Question on shipping with ups and fedex

Guys for shipping items: I have to go to corner store UPS prices seem horrible but the store uses a 3rd party system. Questions are do any of you ship stuff from home and have them come pick it up use online account??? One problem I do not do enough to have them stop everyday. FedEx is weak in my area. The post office seems ok for flat rate box other than that forget it!!!! One thing that burns me some body can ship to me for $20 if I ship out its $30. Give me you insight here.

This won't answer your question, but I had to through in my towel here.

UPS and Fedex shipping schedules and rates are more complicated than anything I can think of. Where I work we ship daily to many locations in the USA. In a week's period of time I have shipped to the same place and paid a different rate each time. We ship to Carlsbad, NM, to the city there. They have several different addresses for different items. The whole place only has one zip code, yet a one pound package can vary as much as $3 in shipping costs.

I'm sorry for ranting here, but I sense you are feeling the same frustrations. If the items shipped are not too large the postal service seems to be doing pretty good right now, but it can be expensive as well.

As to why some people can ship cheaper than others, it is volume. I worked at one of our company warehouses, and we shipped a minimum of 20 or 30 boxes per day, once had enough UPS had to send a second truck. Our shipping charges per pound were 1/3 or less than those charged an individual. The 3rd party shipping is designed to cost less. When it gets to the last destination, if it is not on the already scheduled rout for the driver they leave it at the post office which delivers it the next day. As to which is cheaper, FedEX normally is, but to amil a FedEx package here it is a 25 mile round trip versus a 11 mile round trip. If you are not on a regular pickup schedule, the pick up at your residence will cost on the average of $5.00 per pickup. In our area FedEx used to have a reputation of being late on deliveries and loosing items, especially home electronics. They seem to have improved both problems over the last year though.

Here in NW ND, I have much better luck with FedEx than UPS, delivery on time, rates are better for shipping, they go out of their way to pick up parcels at the house, driver will even call to see if I need something picked up, and I can call them if I need them to stop. UPS can't even find the place, and when they do it is usually 2 days later than the tracking no. says they will. I have a good friend that runs the local UPS store franchise, and he understands why I use FedEx. FedEx drives right up to shop, UPS stops on road and walks 50 yards up driveway carrying 70 lb package. Have told him to drive all the way in, he still walks. ????

Dick

I ordered something from Harbor Freight, they ship by Fedex. It came so fast it made my head spin. We are way out in the sticks too.

I've done that a few times but only with returns. Something defective, company has me print out a prepaid label and handle the UPS pickup. Not an issue. There are ways with other companies to print labels but I am not familiar. UPS guy says they do pickups all the time. I'd think just schedule as needed. Here their route gets them within only a couple miles of my place every day anyway. UPS dropoff is 30 miles away. There is a mailbox type thing to drop small packages in in town. The only store UPS dropoff to weigh and pay/get a label is open for about an hour sometime around after 5PM I think, so I rarely have tried to ship stuff that way, not very handy when it's the only place to ship stuff in town.

If I want to ship something regularly I generally use the mail for smaller stuff. Post office is 30 miles away, anything I want to ship or mail I just meet him at my box if it doesn't fit in. Next day I'll get a bill. If we need stamps, just leave a check in the box, etc. So it's much handier.

I don't use Fedex if possible. They have left packages at the post office in the wrong town for pickup. During light snow they have left packages sitting on top of my mailbox, not tied down, found one the day after delivery that way (and the driveway wasn't bad and had already been driven down with a car that day). Also they like to stop at the highway and leave stuff at my cousin's 1.5 miles away. And they have delivered to my uncle's 40 miles away (with the package addressed correct, they are same town/zipcode, but address is completely different of course).

I have shipped a LOT of stuff. USPS consistently had the best rates and they picked it up at my door. Very seldom did I use those flat-rate boxes. Flat rate is a good deal ONLY for HEAVY objects, and usually those heavy objects will NOT fit into a flat rate box. Priority mail is the best deal. You can use your own box, or the post office will supply one for you.

