Amazon’s Ambition to Compete Directly with UPS and FedEx
wsj.com
wsj.com
I've had 2 bad experiences with Amazon orders, and USPS was to blame for both. They put the envelope/package in the wrong mailbox in the apartment complex I live in and marked it as delivered. I've received other people's mail in the past too...
Amazon's customer service has been exceptional, they send an overnight replacement with UPS and required a signature.
Recently, Amazon opened a pickup location near where I live, and I've been shipping more expensive items there. The pickup process takes less than 15 seconds. Literally, walk in, scan barcode, locker opens up, and I pickup my package.
Can't wait for Amazon to own the entire vertical and optimize the living shit out of it.
https://about.usps.com/strategic-planning/cs02/2f3.htm
It's a more modern version of the mechanical "watchclocks" installed in buildings to ensure that guards make their appointed rounds. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guard_tour_patrol_system https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watchclock
I have no idea how regularly USPS examines or audits their MSP data.
Working for USPS is not a comfortable place to be. USPS kind of got taken over by Amazon traffic, and it's been an adjustment.
Source: I recently had a package stolen from the usps pipeline and was told this by their investigators.
Definitely file a complain with amazon and provide the order number. They will lay down the hammer.
Lack of competition would raise the likelihood of eventual declines in service. Better for Amazon to put pressure on UPS to do a better job of running their business than to eliminate them all together.
why dont they send the first try with UPS, and the second with FedEx or someone else?
One time, I had a package coming via Amazon Logistics. It was marked as delivered but was not there. I asked for it to be sent via a different carrier but their customer service said they couldn't control that.
I guess nobody has built that feature yet. :(
Amazon says there is little they can do about it, except offer me a small credit on my account and file a complaint with their folks that handle the USPS relationship.
When the mailperson that delivers your mail currently gets fired by USPS and gets hired by Amazon - do you think much will change in that regard??
When you give bad shipping feedback, if the same person gets bad feedback multiple times, they get retrained and then fired.
These big shipping companies started out good, but with time things slid downhill. You don't start out with the goal of providing mediocre service.
The problem is if you want top employees, you have to pay top dollar. Amazon's shipping service company will probably start out good, but it may windup in a similar place once they start trying to "optimize" their shipping service.
They will cut cost, overwork existing employees, and try to extend the reach of their service. If they don't, you will be over-paying for "Amazon" services and many will look elsewhere when it comes down to paying an extra 5% or more for better service.
On the topic of feedback: You can provide feedback to shipping companies. I called FedEx and reported their driver for dropping 2 packages in a row (and damaging the contents). He came back 2 days later with the 3rd package, apologized, and read me back my report. You just have to be proactive and communicate with them.
Personally, I stopped shopping on Amazon after I returned to the US. I realized they had become the new Wal-Mart, and I haven't shopped there since 2009.
Otherwise packages come from all makes and models of cars over the last 6 months. Still pretty cool to get most things same day delivery cheaper than me driving to Fry's for a piece of hardware. I don't see how they make money though and compete in the long run after VC runs out.
So they magically transport you there in a second as well?
Anecdotes are anecdotes, sounds like your local UPS driver isn't very good at his job. I'm not sure Amazon can have much of an effect in this area. Delivery positions aren't glamorous high paying jobs that inspire people to care, and amazon doesn't have a reputation for inspiring employees either.
At least with FedEx and UPS you can talk to someone and sort things out. I recently dropped by the local FedEx warehouse to pick up a packet that was on its way to be returned because they'd miss me at home. Amazon Local? You can't even know what are their business hours.
I've had a UPS driver just slap a "missed you" note on the door, rather than actually deliver the item. I did complain to UPS, but it seemed like complaints were rare, nor did they seem to have a standardised system to address them.
It seems like the incentives, feedback loops etc aren't really present for the final part of the delivery. And it seems like neither UPS nor Fedex care, or care enough. Amazon could do a lot better in collecting the feedback, and then potentially do something about it.
The one package I've had delivered end to end by Amazon got stolen because they dropped it off without even bothering to ring our doorbell. (They replaced it for free though, so that's nice).
USPS and Fed-EX are horrible in my area. They often mark packages as "undeliverable as addressed" and I have to call and complain.
