Or, what I've observed from shopping online lately, among other things. :)
First of all, our local Fed Ex delivery-person smokes like a freight train. I've had three packages shipped FedEx lately, and they all reek of cigarette smoke. With the first package, I figured it could have happened anywhere along the line, but three stinky mailers seems to indicate that it's the delivery driver as the cause. Luckily the bubble mailers seal tightly enough that the things inside didn't pick up the odor.
Oh, and Freight Train is a practioner of the Knock & Run delivery method. Runs fast, too - still haven't caught sight of him/her, although I wasn't far from the door today. At least this one knocked. Whoever delivered our crib mattress didn't knock at all, just dropped it and ran.
HistoryShop.com (History & A&E's online store) has some odd shipping habits. I gave in to their 90% off Winter Sale last month and ordered 8 DVDs. Shipping was a grand total of $2.95. Those 8 DVDs will end up being shipped in 5 separate shipments - one is still on back order. One came UPS, the other 3 came FedEx, and the last one is still unknown. I think they may be losing money on this deal. They must get a pretty good bulk rate from Fed Ex, but still. I knew when I ordered that things were back ordered, and would have been happy to wait for one big box of fun.
More FedEx related tidbits: I do a bit of shopping on ShopGoodwill.com. The different stores ship by UPS, FedEx, whatever they choose individually. The things I've bought mostly came UPS, so far. I found some NASA publicity photos last week that I thought about bidding on, until I looked at the shipping charges. The auction was for 12 photos, all 8 x 10 or 11 x 14. The shipping was going to be $7.76, plus a $4 handling fee (that's right, total of almost $12), to send a flat less-than-one-pound envelope by FedEx. USPS would have taken it Priority for $6. Needless to say, I didn't bid. Neither did anyone else.
On to the Customer Service experience. I had issues with the customer service from First Alert last month (luckily, the CO alarm seems okay so far). Swingline has much better phone support, although their website "support" is crazy (and I found at least 3 typos on their site, all which spellcheck should have caught). To send an email to them, you have to have an account, which requires all sorts of information. I called their toll-free number instead. Five minutes, start to finish, and half of that was sitting on hold, being told that all reps were busy.
The reason for the call was our Swingline stapler, barely a year old. It decided recently to stop stapling. No reason, just because. It seems to be trying to shoot two staples at once, or possibly the glue that holds the staples together has gone bad. Not sure. The staples were Swingline Premium, and it was not a cheap stapler - we spent more money specifically to get one that would (should) last a while, after having issues with our last stapler. (Oddly, I think the other crappy stapler was also a Swingline, and the steady one was a cheapy, but I could be wrong.) Anyway, after trying staples from the bottom of the Premium box, and from an old box of Standards, and having no luck with their website, I called. Easy peasy. We should have our new stapler in 2-3 weeks. Gotta love a lifetime warranty and a simple replacement policy. Hopefully the new stapler works better. If not, we're going to have to find a different brand.
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