I recently shipped a 5lb box via USPS, about $13.00 Stopped by UPS and had it weighed for shipment, they wanted $28. ??

Some other info about UPS. We are also in ND and Spee-dee Delivery is awesome and half the cost of UPS, we ship a lot of Haz-mats like refrigerants etc. and that's only half cost too. I know that they did suspend deliveries to some rural zip codes last year out in the Oil Patch because of labor issues but now they have resumed some of that area. But we can only reach ND,SD,MN,WI,IA,IL,& parts of NE & MO with them so we have gone to "on call" with UPS. That is half of a daily pickup or $10.00 per week basic charge and then when we "end of day" with our UPS screen it sends them a signal and they will stop and pickup what we have, if we have nothing they don't stop so that saves money in the slow times when not much is going out. They are good but a little more expensive than Fed-ex.

Lane; origin and destination
Volume; amount you ship
Day of the week/month
All figure into what you pay.

UPS has small package down to a science.
They know from past experience that the truck somewhere along your route will be overfull; half full; just right full on xx day of the week/month.

Obviously running a half full truck down the road cost more per package than running a full truck down the road.

Another thing that many don't know about UPS is that if you ship to a main street business it will be cheaper than a rural or residential address, it used to be about $3.00 now it's more like $4.50 for the same wt. package. There is a box that you must check on the screen for that and if you don't and it turns out to be residential they will actually charge you for an address correction as well as the real charge. That may help explain why the charges vary so much for the same item.

i usually just send it with the mail lady alot of time. the buyer has to pay for the shipping anyway so why is it big deal to you. speedeze fedex ups are here daily but i most always send out thru mail lady no big deal.

I will pay extra anytime to avoid iffy mail.

(quoted from post at 09:22:26 02/08/15) Some other info about UPS. We are also in ND and Spee-dee Delivery is awesome and half the cost of UPS, we ship a lot of Haz-mats like refrigerants etc. and that's only half cost too. I know that they did suspend deliveries to some rural zip codes last year out in the Oil Patch because of labor issues but now they have resumed some of that area. But we can only reach ND,SD,MN,WI,IA,IL,& parts of NE & MO with them so we have gone to "on call" with UPS. That is half of a daily pickup or $10.00 per week basic charge and then when we "end of day" with our UPS screen it sends them a signal and they will stop and pickup what we have, if we have nothing they don't stop so that saves money in the slow times when not much is going out. They are good but a little more expensive than Fed-ex.

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Spee-Dee delivered to me about 3 times, no problems, and then they decided that my zip code placed me somewhere out in Nebraska instead of Southwest Iowa. That package was a full 3 weeks late in arriving and I missed some sales because of it. Spee-Dee no longer delivers to my place.

I think US Postal service is best for most items. You can print label from their website, and schedule pickup at your house or business. And they are usually cheaper. I have had problems with ups playing football with packages in the past.

Don't ship UPS from the US to Canada . The brokerage fees will add another 30% or so onto the price .

Unless things have changed recently, Fed-Ex charges more than UPS. Doesn't most of the Postal Service stuff go through Fed-EX by contract with them?

I was talking to our post master at Christmas time and was told they use UPS and FED-EX.

I have used FedEx for pick up. There was no extra charge for that. The time I used UPS, I printed out the shipping labels, stopped the driver, and he loaded in all the pieces.

UPS has a different rate for shipping to residential addresses than businesses. And different prices for different customers, depending on the volume of pkgs shipped. Therefore, it costs you more to ship something out than a business with a large volume must pay to send someone a package.

After several screw ups with UPS, they are not allowed on or near our property anymore. Fed Ex has been good for us. clint

I have a UPS online account. I take my packages to the local Case/IH dealer to be picked up because that is the last place the driver goes before he leaves town.