I had an Amazon rep stick up for this behavior recently. The rep said "well maybe you aren't on a GPS or perhaps you haven't labeled your house clearly enough or maybe your address is different than what you think it actually is (given roads get re-named over time)"
It's one thing to say "customs is expensive" - it's another to dump a massive fee on the recipient without even warning the vendor thst this is possible.
Are you our new spokesman?
My company orders through Amazon Prime almost daily, and we've never had an issue. And I'm certainly not in a metropolitan area.
>get angry customers complaining about $50 CODs
These people should learn about brokerage fees and do the leg work themselves if they don't want to pay those fees. You're obligated to do the paperwork when you import something. UPS will do it and charge you for it (albeit a bit expensively). If it's a problem, blame the seller.
>it's another to dump a massive fee on the recipient
Refuse the shipment.
Purolator was terrible, but the last time was during the whole Canada Post upheaval and they were swamped. It was "Out for Delivery" for about 5 days.
Canada Post is much like UPS in that it depends on who is making the delivery. I've had some excellent ones, some average ones, and others who just put up the sticker without contacting me.
Now here in SF USPS is great, except on my carrier's off day. The sub doesn't give a shit, delivering to the wrong address, throwing packages in the bushes, or just leaving packages behind for my normal carrier to deliver a day late.
You're gonna have problems with all carriers at some point. You're talking about a very labor intensive and time sensitive job. Someone's gonna get tired at the end of the day or need to meet unrealistic performance metrics. Shit happens.
What put USPS over the top for me though was the PO box. That affords me a semi-anonymous address and the ability to pick up packages at my convenience. If you get a box at the Lakeshore station they're even open on Sundays.
Only Amazon is reliably delivering(1) to my address. I have received parcel for somebody else, at a different flat number of a different building ( building have names here ) at a different street name and number, and different postcode ( postcode contains generally very few buildings, mine for example only contain my tiny block of 11 flats ).
I have 3 parcels that were lost in the last month. And I live in London, on a High Street, in a building that has existed since the 70's and is found precisely in literally every mapping application.
I can see why people paint Amazon as the evil empire bound on destroying everything it touches and I actually agree with it. But it is hard to ignore how incredibly reliable they are compared to basically everything else. I buy from Amazon even if they are more expensive, and often I don't buy stuff when they are not available there. The "Dispatched from and sold by Amazon." is worth paying for.
(1) Within the parcel shipping companies. I must say that Royal Mail is doing great at my address.
Everyone has their own experiences; I think the only thing that would work for everyone is choice of carrier on checkout.
DPD is the only one I've found entirely reliable across those three locations (two offices and my home; one of the offices some of the carriers insisted didn't exist, while DPD had no problems delivering to it), but from what I see they too get plenty of complaints in other locations.
It seems to vary hugely depending on which depots and drivers delivers to your address.
In every case it was one of the carriers who failed, not Amazon. USPS has been the absolute worst for me, followed by UPS, but all three of them (including FedEx) have had a noticeable increase in strange events like claiming to have attempted to deliver a package when I was home the entire time and am 100% positive nobody attempted to deliver anything. Who the best/worst is for anyone in particular probably varies based on the local staff of whatever carrier, but it seems like all of them have slipped quite a bit.
In this case does AC stand for air conditioner?
In my experience, usually on big shipments like air conditioners, FedEx and UPS prefer for you to pick it up at their warehouse. So if they made a mistake there, my guess is its a relatively recent policy change.
I spoke to my mailwoman the other day, and she told me USPS will be delivering the majority of the amazon prime packages. And what that told me is that the other companies are trying whatever they can to get that amazon order, even potentially guaranteeing delivery of 'AC's, when thats not something they would normally do.
For me UPS has been the weakest link in the otherwise marvelous Prime program.
Agents should be able to see a complete overview of delivery that day, in order of route, and consistent metrics taken to better the service over time. Staffing could get weekly info of inbound parcels for each route and determine staff levels needed as compared to now which is just fly by seat of your pants. Of course CanPost who I work for don't do any of this, don't talk to any employees and make all these decisions far away from the people who have to implement them. The routes they design are ridiculous and nobody follows the official version. It seems trivial to solve since it's just a plaintext database and updates, plus talking to the agents to average time values and build efficient routes but for whatever reasons they don't even try. The DbaaS startup I work for remotely is constantly asking me ways they can improve, nobody at CPC has ever done so.
