Reader John is an Amazon Prime member who can’t get anything sent to his house via UPS without a signature after he filed a claim over a $30 DVD that never showed up. He really likes his UPS driver, but the guy says that because of the “blacklist” he’s powerless to leave packages when John isn’t home. Period. Does anyone know how to get off of a UPS blacklist?
I’m having some trouble and I didn’t know who else to turn to – I sound like a grieving widow on the A-Team – but I thought of you folks and maybe you can help me out.
My family and I buy a lot of stuff online, mostly from Amazon, so we got the Prime deal that gives you free two-day shipping. Good stuff, right? We all work and some of us don’t get around as well as we used to so it works out very nicely. Save money on your things, save gas and parking, save your back and your knees, etc.
One of the first things I bought with the Prime membership was a DVD boxed set of a TV series.
Now we’ve had the same UPS driver for many years, we know him, he’s a nice guy, and he ALWAYS leaves our packages in our front door no matter what. When it came to this PARTICULAR package the online tracking was telling me it was delivered but no one at my house ever saw hide nor hair of it. No big deal. We’ve gotten packages for other houses occasionally, stuff gets misdelivered, it happens, and after none of my neighbors brought it over for about a week I figured it was lost and made a claim with UPS. We’re talking thirty bucks here. I didn’t want blood from a stone, I just wanted my season 3 of Stargate Atlantis.
In case you’ve never done it before making a claim for a lost package with UPS is a screaming nightmare. They make it incredibly difficult, you have to go through half a dozen web pages and talk to as many different people on the phone. It’s a giant pain in the ass. I made my claim anyway.
Since I made my claim, every few days I come home and there is a “we missed you” sticker from UPS on my front door. All my lovely Amazon stuff UPS was now demanding a signature for – even when, after this happened a few times, I called Amazon and had them set up my deliveries to not require signature authorization. I called UPS and they said “regardless of the shipper’s instructions it is at the delivery driver’s discretion as to whether to require a signature for delivery.” This strikes me as absolute garbage. Like I said, we’ve had the same driver for years, he’s a really good guy and he KNOWS everyone at my house works and we can’t be home to pick up packages.
Then, yesterday, I got home from work just as he was walking down my front steps with a package and he said, “hey, thank god you’re here and you can actually get this.” I asked him what the hell was going on with our deliveries.
He explained that it wasn’t him who misdelivered the original package that I had to file the claim on, that a relief driver was doing his route that day. He went on to say, though, that since we filed a claim – a THIRTY DOLLAR CLAIM – we had been put on a “blacklist” – his words, not mine – and that he was prevented by his superiors from delivering ANY package to our house at ANY time without a signature, regardless of the shipper’s instructions.
This is a delivery driver who has left large packages INSIDE OUR HOUSE before – we live in a safe area and don’t always lock the front door, and if we get large or multiple packages he has opened our front door, stacked them inside the house, and closed up behind himself. He’s a great guy and he’s always been good to us, but I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“So you’re telling me that even if a package specifically says it can be left without a signature, you aren’t allowed to just leave it in the doorway or inside the house like you’ve always done?” I asked him.
“Nope,” he said. “You’re on the blacklist. If I leave anything at your house without a signature I’ll lose my job. Sorry man.”
I can’t start taking off work to be home to pick up packages (and neither can anyone else) and I don’t want my UPS driver to lose his job, but what’s the best way to go about fixing this situation? I don’t want any special treatment, just what we’ve always had – a good, nice delivery driver who can leave stuff in our doorway when no one’s home.
I mean, a BLACKLIST? Seriously? They CALL it that? That’s pretty dumb.
Any advice is greatly appreciated.
(Photo:Northernplateguy)
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@BStu: I agree – I’ve always had better luck in these situations going through the vendor who sold me the item than going directly to the shipper. Amazon has a vested interest in keeping you happy with the Amazon Prime program but UPS just wants to cover its ass.
Im calling BS, i know of people that lie and say the package never arrived and claim it.
1) It is very easy to do and only takes a minute phone call.
2) They did it multiple times for items over $300.00
So getting blacklisted(which does happen) does not make sense that it would happen when you do it once for $30
@mmejanvier: I think you’re forgetting how much the individual end-point drivers, sorters, managers end up affecting a particular routes performance for any given shipper.
When I used to live at my folk’s place, I got used to never receiving UPS packages on Fridays because there was always some reason why they ended up rescheduled for Monday (including my favorite, no on was home when someone was excuse). After a few years of dealing with this (and complaining consistently whenever it happened) the manager that handled their neighborhood was replaced and lo and behold the service dramatically improved.
Compare this to the USPS driver who has been handling their neighborhood for a good 15 years and who they actually give x-mas gifts to (if you want to get the best possible service somewhere that you plan to live for a while, giving your postal worker an x-mas present consistently is a great idea) and who will go pretty far out of his way to make sure they get their mail.
As a whole UPS, Fed-Ex, and the USPS are not horribly incompetent organizations, but for any given residence/business you can see vastly different levels of service based on who actually has to get the package to your door (or how is managing them at the local level).
I’d say the moral to this story (esp with Amazon) is to always let the shipper deal with any missing/misdirected items. I’ve had UPS “lose” a couple of very expensive pieces of electronics and I never ended up on a Blacklist, but I also learned that as soon as something looks sketchy with UPS you need to call them and the shipper ASAP.
