I hate haTE HATE UPS!!

I shipped a package today. I went online to get a quote so I knew how much to charge for shipping. I put the measurements of the package and my estimated weight. Turns out my weight estimate was about 10% high. I should be good, right? 

I give the final price to the buyer, including shipping and when the paypal comes through, I go to the UPS store only to be screwed over! I get in there and the cost comes up just shy of twice the price the website says it'll be!! I then realize that this is not the first time I've been screwed by the bait-and-switch.  

I ask if there's anything they can do to get the cost closer to what the website says. He just gave me a business card and said "next time you ship, call us and we'll give you a quote that should be accurate".  

I said, "thanks, but no thanks. Next time I'm driving farther to FedEx, or the dreaded post office, or I'll run the package out to Oregon Forest Gump style. You guys aren't going to stick it to me again".

Once I bought a 12”x12”x12” box from The UPS store and went home to pack something.  

When I returned he measured the outside and rounded it up to 13”x13”x13”.  I cracked up as I shipped a lot of eBay with this guy.  Not the end of the world but funny how he did it.  Come on!

Another time I was selling the windshield chrome trim from a 240Z and saw a commercial that the UPS store were shipping and packaging experts.     

So before I listed it on eBay I drove over to get an estimate only to be told they have no idea how to package the trim.   It might be in my crawl space still.   

I think the UPS Store locations are a different animal than UPS Corporate. Something in the distant recesses of my brain makes me think that the former are the old Mailboxes Et.c. I have a UPS distribution center near me that has a customer counter; I have never had any issue with price discrepancies from online estimates when shipping from there.

I'm pretty sure the UPS Stores are independently owned franchises.  The rates they charge are not the rates that UPS the shipping company charges but rather they are more "independently set".  This is also jives with the other story that 12" was measured as 13".  Seems the independent owner has something to gain by sending a "larger" box.  

However, UPS the Shipping company has it's own customer service counters at some of the shipping depots.  At these places you will encounter a genuine UPS employees who gain no personal incentive to measure 12" as 13".  

TLDR:  try a new location or print the labels directly from your house and pay to UPS directly then drive the pre-labled box to the UPS Store and leave the package there to be picked up by the brown suited man.  I believe you can drop off pre-labled packages at these stores for no additional service fee.   

02Pilot is more right than I am...ha.  Same time.  

Another thought, Lowes and Depot sells pretty much the same boxes as the shipping stores and I have found out that Lowes/Depot is A LOT cheaper for same/similar box.  

I would rather light the package ablaze and sit in the ashes, before I'll commit the contents to a Mailboxes Etc or The UPS Store.  Calling them thieves is slanderous to true pickpockets.  Right up the road is the UPS terminal, they have a roughly inconvenient shipping office schedule (12pm - 6 or 7pm), but I've yet to catch a glimmer of the rate shafting that the other two will drop on you without a blink.

For what it's worth,  I've had nothing but good luck with the USPS. 

I use Fedex. Yes they charge a little bit to pick up but it is all spelled out to the penny on the web site. 

John Welsh said:

TLDR:  try a new location or print the labels directly from your house and pay to UPS directly then drive the pre-labled box to the UPS Store and leave the package there to be picked up by the brown suited man.  I believe you can drop off pre-labled packages at these stores for no additional service fee.   

I used to measure and weigh at home, print up the label, and then drop the whole thing off at Staples. super easy

I used to work for Mail Boxes Etc/The UPS Store.  They are independent franchises, and some of the owners will squeeze every penny they can from a customer.  That being said, they will measure and round up because of whats called dimensional weight, if they charge actual weight and ups decides that the box is too big they will charge the difference back to the store. 

To be honest, I worked there for a couple years, and I'm still friendly with the owner and manager, but I don't ship there.  

For even more shiny happy moments, try having UPS bring stuff across the border into Canada.  N-E-V-E-R again. Shipping/Taxes/Duty/Brokerage/Handling/Packaging/Usery and it's MORE than twice the item purchase price once it gets here.

USPS ain't that bad.

I currently have a package traveling usps and it made it from florida to columbus distribution center, dissapeared for 4 days. Showed up in denver colorado, was overnighted back to columbus and left there at 2;14 am and again at 10:16 am. My next package will be mailed via fedex!

I gave up on UPS years ago, every time I quoted shipping using the on line calculator I wound up getting the shaft. Most of the time I use FedEx or the USPS, the USPS has improved a lot over the last few years.

As has been stated already, most UPS Stores are independent franchise, and in my experience are exceptionally E36 M3ty compared to the larger UPS distribution centers.

I bought a 4x6" band saw from HF online, it showed up damaged, I RMA'd it.  HF emailed me the RMA paperwork, and shipping label to print, and send it back.  Pre-paid shipping label was stuck on the box, and I headed to the nearest UPS Store.

I wheel the heavy package into the UPS Store, I load the thing on their scale, they weigh, measure, and then try to charge me a ridiculous amount of money to ship the thing back.  I pointed out the shipping label already on the package, and they informed me that since they were privately owned, they didn't have to honor the pre-paid label, and that the pre-paid shipping wouldn't actually cover the full cost of them shipping the package.

