UPS, friend or foe

One would think that A company whose sole purpose in life is to ship packages, would be able to actually SHIP packages correctly right? Alas, one would be wrong. On February 6, 2009, my colleague and I had a great idea for a present for our boss. His birthday is February 29th so we decide to purchase said gift. I did the research and found the perfect example of this gift and proceeded to purchase it. Again this was on February 6, 2009. On February 11, 2009 they ship said gift. Needless or maybe not needless to say we have still not received said package all due to my newest foe, UPS.

It appears UPS did get close to me at one point during this process but alas here are the gory details. My now good friend Dave, the shipper, sent me the tracking number on February 16th. All looked good, it made it to Chicago and was out for delivery. On February 19th, the package suddenly was missing an apartment number? interesting. It was sent to my work building where there should be no apartment number. confused? I was. But then on 2/20 the status changed to say, the address has been corrected, delivery has been rescheduled. On February 20th, the status says Delivered. yay. exept.. well wait.. it says delivery in Addison, IL. Hm. That doesn't seem right. I work in Chicago. On February 23rd, I go out to check on the status of my package and see this information. Immediately I knew something was wrong. I reach out my friend Dave, the shipper, and ask him to confirm the address it was shipped to. He confirms the next day that yes it was to my work address. Hm. So I call UPS. the automated message tells me my package was delivered, yay, except to the wrong address. The address it was sent to in no way, shape or form, resembles my work addresss, except that it was sent to WEST CHICAGO and i work in CHICAGO. close..ok really ? its not close at all.

My next move it to open a query ticket with UPS on February 25th. They respond the next day with yes you are correct, this was shipped to the wrong address. Please reach out to the shipper to initiate a package investigation. Why the shipper? Wel lthe receiver doesn't have all the necessary information. why not you ask? I don't know. I reach out Dave, the shipper and ask him to do this. In the meantime, I get aggravated enough to call UPS again on Friday February 27 (after figuring out their really annoying phone system on how to get an agent. the key is to say AGENT. nice.). The agent, after hearing my story, doesn't understand either how the package ended up at that location so far from the actual city of Chicago. (note, I provided her with my correct address and phone number, important later.) She sends me to the claims department to open the investigation even though I am the receiver (apparently you can do this which the email didn't say). The claims lady, after hearing my story, apologizes profusely, puts me on hold and calls the location it was shipped to. She comes back, says they have the package and will pick it up on Monday March 2. Then i provide her with my correct address and phone number to ship it to. She says it should be here on Tuesday.

Here we are to yesterday. When I don't receive the package at work, after putting Sadie to bed I check the status of my package again as now we are past bosses birthday or where it should be had it been a leap year. The status now says,


03/02/2009
12:57 P.M.
PICKUP SCAN

03/02/2009
9:11 P.M.
A CORRECT COMPANY OR RECEIVER NAME IS NEEDED FOR DELIVERY. UPS IS ATTEMPTING TO OBTAIN THIS INFORMATION / RETURNED TO SHIPPER

Seriously. I am not making this up. Not only did I provide my correct address and phone number to them TWICE, I gave it to them over the phone and it sounded like they put in the system. Alas, the package is now on its way back to Dave, the shipper. So again I call UPS last night. They say since the package is in transit there is nothing they can do. I am to reach out to the shipper and have him reship the package. I ask assuming it would be free of charge as this is the second time in one week UPS has screwed up. She never apologizes, rude, and says there is nothing she can do. Once again I reach out to Dave, the shipper and ask him to resend upon receipt of this package. Dave, the shipper, was very nice and said they will resend. I clarified my address for him and suggested they make UPS overnight it to me since it has now taken almost a month for them to get me this stupid package. The package is still in transit so one can only hope I will see it in the near future. But hopefully now you understand why UPS is stupid.

It is a sad fact that my very funny bosses birthday present has been all over the country, shuttled to and fro. Let's just hope that in the end the freaking thing isn't broken because I may just have to demand a refund of my shipping dollars. oh...i might anyway. good thinking me.