Each Day Already is a Challenge

I'm ranting

In case you haven't noticed, I'm really not a ranter. Oh, I have my "grrrr" moments now and then. (Okay, sometimes daily. ) But once I've said my "grrr" I usually can go on to other things quite easily, thank you.

BUT.....

I really am perturbed at both the U.S. Postal Service and at UPS. Yes, it those boxes that hubby and I sent from Lake Jackson, TX to Cincinnati, OH that have me ranting again.

You see, we have receipts for everything we sent. We didn't insure the stuff we sent by U.S. Postal Service. But I didn't think they'd really lose anything. Besides, we were already spending so much that adding anything else just wasn't in the budget.

I'm missing 3 boxes we sent as Media Mail from the Post Office in LJ. I've known that tracking them would be next to impossible, since we didn't insure them or pay for any kind of proof of delivery. Still, I was just about to contact them when I got some correspondence from them.

It seems that one of those missing boxes is...well...in pieces. And that, of course, means that the contents are spread out somewhere between Texas and Ohio, I guess. Well. Maybe not. The actual place that they send loose mail is in Philadelphia, although the correspondence comes from Atlanta. Now how in the world are we going to find any of the missing pieces? I'm pretty sure we're not. It sounds as if they could be anywhere between here and TX, or maybe in PA or GA.

The thing that makes me really angry at the Post Office is that the boxes they delivered looked like they had been through a war. Really. The bottoms were soaked with rain (or maybe they had been sitting in snow?). We used official Post Office packing tape, but it was peeling off because of having been exposed to the elements. Because the boxes were wet, they were also crushed, at least on those wet bottoms. I'm not at all surprised that 3 boxes went missing and that only one of those has been partially found. Actually what they found was just the part of the box with the mailing label and postage.

We were in a pretty big rush down there in TX and besides, we weren't thinking "business". We were thinking "personal belongings." We don't have packing lists of the stuff that was in those boxes. The only things we did send by USPS was what they call media - books, videos, CD's, audio tapes. But there's no way in the world I can tell them what's missing. Not after having been in storage for 4 years and with the rush we were in to get everything packed and shipped. It's highly possible that some of my personal videos - videos of Derek at Christmas time and such - are missing. I haven't found them yet. It's more likely that at least one of the boxes held some of Derek's prized comic books. (A box of those went missing when we shipped stuff from TX to Michigan 4 years ago.) This time when we packed, I tried not to be specific on the outside of the box, especially with the comic books. But I think there might have been one of his boxes already packed well enough for shipping that admitted to being comics. I fear that's one of the missing boxes.

UPS isn't much better. Yes, the boxes were in better shape when they arrived. I'm also missing 3 UPS boxes - 2 sent from the UPS store and one from a pack and send place. The good thing about UPS is that each box is automatically insured for either $50 or $100 when it's shipped. The bad thing is that UPS swears that the boxes in question were delivered and that I signed for them. Of course, their records also show that they delivered these boxes to my office. I don't have an office. And our address - our street - is strictly residential.

UPS is right that they have my signature. I think I only signed for one set of boxes that arrived - 18 boxes. Perhaps I also signed for 12 others that arrived. In total, we shipped 30 boxes by UPS. Unfortunately, when I signed for boxes, I signed for the NUMBER of boxes, not for specific ones. Although I teased the driver that I wanted to check each tracking number before he took off, he told me in no uncertain terms that that was not an option. So? I have all of the records where I checked off boxes as they arrived. There are definitely 3 boxes missing. But UPS is claiming there is not a doggone thing they can do about it, since their driver claims that they were delivered and that I signed for them. End of story, in their minds. And, again, I really don't know what's in any of those missing boxes either.

In the boxes we sent by UPS, we used clothing as packing material, so each missing box most likely has some clothes in it. Other than that, the only thing I can say is those boxes did not contain my Grandma's china or my elephant collection, since we brought those in the car. Nor to the UPS boxes contain media, since we used USPS for those.

After 4 years of not having this stuff, it's really not the stuff that I'm concerned about. It's the attitude of both UPS and USPS. They really do think that every individual who ships something should think like a business. Inside - and saved in your files - there should be a packing list of all the items being shipped. The to and from address should be on the boxes and inside the boxes. Each box should be insured and one should pay for delivery confirmation receipts. And when the drivers arrive with a truck load of boxes, one should insist on having a list of the tracking numbers on the boxes actually being delivered. You know, in any business where I've worked, that has not happened. How would they think that a regular consumer, a person shipping household goods, would think that way???

I'm sure there will be more to this story later. I'll be grrrrrrrring about this one for a while, I think.