Dan writes, “Apple saved Mother’s Day!”
My daughter and I ordered a book as a Mother’s Day gift, and I was disappointed to learn it would ship late and miss the big day. I had waited until the last day of the promotion (April 30th at about 9:00 PM EST), so I didn’t want to complain. Then this landed in my inbox.
Reader Matt CC’d us on this sad email to Steve Jobs. It seems that some #$!@#$ at FedEx stole his Mother’s Day gift right out of the box. Now he’s asking Steve Jobs to help him get the stolen iPod replaced in time for Mother’s Day.
Earlier this week I ordered a part from Canon USA Service for one of my Canon cameras and it arrived today. I am impressed for the fast shipping but not so much by the efficiency of the packaging.
Additional photo inside.
Express shipping from Amtrak is a cost-efficient way to ship packages between cities, sometimes costing half the price of UPS or FedEx.
From the looks of David’s package, Dell isn’t close to honoring its promise to switch to alternative packaging within the next two months. This obscenely large box contained nothing more than a 2GB flash drive. David’s son snapped a few pictures, which appear as an eerie slideshow after the jump.
[protected-iframe id="b8f18f624db3162ddc3edeca28b1ece8-40783744-40309798" info="http://digg.com/api/diggthis.php?u=http://digg.com/xbox/Help_Microsoft_Thinks_I_m_A_Thief_For_Wanting_My_XBox_Back" width="55" height="82" frameborder="0" scrolling="no"]Microsoft hasn’t returned Tiffany’s XBox 360 for four months because they think she is a thief, even though she has her original receipt and a credit card statement proving that she is the console’s rightful owner. Microsoft repaired the XBox back in January and tried to return it via FedEx, but a shipping snafu landed the box back at Microsoft’s service center. Tiffany has called repeatedly. She even sent a letter to Microsoft’s legal department, after sending her receipt and statement, asking how else she could prove ownership. That was 22 days ago. She has yet to receive a response.
The workers at the FedEx Kinkos in Astor Place didn’t know how to react when reader Eric asked to overnight a letter. They were apparently trained to handle only the Kinkos side of the store, and weren’t sure how to ship Eric’s parcel—a school board election ballot—to Hackensack, New Jersey. Their solution was both innovative and idiotic: they told Eric to write his credit card info on a slip of paper, and promised to take care of everything the next morning.
Nick paid the UPS store in Woburn, Massachusetts $600 to ship his computer with insurance to and from England. UPS smashed the computer somewhere along the way and insisted that Nick would need to wait 4-6 weeks for a decision on his claim. After a month, Nick called the UPS store and was told that they needed additional documentation. Another month later, Nick decided to get a new computer and asked for the damaged computer back so he could use it for parts, only to find out that the UPS store had inexplicably shipped it to headquarters, which then delivered it to a stranger in New York named Ken.
Reader Dustin lives on a military base and Microsoft keeps telling him that they can’t fulfill his warranty because UPS doesn’t ship XBOXs back and forth from military bases. According to UPS, this isn’t true. Dustin tried escalating his complaint and got some apologies, but months went by and still no box arrived for his broken XBOX 360.
Emily noticed that the weird puppet crap she was thinking of buying on Ebay would make her PayPal account explode:
I know shipping products can be expensive, what with the rising fuel costs and all, but this shipping charge from the UK to Utah is ridiculous! Maybe the seller’s just padding the fee, I don’t know. 🙂
He just wants to send his Xbox in for repair, and you keep losing his request. He swears he’s not a “crazy blogger,” but despite that, we still want to help him. So please? You’ve got all his phone numbers and contact info now. Can you send a box?
Half an hour of arguing on the phone with a Sears rep and I was able to get the discount credited back to my card, but no free shipping, and it could take 10-14 days for them to “trace” my $20 blow gun. I am filing a claim with my credit card issuer just to be safe. This is the same company that sends me a free ratchet in the mail every time I exchange one in the store, so I can’t complain too much.
This order is tragic. Just another reason customers avoid Sears like bird flu and the company can’t turn a profit. If Sears further bungles the response or fails to send a free ratchet, share the failure with Sears’ executive office—but don’t ask for Mr. Lewis. He was fired for gross incompetence.
Amazon gives you free shipping if you buy over $25 of qualifying goods so people will sometimes search for “filler” items, little cheap doohickiesand to toss in to bring the total up. Here’s three quick ways to find them, courtesy of WiseBread:
Okay, everyone together in Moe Szyslak’s voice: 
“Whaaaaa?” We’re just as confused as you are. Newegg, which has one of the most stellar reputations of any retailer, online or b&m, apparently sent a customer a regular PS3 box instead of one with a Blu-ray copy of “Spiderman 3.” Here’s where it gets all evil alternate universe: when the customer called to complain, the CSR told him it wasn’t Newegg’s problem and for him to talk to Sony.
Update-3/7/08: Newegg contacted the OP and resolved the issue—see the OP’s comment below.
Reader Matthew bought a new MacBookPro and an iPod from Apple. The MacBook was ok but the iPod came with a scratch on the screen. He decided to try to exchange it for an undamaged iPod. He sent it back to Apple and instead of a new iPod he got his old one back with an additional scratch on it.
Steve was going to split the cost of a TomTom GPS Navigator unit with a friend so they could give it to his sister as a gift.
Reader Matt forwarded this email exchange he had with Zappos.com over their recent decision to stop promoting their price guarantee and free overnight shipping.
Matt bought a camera from TigerDirect. He monitored the status of the order online, and saw that it was marked “shipped” a few days after he placed the order, so he returned the other, more expensive, camera he’d bought at Best Buy. Unfortunately, the TigerDirect camera never arrived.
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