I was surprised when Amazon delivery appeared on the streets and they were run just as poorly as us, assumed they would 'disrupt' delivery instead of carbon copying an already bad service with UPS/Post/DHL ect.
That's a feature that UPS My Choice and FedEx Delivery manager have had for a long time. UPS even lets me permanently divert all deliveries to my address to a nearby UPS store.
I know UPS has a few different modes of employment. Some guys supposedly lease their vans, and are kinda self-employed. I'm not sure.
I see my UPS driver still delivering packages at midnight.
I have never had much of a problem with UPS. I just hope they arn't taking advantage of their employees.
I have thought about making a better, smarter, bigger mailbox. A mailbox that would be more secure. I don't want to give away details, but would what do you guys think?
Say if you could buy a mailbox that would scan your mail, and alert you you through an email? A larger mailbox you could lock remotely after recept of a important delivery. Or, is it a bad idea?
I've never had a problem with shipping insurance, or a company replacing an item that was stolen. I have never had a problem with stolen mail, but it's a problem in certain areas. I'm just throwing it out there, is it a bad idea.
Mansions here with people who run some kind of home finance business getting dozens of cheques a day and gigantic amounts of legal docs have special boxes that lock once you close the lid, so they leave the lid open and once closed it's self locking. Can't remember who makes them.
Combo lock you can securely change remotely would be good for airbnb rentals or self service po boxes, like German packstations.
Like this? http://www.steelmailbox.com/html/dvault.html
> Say if you could buy a mailbox that would scan your mail, and alert you you through an email? A larger mailbox you could lock remotely after recept of a important delivery.
All that technology-stuff seems like extra complexity for little value. Why lock it remotely when you could design it with a one-way door and regular key lock and have it locked all the time? What use are the email notifications/scans of the outside of the items if you can't do anything until you're at home anyway? There might be a small amount of benefit to being notified if the mailbox has items in it to retrieve, but I'm not sure if it's enough to justify the cost and complexity of the feature.
Don't feel too bad for them. Drivers are the most desired position. When I worked there guys were waiting 10-15 years to make it to a driver.
They bid on routes, based on seniority. Some bid on late routes (i.e. boxes where the last pickup is 7:30pm, etc.) on purpose as anything over 8 hours was time-and-a-half. Back around '00 they started at $50k for drivers, so it adds up.
I think the article fails to cover a lot of areas where Amazon will have a competitive advantage over UPS and Fedex. First of all, Amazon will be vertically integrated. They can control the packaging. They can control which warehouses are used to store items. This could lead to better packing efficiency in delivery vehicles, and could make automated loading of vehicles easier. If you have a particular route that is usually 110% full or 40% full, you could either move more items to that warehouse or take some away. Plus, Amazon can incentivize cheaper shipping options dynamically. Will the marginal cost of this order be incredibly high because you'll need a second truck for a particular route? Discount one day shipping, or offer two day shipping to their work instead.
On top of all that, Amazon doesn't have unionized employees. That's a huge advantage when you are trying to reduce costs. Not only are their employees wages probably less, but they also don't have contracts that reduce planning ability, like fixed routes, etc.
(The above is my comment on this post yesterday, though the post failed to get traction. I think it's probably still relevant 24 hours later)
There's no realistic way to reduce costs being non-union shop in what is traditionally a unionized business. Either the shop will organize on its own or you run the shop to union standards in an effort to stave off organization.
This is even assuming that Amazon directly employs their delivery drivers. I know Google delivery uses contract drivers in Chicago. I wouldn't be surprised if Amazon has a similar set up in some places. It's pretty hard to organize when you are the driver.
Regardless, Amazon will fight tooth-and-nail to prevent unions from forming. They've successfully done so at their warehouses, and I don't see why deliveries would be any different. See this article by the NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/17/technology/amazon-proves-i...
> unskilled
http://www.alpa.org/about-alpa/what-we-do
> necessary
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2015/01/15/415m-settlement-...
Additionally, Walmart actively discourages unionization via propaganda during training and outright threats. If Reddit is to be believed, closing an entire outlet is not too big a price to stave off the specter of unionization.
Less of a deal for cities, but some of the small towns I drive through for work don't seem to have any other employment than trades/Walmart/service/trucking/maybe "the local plant".
What kind of world are we creating for small towns when 2.5 of those disappear in the next few decades?
The Caves of Steel series sees all of terrestrial humanity living in huge hives, for example, with only robots outside of those, doing all the farming and mining.