I just spoke to my UPS driver. He said that it’s usually a dollar amount that will trigger the signature required. However, he said that there are also a bunch of other factors and they’re all outside the driver’s control. For example, he told me you could file a claim on a $5 cd that you never got… While that dollar amount won’t be enough, it could be that people on your street have had a lot of claims (a string of thefts?)or that you are getting an increasing number of packages (thus more potential for more than a $5 cd claim).
He said there’s nothing the drivers can do – they punch in your address or scan you r package for delivery and a block will pop up requiring a signature to deliver the package.
If they leave it at the door, they are taking personal liability since they didn’t get a signature. He said they get a lot of grief over it but it’s out of the driver’s hands.
He said the best thing to do is just have it shipped where someone can be there to get it – like your work address… Another option is to hold at UPS for pick-up but he said that’s usually more trouble than it’s worth.
UPS has stolen items in shipment from me before. They are awful. Use FedEx.
It might be worth it to install a security camera that covers the area that UPS leaves the packages, with signs indicating that that area is now under surveillance. Notify UPS that the area is now monitored and you will make surveillance videos available to them in the event of any future lost packages left without a signature. Maybe they’ll lift the blacklist since you are now taking extra precautions to protect your packages.
It’s been my experience in working for an electronic security installation company that even a cheap surveillance system is a powerful deterrent. Fake cameras can help, but they’re not much use in court!
Jim
Comment on I Was Blacklisted By UPS For A $30 DVD That Was Never Delivered A few things I’ve learned as a logistics coordinator:
ALWAYS take your complaint to the merchant, not the carrier. 1. They
are more likely to credit you, and you will eventually have to contact
them anyway re:replacing the item; 2. UPS and FedEx generally stick to
their policy that the shipper must file a claim. For the shipper
(Amazon) claims are a piece of cake; 3. Carriers will not pay more than
$100 for a claim on an uninsured package, regardless of the actual
value. Amazon will usually give a full credit if you’re not a lousy
customer.
Don’t let UPS beat you by making you take your time to pick up the
package at their terminal. That totally defeats the purpose!
Jelly_bean
@Lambasted:
That would indeed be a good description of the area SW of Ybor City in Tampa where the UPS depot is.
Yeah, I wish this was how it worked. I’ve called and requested the package be left for pick-up… shown up only to find rude employees standing around the place but not willing to help anyone. Happens rather consistently.
Yep, this happens here as well. The guy’s quite good at just walking up to the place with just the door tag already filled out, hanging on the door and doing some nice power-walking to the truck. No knock, no doorbell rang. Went back through my security camera footage to verify it.
@dragonvpm: I’d agree — the quality of service (and lack thereof) is very localized. I get great service from the FedEx & USPS delivery people here (God, I love the attractive USPS PostalChick who shows up occasionally. USPS–we need more attractive PostalChicks!). When I used to live in an apartment, the UPS & FedEx guys were great but it was painfully obvious the USPS person must have been a flunkee. My neighbors would get together about once a week to swap misdelivered mail with each other. We were all constantly getting each other’s mail and there didn’t appear to be any pattern to it.
The UPS driver at my new home is friendly, but my packages via UPS look like they’ve been used to cushion the landing of a 747 and I often get the “Scheduled for Redelivery” even if no delivery attempt was made. Similarly, UPS also likes to sit on packages at the warehouse to make sure “3 day” means it’ll take 3 days to get to me, even if it’s here well in advance.
@Imafish:
It needs to be said – everyone STFU about paragraphs already! Who cares? This is a blog not your 6th grade grammar class. Get the hell over it already. Sheesh.
@FLConsumer: Sometimes UPS doesn’t just keep the packages in the warehouse, they give them a small vacation instead. I had a 2nd-day-air package that showed up a day early, so they sent it one state over, then back, then delivered it as scheduled.
Duh, there’s your problem. The discs passed through the Stargate! Since UPS drivers will not go through the Stargate, you will never ever receive your discs. And, please learn how to use paragraphs!
Comment on I Was Blacklisted By UPS For A $30 DVD That Was Never Delivered I’ve had a lot of problems with UPS in the past, and this is one of
them. I don’t know if it’s my local driver or what, but they seem to
be the only delivery company without a key to the front door to my
apartment complex, or the only ones who don’t check to see if the
front door is open. Fed-Ex, USPS, and DHL all leave my packages at
the door of my apartment, inside the building. UPS constantly tries
to deliver my packages while no one is at my apartment or will stand
outside, ringing the buzzer even though I have a post-it note beneath
my buzzer button that says: BUZZER IS BROKEN (I have seen this
happen, as I happened to be coming home at the same time I was having
a package delivered one day), and they leave those damned stickies on
my door that let me know that they’ll be here again tomorrow to
deliver my package at the same time (while I am in class), or will
futilely ring the buzzer even though, as the note clearly states, the
buzzer is broken. Not once has a UPS delivery person every knocked
on the front door to my complex (which is only two floors high, so I
would be able to hear it) or thought to open the front door of the
building.
I swear by USPS: much slower, I’ll admit, but at least I get my
packages within the week instead of trying to rearrange my whole
schedule to be home on time and find a ride to the UPS place out in
the middle of nowhere.
I really feel for this guy. Admittedly, I didn’t know one package
could get you blacklisted (that does seem a little fishy to me), but
it really does suck to try and make it to the UPS place before they
close, and some do close earlier than others.
I wish I could get on such a blacklist. UPS drops my deliveries on my porch, even big boxes that say “DELL” which read “EXPENSIVE COMPUTER INSIDE FOR THE TAKING.” I had a Dell stolen, put in a claim, and had it replaced. Still not on the blacklist.