When I was working at Scott Meredith a long long time ago, I used to think UPS was the most wonderful thing in the world. Vinnie the driver would cheerfully come by day in and day out bearing packages and it seemed to be the model of efficiency.
Working out of my home office, I have generally come to loathe and detest UPS.
Today I was expecting a new toner cartridge for my photocopier. UPS says they couldn't deliver it at 3:36 PM because nobody was around. The only thing is, I was sitting at my desk at 3:36 PM. So why don't I have my package? I don't even have an InfoNotice that should have been lurking in the lobby.
And this is not the first time this has happened. Phantom delivery attempts are a frequent occurence. This is the second package this year with a phantom delivery attempt.
In December, UPS managed to deliver my new kitchen faucet to somebody else somewhere else not even in my apartment building. The driver successfully retrieved it the next day. It had been opened, but I think all the parts were intact.
Even when they deliver packages, well... Vinnie always seemed to show up around the same time every workday. For your home office, maybe UPS will show up at 6:38 PM one day, and then at 12:16 PM the next. That makes it really easy to plan around waiting for a package.
They have this wonderful web site, and at least in the modern age many good businesses will send you the tracking # so you can watch UPS screw up in real time. But bottom line is this: if I'm sitting in my home office from 9AM in the morning to 6:30 at night, UPS should somehow manage to get a package to me. No 3:36 and nobody was home BS.
And as a general rule when I call their toll-free number, I just don't ever get the impression that they really give a hoot that they can't master the simple art of getting a package to me when I'm sitting around waiting for it.
In all fairness, the Post Office manages to screw up, but at least if something doesn't get to my PO Box I don't have to sit around from 10AM to 7PM waiting for it not to arrive like it should during this long delivery window. Fed Ex manages to screw up, but I feel as if they show just a little bit more love when you complain. And there are e-mails that disappear into cyberspace and spam filters. There's no foolproof way except maybe a phone call where you actually speak to someone to get information from here to there, and these days there's generation 200X that doesn't believe in using the telephone. But when I think about Vinnie swinging by the offices at 845 Third Ave., there's something particularly disillusioning about the fact that brown manages to do so danged little for me.