The price for a house with land and forest can be as little as 1/100-th the price of a house in Germany so not uncommon that they buy more than one, restorate it and invite the kids/grandkids too :-)
The postal service works pretty well, we have had a few incidents while living in a bigger city where packages was marked for delivery failed, not home while being home the whole day. But those got sorted out after a phonecall and haven't had them since. Apparently all the delivery companies hires the same local people to do the actual deliveries so you don't get around the problem by switching company.
Can you please share prices ?
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/wal-mart-to-shut-down-meat-...
If you think of WalMart as the replacement for Sears, then Sears was at least partially union... or something.
Not that the speed in any way sours my opinion of unions. I'd burn out working under Fedex-like conditions.
This was true in the past, but FedEx and UPS are practically identical in their service offerings for the last 15 years.
Now that I'm in a house, I much prefer USPS if only because my post man comes by at 9am and UPS/FedEx don't come by until 2-3pm.
But the USPS also contracts with UPS and Fedex for backhaul capacity. It's not unusual for a UPS truck to pull up to a Post Office and drop off a bunch of mail, which is then delivered to the address by the postal carrier.
1) Say this is not news but PR. Congrats to Carney.
2) Expect actual technology to lag behind the vision communicated by 3+ years while the dev teams try to find remotely suitable heuristics for the NP-SweetMotherOfGod problems that the executives think are just a matter of throwing enough servers at. Several entire orgs will be eliminated or repurposed while this happens.
3) Expect costs to be an order of magnitude higher than the competition for a good 3-5 years due to really stupid and trivially fixable mistakes/inanities that are obvious to anybody on the ground floor. These inanities will eventually be addressed by some level 4 or level 5 analyst that will eventually (but not today) get fired for pointing out the wrong person's mistakes...or worse, endlessly moved around orgs with no advancement potential.
4) Expect it to be rolled out to countless cities mindlessly by some executive that thinks they can predict results for Kansas City based on actuals from New York City. These program rollouts will eventually extremely costly and will be neutered to mean nothing, delicately handling the PR hits as they come in, while the program will still exist on the record. The programs will never be shut down.
5) Expect it will eventually (5-10 years out) become cost-neutral, but never profitable. Right as this happens, some other crazy idea will be announced, pushing everybody back in the red.
Rinse and repeat.
but [Amazon] may cancel the CMI deal with just 180 days’ notice merely for the sake of “convenience”, which can be implemented from January 1, 2018.
CMI is (air)crew, maintenance and insurance and they then combine that with a dry-lease of the airframes from an Atlas subsidiary.
http://theloadstar.co.uk/atlas-air-shareholders-approve-amaz...
So it looks as if 2017 will be the proving-year for Amazon to determine whether they want to take the plunge into self-managed logistics, and they have an escape clause if not.
I'm currently waiting for a package "guaranteed" before midday. I've had a couple of emails since then, the last pushing it back to "before 9pm". It's 9.25 now.
They've delivered stuff to the wrong place. They've said they knocked and nobody answered (I work from home, wife is on maternity).
And their vans are rentals.
All in all it feels unprofessional. It makes me questions not only the value of Prime but Amazon as a whole. I've started shopping around a lot more.
That said, I'm not sure they are worse than USPS and UPS, both of whom have left packages outside in the rain in the middle of the driveway without ringing the bell.
I guess it's always down to the driver. On average, they won't be better or worse than UPS/Royal Mail/Interlink...
But ultimately this is a loss for the everyday worker. The loss of the unions means the standard of living will fall for those that work in the delivery business. Walmart has always been seen as the enemy because of their never ending fight to lower prices which means lower salaries for their workers. I think Amazon is done a good job in not only lowering workers pay but destroying jobs. Why has Amazon escaped the same criticism? Not only that, but they are admired by many as the future of doing business and in effect employee treatment. What gives?
I'd suggest that this would remove the profit-producing deliveries for UPS/FedEx and leave them with those that they do at a loss.
It also explains the code name: "Consume the City"
For the USPS, they have to provide a bunch of flat rate services to everyone in the country. Amazon doesn't. All of their shipping innovations are going to be aimed at making it cheaper and easier for people in denser areas to get deliveries. I don't have an issue with this, because if people live far from civilization, they don't get to demand all of the latest parts of it, but it is something to keep in mind with all of this.
