I sent one small package via FedEx to one of my clients in Washington, DC. A mere month later, it is on its way back to me because of FedEx incompetence.
Take a look at this tale of stupidty:
Simply put, I sent the box to an office building in Washington. FedEx repeatedly tried to deliver it after 5pm, when the office was closed.
After three attempts, I called FedEx to complain. They told me that there was only one delivery on that route per day, and that I had no recourse other than to give them a different address. I gave them my client’s home address.
Well, it looks like they never even tried to deliver it to his home; instead they sat on the package for a couple of weeks and now they’re sending it back to me.
FedEx. When it absolutely, positively needs to be there overnight… send it U.S. mail instead.
Ah… the Hagerstown depot. I haven’t seen that name in a few years since I left Baltimoe.
The fact is that all of the carriers are pretty inept.
1. DHL’s tracking site requires you enter the origination zip or the destination zip. Sometimes you get different statuses based on which one you enter.
2. Once a UPS depot misread the return address as the destination. It got to the middle of the country, and turned back around. Oy vei.
3. The USPS once couldn’t deliver a package to my office building saying the street didn’t exist. Uh. Right.
Heh… the package arrived back at my house in San Jose today, and scrawled across it was the word “MOVED”. I guess that was the excuse the driver gave for not being able to deliver to a locked, closed business.
The capper to this story is the efficiency of FedEx computer systems: less than a half hour after I signed for the returned package, I received an automated email informing me that the package had been delivered. And according to the email, it was delivered to the address in Washington.