Damaged packages - USPS to mainland

[DTisme]

We're having a bunch of trouble shipping via USPS to the mainland lately. We've shipped 9 boxes in last few weeks, and only ONE of them showed up in California that wasn't bashed up. Doesn't matter if it's USPS flat rate boxes or our own, which are stronger. Have had some expensive breakage, even though we are packing well. We've never had this issue in the past - anyone else seeing an uptick in damage to the mainland?? Packages coming to us have been fine! What's going on?

[terracore]

I used to work for the USPS for a short period of time. Career appointment, not a contractor.

USPS mail is moved using whatever contractors are cheapest and they will dump one contractor over another to save a single penny (literally).

Years ago I knew a woman who worked for one of these contractors. She admitted that many employees hated their jobs so much they made a game out of how hard they could throw the parcels into the bin and maybe get "bonus points" if they hear what sounds like something breaking. I understand that things have actually become worse since then.

There isn't much you can do to protect your mailed belongings when people make a game of destroying them, but you can complain to the ends of the USPS Earth to try and affect change. Making insurance claims help, but if you don't have a receipt showing purchase price for whatever you're shipping you usually won't get paid if you're using USPS insurance. Read their list of disclaimers: It disclaims almost everything to the point that buying the insurance is pointless unless they just simply lose the package. And that almost never happens.

The individual employees working the USPS counters can't help you, they will just refer you to a 1-800 number to call.

I sent a computer in for warranty service and it arrived so completely smashed that even the "damaged goods" person at Gateway called me and said only a vehicle collision could completely destroy a steel computer case like that. They helped me through the USPS insurance process but it was only with their submitted invoices that I got paid. I got a check from the USPS insurance people and decided to cash it at the USPS counter. The counter person looked really surprised and commented that she had never seen an instance where somebody actually got paid for a USPS insurance claim.

During about half of this last year almost all my packages received at the Hilo post office had a RECEIVED DAMAGED stamp on them, and not surprisingly, all such packages were damaged. I had to wait in line about 10 minutes to get one of these, and it was so mangled that it took the clerk almost 5 minutes to find a way to read and enter the scan code. Imagine how pissed off I was when he slid the box over to me and it was EMPTY. I waited 15 minutes to get a box that somebody had crapped up so much that the contents were missing. Fortunately it was an amazon shipment and they took care of me, but no insurance gives you 15 minutes of your life back. In the last few months, all my packages have been in better condition. I'm guessing they changed contractors.

[terracore]

Need to add: I recently purchased a used APC UPS system via ebay and it arrived plastic bagged by USPS with "received damaged" stamps all over it. There were bits and pieces of the UPS system in the plastic bag. For those of you who know UPS systems, you can usually drive over an APC system without it disintegrating like this.

I got a refund from the ebay merchant and in her reply told me that pursuing the USPS Priority Mail "Included" insurance was pointless and that in the future she would no longer ship to Hawaii or Alaska.

So if you try to buy a used UPS system from eBay and can't, I'm probably the one who ruined it for you.

[alaskyn66]

Shipping to Alaska and Hawaii chaps my rump. In this day and age shipping shouldn't be an issue. In Alaska I once payed 15.00 shipping (fedex 3day) for a 3.00 electronic doodad from tiger direct. Although in Hawaii I ordered a VHF antenna (fedex 3day) that came a week later obviously damaged. (refused delivery of the 10 ft box with a crease in the middle) .. But got a replacement 24 hours later to the minute.

When I moved back from Alaska i sent 32 boxes priority mail of varying sizes, half were damaged by the time they got to Pahoa. one of them was a desktop computer I had to replace.

Edited for punctuation and stuff. (Sorry, English teachers everywhere.)

[lquade]

funnest one we had was simply the mailing label in a plastic sandwich bag. no box, no wrapping, no goodies, simply the label. when we checked the tracking number on-line, it said "delivered" so you can imagine the vendor went round and round with us.. hey the label made it, how much more do you want?