And if Amazon can peel off the cheapest customers from UPS and FedEx, that's going to raise the rates for all of the remaining UPS and FedEx customers.
I remember seeing an analysis of price and delivery quality: Royal Mail: 100% price, 85% happy delivery Other Courier: 66% price, 66% happy delivery
Without going down the rabit hole of the wages these different workers were earning, as a consumer had a choice: subsidize cheaper shipping to the whole country, or get cheaper shipping.
Or the equivalent: "we see the writing on the wall, so we're going to charge you an arm and a leg for each harder delivery, to make the most money before you handle those deliveries on your own too."
Taking some of the deliveries allows Amazon to threaten to take more (or all) of them and pressures UPS and FedEx into keeping down the rates they charge Amazon.
I would shop from Amazon again if I could choose to have something delivered by Royal Mail as then I know it would get to my door.
Amazon did the whole "left with neighbour" thing... but my neighbours are drug dealers and their clients come and go all the time... the packages never turned up and I'm hardly going to go confront the neighbours about it.
I shopped there for convenience, to reduce hassle, and their delivery service increased hassle.
For Amazon they need to find a means of setting humane targets and then finding a way to accurately measure performance of staff...
> For Amazon they need to find a means of setting humane targets and then finding a way to accurately measure performance of staff...
Yeah, my suspicion is that this is the root cause of my troubles with them. I live in an apartment building, but I have a street-accessible front door, so I have a sign clearly saying to leave packages with the apartment manager in the office. Half the time they just dump the packages at my door anyway, the other half of the time they just dump them at the office's street-accessible door, because they got there when it was closed.
I don't know what's so hard about noting a delivery exception and attempting again the next day. All the other carriers seem to be able to handle that. A few of the drivers have called me for instructions, but it's kind of pointless: the next day's driver is just going ignore all the instructions and dump the package anyway.
It wouldn't be so bad if I could have all Amazon Delivery packages redirected to one of their nearby drop boxes, like I do with UPS. The problem is if I set things up to use an Amazon drop box, ALL my stuff will go there, not just the Amazon delivery orders, and they don't support 2-day shipping. I still want the USPS orders to go to my mailbox, since that's the most convenient option.
They really need to allow users to enter shipping preferences, since not all carriers are the same for everyone. For me USPS and UPS are the best, Fedex and Amazon Logistics are the worst.
I live in a safe neighborhood, the door and the number are easy to see from the street, so the delivery person should waste no time locating the place. I never had issues with Amazon.
Seems like they're pushing the system a bit too far.
Nordic socialist consumer protection laws are nice :)
The system is by no means perfect but I like that it dictates very clearly who is responsible for what/when.
And as pointed out by Symbiote most companies have a way to give them power of attorney to deliver the package without someone signing it.
> Nordic socialist consumer protection laws are nice :)
Errr... so a law that I couldn't have a package left on my protected porch I've never had an issue with or with my neighbors with whom I'm friendly, even if I want to, is "nice"? No thanks.
"Your DHL Express shipment #### from #### is expected to be delivered to you today between 9-20. If you are not at home, you can give DHL power of attorney to deliver the shipment to your address without signature. Reply PROXY and specify location"
Though I actually used their other option, which was to have it delivered to the collection boxes in the nearby supermarket.
I've had other deliveries left with my neighbour, but most seem to end up at the post office.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeI...
If you're living in a bad area, Royal Mail will lose your mail as well.
Things that don't fit, Royal Mail will take to the concierge in the next building over (Amazon almost never does this).
Before, my problems were generally when USPS was making a Sunday delivery. They'd often leave the package outside the entrance to my apartment building - otherwise known as "the public sidewalk".
The last few weeks, most of my packages were handled (well, mishandled, to be more accurate) by Amazon's delivery service. I finally cancelled the two remaining orders that were somewhere in transit, and cancelled the auto-renew for my Prime account.
Now, I order directly from shops, and might get a Costco membership for bulk items.
I'm having the opposite problem (UK also), my amazon deliveries are fine but roughly 50% of my royal mail post is going missing (bank statements, credit cards, gig tickets). Multiple complaints, nothing has improved.
Sample size of 1 says very little. My big complaint about amazon deliveries is the silly 8-8 time slot they allocate. Who on earth spends 12 hours in one place every day?
EDIT: Nice downvotes. Someone complains he has a drug dealer for a neighbour and that's amazon's fault and somehow that's my fault?
