Thank you to all the UPS/FedEx personnel
- Thread starter moparkxracer
- Start date
UPS has screwed me over in so many ways possible, I have not shipped a package with them in probably 3 years and I try to avoid having a package delivered to me from them as well. 2nd day air to them means 7 days late for me even though they told me that it is a guaranteed service. Not to mention the 8pm deliveries regardless if it's overnighted or ground shipping. They used to come at 11am like clock work, then it got pushed later and later, 7pm is typical now. I've stayed home from work waiting for packages, then "MYUPS" emails me saying an attempt at delivery was made and no one was home.
FedEx has not let me down yet.
FedEx has not let me down yet.
I will say though, I ordered 100 rounds of .50bmg ammo for my gun and the only option for shipping was UPS. I set it up to be held at the local distribution center for me to pickup rather than be delivered. That showed up on time, in perfect condition with me being in/out in under 10 minutes. I was very happy about that. 1st time in 3 years I haven't had an issue.
Mike, like every company on the planet, we cant please everyone. If you're getting good service from FedEx, then more power to you. There's more than enough volume to go around.
There is, it usually happens between the second and third weeks. The lull this year was higher volume than our peak day last year.
Christmas doesn't ever end at Christmas Day, though. For the next three weeks, there'll be online sales, people will be using their gift cards, they'll be exchanging gifts for something they really wanted, etc... I actually get more OT the weeks after Christmas than I do during. Go figure.
So....Peak Week 4, or as we call it, "Hell Week": (Nah, just kidding! :rofl
Date/Day/Stops/Pkgs
12/19-Mon 180/295 Uh oh, volume's coming back
12/20-Tues 188/319 Yep, its back!
12/21-Wed 196/338 Holee shit! Its Peak Day! New personal record for stops on my route in one day.
12/22-Thur 157/255
12/23-Fri 117/173 About half these stops were next day air, too.
I always joke that I'll be one of the last ones in on Christmas Eve, and I usually am in the last five. Not this year. Had an 8 hour day, which was nice.
See, normally management would not have worked the seasonal drivers if volume dropped off like that, but this year they kept 90% of them on road. They left our routes essentially the same as the previous week. They then used the other 10% as shuttle drivers for late air. Reason being they wanted most of us to have hours left in case we had to work Saturday (which we will be tomorrow -- hopefully will be an easy day)
So there you go...that was my Peak Season 2016, the 32nd of my career. :coolspot:
MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!!
There is, it usually happens between the second and third weeks. The lull this year was higher volume than our peak day last year.
Christmas doesn't ever end at Christmas Day, though. For the next three weeks, there'll be online sales, people will be using their gift cards, they'll be exchanging gifts for something they really wanted, etc... I actually get more OT the weeks after Christmas than I do during. Go figure.So....Peak Week 4, or as we call it, "Hell Week": (Nah, just kidding! :rofl
Date/Day/Stops/Pkgs
12/19-Mon 180/295 Uh oh, volume's coming back
12/20-Tues 188/319 Yep, its back!
12/21-Wed 196/338 Holee shit! Its Peak Day! New personal record for stops on my route in one day.
12/22-Thur 157/255
12/23-Fri 117/173 About half these stops were next day air, too.
I always joke that I'll be one of the last ones in on Christmas Eve, and I usually am in the last five. Not this year. Had an 8 hour day, which was nice.
See, normally management would not have worked the seasonal drivers if volume dropped off like that, but this year they kept 90% of them on road. They left our routes essentially the same as the previous week. They then used the other 10% as shuttle drivers for late air. Reason being they wanted most of us to have hours left in case we had to work Saturday (which we will be tomorrow -- hopefully will be an easy day)
So there you go...that was my Peak Season 2016, the 32nd of my career. :coolspot:
MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!!
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Guess it depends on the area and drivers. I have the same exact experience but the other way around. I avoid FedEx like the plague
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I avoid the post office, one day we had 5 different addresses of mail in the mail box. Like it was a last ditch effort to dump it.
You ever stop and pick up cans? I made over $7.00 driving the dirt roads around home this week. Could have over $10 more but I'm afraid to stop on paved roads.
I work for Amazon and we also call it "peak". UPS had people at each building to monitor trailers coming in an out due to previous years where they couldn't keep up. We only shipped like 65+million packages a week in north america. I don't see why shipping companies cant keep up.. :rofl:
My next door neighbor works for the sub-contracted company that maintains the City of Phoenix public buses, he told me Amazon is not so good of a corporate neighbor. Makes the 2 way streets a bit unsafe to "test drive" buses during peak when an employee shift change happens at Amazon.
Seriously, dont go there. Not even the most optimistic people could possibly predict the exponential volume increases over the last few years during Christmastime. We do the best we possibly can, and then some. It's the unreasonable people who expect far more than that.
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It was an unfortunate situation that ups put themselves in when they signed the 2 day gautentee shipping contract, nobody could have predicted this volume all those years ago. But as "bad" as it is ups is owning the situation by going out of their way to make it happen.
During peak Amazon contracts local police to help with traffic because of the huge amount of people during shift changes. You wouldn't believe how many people are late trying to get in the parking lot.
I was being sarcastic for one, and ups did far better than any other carrier meeting our demands. Year to year you are correct, no one could predict the volume increase. We adjust our shifts during peak based on predicted incoming volume. I'm not bashing ups whatsoever, you guys work harder than we do during peak. That being said don't be surprised if Amazon is completely self sufficient in their shipping within the next 5 years or less.
Thank you to the FedEx man that stood up and did what he did, I find it disturbing that people think it is appropriate to try to burn it. Those people must have not served to protect it.
Our USPS carriers could stand to learn a thing or two from our regular UPS driver. I live at the bottom of a hill on a dead end private street that is not plowed or maintained by state county or local. When we get any amount of ice/snow, our street is not passable with 2WD vehicles. When this happens, we don't get mail. I think it was last year we didn't get mail for over a week because if you didn't have AWD/4WD, you weren't getting up the hill. But our UPS driver will park his truck at the top of the hill and walk the packages down. THAT's service. :thumb:
I should've taken a pic of my truck yesterday night. We had a major thaw this past week and my roads were like mud bogs in a lot of places. I had mud splattered up over the hood and windshield and you couldnt see the company shield on the sides, either. Funny as hell to me. :roflmao: The wash crew, on the other hand....
I should've taken a pic of my truck yesterday night. We had a major thaw this past week and my roads were like mud bogs in a lot of places. I had mud splattered up over the hood and windshield and you couldnt see the company shield on the sides, either. Funny as hell to me. :roflmao: The wash crew, on the other hand....
So how’s business this year? Seems like our ups train traffic has been pretty busy so far this year. My train today said it only has 16 trailers on it coming from LA though
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