I saw red, I normally, am pretty level headed, but I laid into them, pointed out that their sign said UPS, and I had a pre-paid label for UPS, and told them what I thought of their policy.  As I was wheeling my dolly with the package back out the door, the manager, stopped me, and offered to do me a solid and go ahead and honor the pre-paid "UPS" label at his "UPS" Store franchise.

Even with the issues I've had with UPS, FedEx has been far worse, but that's a long tirade for another thread at another time.  USPS has been okay, but the line is forever long and their prices suck.

FedEx or USPS for me, and I prefer FedEx.  However, this last time when I was shipping out MR2 parts, the quotes I got on FedEx were like $18 for a <1lb small box.  Went with USPS on those for less than half the FedEx rate.

Yup, you fell into the UPS store trap.

Next time, but the label online and drop it off at the UPS store and walk away.  They can’t charge you for their service and they can’t refuse your package.

Or just have it picked up by a driver and avoid driving to the store and all that E36 M3.

This isn’t bait and switch, it’s how things were structured before the take over and how they were after.  FedEx/Kinkos is the same way.  USPS isn’t, but there is a slight difference between online and the postal office.

Another for USPS. I use them for most packages. Especially if it's small and will fit in a standard Priority Mail box.  If it's over the USPS size limits I use FedEx, some of which are even open 24 hrs.

Anything I sell on eBay, I have it packed and pretty much ready to ship before I even list it so I can use their shipping calculator and pre-paid shipping labels. Makes life much easier.

I ship at least a couple of boxes a week thru Staples and have nothing but good things to say about them.  They were better when they did UPS, USPS, and FedEx, because they would give you quotes for all three and you could choose.   Now its just UPS, but UPS always seemed the best deal anyway.  Anything that gets shipped thru Ebay has a 30% discount so I measure, weigh, print out sticker, and just leave the box on the counter.  Any money spent on UPS gets credited to my Staples rewards card.  Don't know exactly what that gets you, but it sounds good.  Always make sure you mail out a regular shaped box.  One time I mailed out a trim pice shaped like a boomerang.  Took the time to cut a box down to make sure it took up as little space as possible.  Got hit with an irregular box size fee.  Next one went out in a much larger flat square box.  Cost much less but took up three times the space in the truck.

I appreciate the feedback. I absolutely won't ship UPS again. 

Yes, an ups store is a franchise just like aamco. If you think the store is berkeleying you, you should see what ups does to the store owners. The dimensional bs is true and chargebacks occur way too often. There is no upcharge in shipping. The rate is set by ups and a store owner can’t change it. And no the store doesn’t get any kickback from shipping more packages. You are there to sell everything else at grossly inflated prices to keep the doors open. Supplies are another big piss in the ocean as you can only buy from ups approved vendors and can only sell at the ups controlled price, which is literally a few pennies above the owners cost.

I can go on and on but I’ll stop for now.

So we ship reasonably regularly across water.   Mostly to Puerto Rico, for some time to Alaska.

UPS and FedEx had OUTRAGEOUS prices for those shipping.

USPS was as if you were sending something to California.  

One thing to note - Amazon uses the USPS for a reason.  It helps that they have talked them into delivering on days off, but I'm sure there are other reasons.  Not that they are fantastic, but at least better than UPS and FedEx for most items.

For me, it's USPS on convenience alone, but I'm pretty sure they're competitive on price.  Every time I've used UPS to ship something, it's been more of a PITA than it should be.  Heck, shipping a fender by Greyhound bus was almost as easy, and their cost estimate was accurate.

I've shipped a fair bit of stuff this year on ebay, and their website integration with USPS is nice.  They even give you a discount to make up for the stupid final value fee on shipping.  I can pay and print shipping labels from home and leave it in my mailbox for pickup, drop in any mailbox (for small items) or take it to the nearest post office.  Easy peasy.  Time is money, etc. etc. 

My only business with UPS has been returns using prepaid shipping labels. I usually go through Staples but last time I had to use one of the local stores. Thankfully I dropped it off and left. Otherwise I take my business to the post office. 

SkinnyG said:

For even more shiny happy moments, try having UPS bring stuff across the border into Canada.  N-E-V-E-R again. Shipping/Taxes/Duty/Brokerage/Handling/Packaging/Usery and it's MORE than twice the item purchase price once it gets here.

USPS ain't that bad.

I've been on both sides of this, and it's amazing how much you learn when you look into it.

Taxes are not UPS's fault. Neither is duty.

However, all the other fees are from them doing work for you. Don't want to pay the brokerage fee? Do your own brokerage or pay for one of the expedited methods that include brokerage. Don't want to pay the COD fee? Pay the cross-border costs before the package goes out for delivery. Yes, it's more work, but UPS will carry bigger and more valuable stuff than USPS does. If you're paying more than the value of the package in shipping, duties, taxes, brokerage, disbursement and COD fees then you're trying to ship a lot of low value items across an international border.