They're far and above better than Fedex / UPS and never throw the packages over my gate into my flowerbeds.
I've had Amazon Logistics carriers: Be unable to find my door (it's a non-gated, outward facing door in a row-style townhome with street access). Leave things at an _entirely different_ residential complex, whose address matched neither my street name nor number. They've done this twice, and not even at the same wrong complex (the hint is it said "left at reception", and we don't have a reception area). Try to pressure me into letting them just leave something on the sidewalk outside a gated apartment ("would that be safe?").
I'm a Prime addict and I feel like my dealer just started cutting the supply. At least let Prime members opt-out of Amazon Logistics (hell, I'd pay extra in my annual fee to do so).
Not sure that I've ever had a package delivered by Amazon, but if I did there weren't any problems. That UPS incident is my only personal shipping issue in years.
Just like you mentioned, it was really bad at first. Packages would routinely arrive late, wrong address, etc. I live in a gated apartment complex and they would always leave the package with the leasing office instead of using the code I provided (UPS, FedEx, would always leave at my door).
Now it is indistinguishable from other carriers, in that all my packages arrive on time, at my door, without any problems.
The only thing I don't like is PrimeNow, which uses 'part time' carriers like Postmates, and they ALWAYS get confused by my apartment complex - so I stopped using it.
UberEats on the other hand can never find my house as their routing sends them down an alley that has no street numbers.
I wish I could say the same. I get calls from UPS delivery guys/gals about 30% of the time because I live in a duplex and my unit faces the alley. So they come in through the main street, can't find "Unit B" and end up calling me. I have to explain to them that they have to enter through the gate on the side.
This one time they left the package in front of the mailboxes, out in the open. When I got home, the entire box was soaking wet from the rain. Gross.
The first ones were terrible. They seemed to have no good fallback if the building's gate was locked and nobody was available to buzz them in, and stuff just got lost. They were customer focused, yes, but that just meant they shipped me free replacement stuff with free overnight non-Amazon shipping. Not the best experience overall, though, compared to getting it on the original date.
Fast forward to 2016 and they're pretty good here. Though USPS has been best for my building (and elsewhere people here are talking about USPS being the worst - again, it's a hard problem to solve for every area for everyone).
* Package marked as delivered on Saturday. Package actually delivered on Sunday.
* Package not delivered because there was no safe place to leave it (there's a sign next to the front door with instructions do leave it in the complex's leasing office across the street).
* Package delivered to my door, despite my door being behind multiple card-access doors.
* Package left at the door to the leasing office, even though the leasing office was open and the lights were on.
These have all happened in the past three months. I'm borderline ready to cancel Prime.
At least Amazon is more than willing to work with you to figure out how they can make your experience more palatable.
UPS in the USA do [2]
[1] http://www.royalmail.com/personal/uk-delivery/special-delive...
[2] https://www.ups.com/content/us/en/shipping/time/service/next...
If you can void your guarantee based on "forces outside your control" in something like shipping, where you're at the mercy of traffic, weather conditions, and human error, it's not really a guarantee.
The UK is a substantially easier country to ship in logistically than the US. I don't doubt that Royal Mail's guaranteed delivery works.
They also deliver on Sundays and they call me since my apartment building's package room is closed on Sundays.
I haven't had that near as much in town, but USPS is my absolute last choice in the space.
I complained to the postmaster multiple times. Although, as a typical gov. employee, he just laughed and said we do what we want, it is your neighborhoods problem. Eventually the whole neighborhood got together and made some changes happen. It is still not perfect, but better.
I've had a lot less issues with UPS than I've had with the Amazon delievery service.
Are you sure about that?
It sounds like you bought from an arbitrager: someone who's just a middleman, posts something for sale which they don't even have, but at a higher price than some retailer that does. Then, when you buy it, they go buy the thing (on Amazon in this case), use your address as the delivery address, and then pocket the difference. It's extremely common on Ebay and Amazon both, and many other places.
Since I couldn't guarantee what carrier would be used, I eventually had to use Amazon Locker only. I live in a house now and no longer have this problem.
Last week I paid extra to have two packages delivered by Monday. On Monday the expected delivery date had changed to Tuesday; on Tuesday, it was Wednesday; on Wednesday, Thursday; and on Thursday, my packages finally arrived. As far as I can tell Amazon has kept the fees I paid despite failing to hold up their end of the bargain.