[OrchidIslander]

quote:

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Originally posted by DTisme

We've never had this issue in the past - anyone else seeing an uptick in damage to the mainland?? Packages coming to us have been fine! What's going on?

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@DTsime, I work for the Post Office - and it goes without saying that 8 bashed parcels out of 9 is so far unacceptable that it borders on the ludicrous. I hope that whoever received the parcels on the mainland took photos of the damaged goods and bashed shipping boxes. If you have photos you should take them to whichever postal location you used to ship items and request to speak to the Postmaster. Heck, even if you don't have photos the Postmaster should be informed and your interests addressed. Obviously something went seriously wrong with the batch that your parcels were in. Based on your shipping data they should be able to research to determine if some sort of detrimental shipping occurrence was noted within your batch. File a formal complaint with the Postmaster. Since your items were expensive, I am so hoping that you had them insured adequately. Previously mentioned photos - along with purchased insurance - should serve you well in the claim process. When, and if, you talk with the Postmaster - I'd be very interested to hear what he or she had to say.

So sorry this happened to you.

Merely based on my own perspective, the Post Office is chock full of employees with personal high standards and customer service oriented attitudes. Most go all out to satisfy the customer. I did not believe any of this until I started working there.

Good luck,

Mike in HPP

[terracore]

"funnest one we had was simply the mailing label in a plastic sandwich bag"

I got one of those too! I filled out a form describing the contents of the box attached to the label and included a picture. No luck though.

Another plastic-bag special was a book somebody sent us- dripping wet.

[lquade]

yes, the amount of postage alone would say the label was attached to something! how does the post office get away with such stuff.. i have also had a box with tire tracks clearly shown across the crushed mess. maybe we should start a website with just post office mishandled mail...

[DTisme]

Thanks, all. I hate to hear about these problems.

We don't have receipts for the items bc they are all antiques, and have been in our collections for decades. Last bad experience we had was a couple of years ago, we did send a package containing a ceramic bowl to Calif., lots of bubble wrap, etc. This, too, was an antique and I was heartbroken how it arrived. We filed a claim, and the claim was approved. I didn't have a receipt, but I did have links to same item on ebay and photos of the package, the packaging, and the broken item. So claims do get paid if you can make the effort to prove worth.

Mike, you give me hope. The 9 packages did go to the same address, but not in the same shipment, and I believe we sent 3 packages in each shipment from different post offices here -- will have to look to see what ones went from what PO. I doubt if this happened locally, so not sure about talking to the postmaster, but we might. When the recipient got them, he immediately took photos of the crushed sides of the boxes, and when he heard broken glass inside one of them, he took a video of him unpacking.

Mostly boxes were crushed with no damage. We pack pretty well. We were probably pretty lucky that there were only 2 broken items out of the 8 crushed boxes. One of the broken items was among a bunch of other stuff and luckily it was the least expensive thing in the box, not worth a lot, so we'll probably skip a claim on it. But one item -- the one the recipient took the video of -- we were selling for $150, so we'll submit a copy of the invoice and the photos and video of the damage.

I order a lot from amazon; probably a couple of orders a month, for 9 years now since living here, and have never had anything arrive broken. And amazon packs LOUSY, as you all know, sometimes with the item bouncing around with just a little bit of packaging. I did order a book once, though, and the package arrived empty. And have had a couple of orders that never arrived. Amazon refunded.

So yeah, Mike, will def let you know if we talk to the postmaster(s) and what they say.

One more thing: I think one of the mistakes is using the USPS Flat Rate boxes. They're way too thin for anything fragile.

[CatFincher50]

I recently shipped 12 boxes, regular ground. They told me would take 6 to 8 weeks but they arrived in less than 5 days. 2 out of the 12 boxes I marked as FRAGILE and these were the only ones that arrived in tact. All other boxes had damage to the stuff inside, some boxes were literally crushed. I had used lots of bubble wrap and still items were broken beyond repair.

So mark your boxes FRAGILE and perhaps they will be handled with care and considereation.