corporation: to give their customers what they dearly want, however little they realised it: the opportunity and reason to complain. At that for all we know, the delivery-dude might have been in some form or other carrying out company policy. For instance, if for some reason he had some kind of time constraint, doing that extra for the customer might have cut into his productivity performance. It is known that long distance truckies (in this country at least) actually have to exceed the speed limit to fulfil their delivery requirement. Why should couriers be exempt? So, for the sake of 'increasing productivity', often the customer has to put up with skimped service.
ReplyDeleteWhich goes to show that privitization of a public service did not automatically mean you got a better service.
Cheers,
Ion
You're going to tell me the UPS is a public service, now aren't you? :-/
DeleteIt's not just UPS, I used to have stuff sent by work, sometimes they would claim to have tried to deliver but no one was in, others a quick light tap on the door and off back to the van. The card that was shoved through the letter box he had written in the cab. I caught him before he could pull off and did as you to have the same responce.
ReplyDeleteIan
Mike
ReplyDeleteYou know where I live (waking distance from Royal Mail Depot), but I still get fragile parcels thrown over my side gate!
I found the postlady putting a amazon box under the wheel of my car, on the front drive.
ReplyDeleteOn asking what she is doing, she told me she rang the bell and waited before putting the item in a safe place.
I have not ####### bell
On telling her that, she simply walked off