It was my package, they were the Amazon courier and couldn't figure out how to open my front gate.
It was bizarre.
I had to put a sign on my mailbox asking delivery people to toss the package over the fence and into my yard if I'm not home. This is basic common sense in a big city. Sadly, its sometimes ignored. I now just deal with work delivery which means a good chance of a package getting lost in 30 floor skyscraper I work in. Its incredible how shitty package delivery is in general.
Some neighborhood are fortunate to have great responsible delivery worker/driver who actually cares about delivering packages safe and sound; but to many of them though, it's just a job.
I get a month extra Prime each time, but I likely won't be renewing when it runs out.
If you look at the "Ground Control" infographic in the article, a significant portion of logistics is in the linehaul network: tractors + 53' trailers full of thousands of packages. At the end of the day you don't really know if Amazon, Fedex, or USPS handled these shipments, all you see is the guy who shows up to your door. I imagine there is the potential for huge savings to have Amazon vertically integrate this.
Sure, personalized delivery to your doorstep is a tough problem to solve. But delivery of thousands of packages between point A and B? Not as tough.
Maybe it’s the state you live in? They have never given anything to my neighbours when no one was at home during delivery, they always tried next day, call or leave a form to schedule next delivery time so someone DOES receive the package.
Going to the distribution center to pick up the package typically entails a 30-45 minute wait. They require both an ID and proof of residence (e.g. electric bill) if the address on your ID doesn't match the delivery address - and of course nobody in line knows about this so you end up spending that 30-45 minutes with a crowd of angry people who can't even pick up their packages.
The security and peace of mind is well worth the cost. There are very few packages I need the minute they're delivered.
Edit: saw your response, fair enough.
> I'm really sorry about the problems you've had with the last few shipments. Unfortunately, there is no way to request a specific shipper for your Amazon orders.
but there's no reason to be alarmed. Amazon really isn't as big as they look. Revenue last year: $107B
Compare that to other things: About 1/5th of Walmart. 2/3rds of CVS. 10% less than Costco. 1/3rd more than Target. 15% more than Home Depot. Sure they're #1 in ecommerce, but ecommerce is only 16% of retail sales in the US.
There are actually quite a few companies the size of Amazon. And many of those companies are actually more profitable than Amazon too.
[1] http://www.channeladvisor.com/blog/?pn=scot/deep-dive-into-a...
Nothing new. Blockbuster killed small video rentals, Barnes and Noble killed small bookstores, Walgreens/CVS killed small drug stores, and WalMart killed a number of store types.
To be honest, my experience is rather the other way around... I expect Amazon to have the stuff my local shops don't.
Or that the companies who provide better/faster/cheaper not to grow large on providing what the people want at the prices they want to pay?
Which Amazon has been spammed by chinese dropshippers.
> cheapest prices
Not always. Depends what you're looking for.
I find that smaller unique shops still have a huge edge, it's just the medium to large shops that are losing. I still would rather a world with lots of small people making good money selling unique goods via post/internet then a huge segment of the population just punching the clock at minimum wage.
I had a roommate in college from London who pointed out that Americans tend to add "-ation" onto words where it isn't necessary or doesn't further elaborate the meaning (e.g. transportation where transport is sufficient). I haven't been able to un-notice our rather pointless addition of letters to nouns. What is wrong with Sort Center or Sorting Center?
I did, before writing this post, find "sortation" in some unabridged dictionaries referring to a mechanized or automated sorting process, but the word still just sounds off to me...
My own bias is certainly towards brevity in most cases where context gives a clear meaning. I should clarify that -ation seems unnecessary where the noun it extends: (a) already describes a process. (b) is in common use describing a process.
The suffix seems more useful where it explicitly turns a verb into a noun where there was no suitable noun in common use, or where any existing nouns derived from the same root do not refer to a process. This is the ignored distinction my roommate's offhand comment likely implied.
The problem appears to be that American English simply no longer sticks to the formal meaning added by the suffix. Reserve/reservation and preserve/preservation are used interchangeably to refer to large plots of land left to nature. But making a reservation at a hotel is the process of reserving a room.
I guess this ambiguity is what we get for speaking a language without central authority. I'll take it over ivory tower language academies decrying use of "le weekend..." ;)
Plus anything is better than the rag tag set of local shippers they use for same/next day orders (or 2-day orders that were late getting out). I'm not going to name and shame, but I've had bad experiences with all of the non-majors (i.e. not UPS, FedEX, USPS) they use from coast to coast.
If they can't do it better/cheaper then the reason to do it is because UPS or Fedex are rent-seeking, and doing it themselves would bring Amazon's cost close to the actual cost of delivering
Amazon Fresh (groceries, which UPS/Fedex cannot do)
1 hour delivery (which UPS/Fedex cannot do without keeping their fleet at Amazon's warehouses)
Restaurant delivery
etc
The point is to capture the means of delivery so they can become the carrier for parcels/food/whatever. Uber is trying to do this too. As is Postmates. UPS/Fedex have the issue that they are very good for bulk travel, but weak at last mile (it works for them now because of the volume they do, but the best they can reasonably do is next-day).
Amazon only has to move things between their warehouses and consumers. 99% of pickups are at their warehouses. Hell if they use UPS/FedEx for returns then it's 100%.
One word: Teamsters.
UPS drivers are Teamsters. Which means they have good paying jobs with pensions and fringe benefits.
All Amazon has to do to be cheaper is to hire no-benefit minimum wage part-timers. Or even better, just use independent contractors. It's the Uberization of package delivery!
It will be far cheaper, but it won't be better.
Fedex never really got Fedex Ground right.
And don't get me started on why they have to use 16 digit package tracking numbers that start with '1Z'. WTF?
Amazon is looking at hitting the low hanging fruit first. Where they can ship large amounts of times from point A to point B then have USPS or their own carriers deliver. They're not trying to compete with UPS or FedEx today. Maybe some day in the future but that's years off at best.
If they can do their own shipping for certain items to certain locations (especially if they need to move an item to another state before having UPS / FedEx / USPS ship it) they can likely save some money.
They could choose to offer parcel shipping services to any retailer as part of the Amazon Marketplace Web Services API, just as they currently offer the Multi-Channel Fulfillment API[1], which allows a retailer to fulfill orders from any sales channel using the Fulfillment by Amazon network.
[1] http://docs.developer.amazonservices.com/en_US/fba_outbound/...
E.g 'just left your parcel on the side of the porch, behind the tree, no one was home'. Or requesting them to do that if you're not home. With the other issues of wrong deliveries and the like Amazon is just as likely to get it wrong.
If large companies like Amazon would threaten or effectively start to handle their own logistics, it just might force the market to open up a bit more.
It's not necessary to replace UPS or FedEx, just the parts that cost Amazon the most money and are easily replaceable.
The real lesson here is that Amazon's SLA should have given them the positioning data it takes to catch ups in a lie like this. I should not have had to pursue it. Amazon should have been penalizing then by an amount that stings AND having the driver out late.
Also don't forget that UPS is a union ship, with very expensive union contracts. The UPS is the largest individual employer in the Teamsters Union.
https://teamster.org/upsupsf-contract-updates/ups-agreements...
I don't know that last mile out to smaller areas will ever be worth it for Amazon.
By contrast I've never had an issue with FedEx or UPS (USPS is bad, and so is onTrac).
I have had problems with Fedex delivering for Amazon and with Same Day Service in Manhattan twice.
Amazon also has these pickup boxes in the local drug store -- they do think of things.
A lot of the stores seem to run out of items in NYC and I'm hoping Amazon would run the warehouses/logistics for these stores chains (e.g., CVS, Duane Reed).
RE: USPS. I don't like it when they delivery last mile.
http://www.sidehustlenation.com/amazon-fba-clearance-arbitra...
Right now I have a new type of problem:
I have waited for a package (in Romania) for a month, which the German DHL won't deliver. I have contacted the seller every week.
Amazon has some "must answer in 3 days" rule for sellers -- but seems to accept auto answering emails as an answer! My claim was cancelled because the sellers promised to deliver, now nothing happens when I complain.
(DHL has delivered to me before, worked great. And I work from home these weeks.)
It is just ridiculous.
This seems to be some criminal that found a hole in the Amazon state machine for orders/sellers/delivery/returns/cancels/etc: Send empty packages with bad addresses and never deliver, after 3 months the sale times out.
The only problem is that every time this happens, Amazon lose an old customer.
Why would FedEx ups change when it makes a pile now. I recall hearing how letters would never be sorted automatically.
It will take an outsider like Zon to get to the future.