Time to replace the humans in the logistics chain with robots.
Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
131–140 of 245 posts
Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
It happened to me. A TV intended for someone else ended up at my front door, and I had to chase the delivery guy down. Not even the correct street. It was shipped from Walmart, no signature required.
You did the right thing morally. Legally you had no such obligation. https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/0181-unordered-merchan...
The law does not declare misdelivered merchandise to be a "free gift" like unordered merchandise.
In fact, the code states: "Whoever, without authority, opens, or destroys any mail or package of newspapers not directed to him, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both." 18 USC 1703
Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#133It seems like people who are responsible don't care anymore. Maybe it's the wages, the pressure or whatever. It looks like it's about time to replace even more humans from the equation.
The wage for a UPS driver is somewhere around $11 an hour, with seasonal temporary help making less. Most of them are part time drivers, so they have to work a second job to make ends meet. Surprisingly, if you pay people crap and force them to look for new employment while working for you due to low wages, no hours, and poor advancement opportunities, you tend to get bad service. And if you rely on seasonal temps yo…
Their pay is what it is because of economics. And they will get replaced if they keep up with the poor service, because of economics. The worse your service, the easier it is for a robot to replace you. It's not possible for a individual, a corporation or even a government to go against economical forces.
Then again, don't get me wrong, I do think that the government needs to do more wealth redistribution.
Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#134Genius idea. Similar idea applies for iPhone's anonymous shipping packaging and plain envelope for credit cards -> reduce theft.
Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
They are pretty well paid, but it's probably not the drivers doing the damage. Drivers don't load their trucks.
That's definitely true. The trucks are loaded in the early AM, so the drivers can hit the road ASAP. Does make me wonder what surveillance systems are in place in the warehouse and loading areas? Or if that would even make a difference? I have no idea, never worked in a warehouse.
Quite likely they get damaged even before that, while they are on semi trucks (feeders). Assuming that loaders don't realize these are vulnerable to crush damage, they could get stacked on top of each other at the bottom of a loaded semi with moderately heavy stuff on top. Judging from boxed bikes I've seen, there is minimal or no padding, so this could easily result in damage. Not sure if it's official UPS policy, but it's much less likely for a presumably-expensive TV to end up stacked like that.
Surveillance - that's what supervisors are for. Really though, you have 800-1000 packages to load into 3-4 cars over 3-5 hours. When you have 20 of these bikes arrive on the conveyor belt in a 30 minute window and nowhere to put them (since it's hours from shift end and you can't put them in the delivery truck yet), they get dealt with fast and not so gently. That could easily mean a 3-4 ft drop onto concrete, and a supervisor would be unlikely to care since they know the pressure to go fast. The official policy is "hand to surface" for every package, but in reality you have to work at a pace where this is impractical - so it's ignored apart from egregious abuse of packages.
edit: as for discussion elsewhere here about proper packaging, here's FedEx guidelines/testing: http://www.fedex.com/us/services/pdf/PKG_Testing_Under150Lbs...
Some of the criteria, such as dropping the package 10x from a 30" height, might seem absurd if you haven't seen how the sausage is made. It really isn't.
Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#136Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#137I wonder what sort of damage these bikes are receiving, because they're designed to be ridden by a person... a TV is definitely far more fragile.
Carbon fiber frames can be surprisingly fragile, especially when subjected to forces they weren't specifically designed to withstand, such as being crushed inwards from the sides. Vanmoof (the company in the article) seems to specialize in aluminum commuter bikes though, which should be reasonably robust. Aluminum is a wee bit brittle, but it's a lot more burly than carbon fiber. As such, I suspect the frames aren't…
All of this is me hypothesizing, so take it with a grain of salt: the widest part of the frame is probably the rear half. When mounted, a bike wheel helps keep the rear "fork" spread properly, but if you were to drop an aluminum frame without the wheel there, it would easily bend.
Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
You did the right thing morally. Legally you had no such obligation. https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/0181-unordered-merchan...
The law does not declare misdelivered merchandise to be a "free gift" like unordered merchandise. In fact, the code states: "Whoever, without authority, opens, or destroys any mail or package of newspapers not directed to him, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both." 18 USC 1703
Does this apply only to USPS deliveries, or are private shippers like UPS, FedEx, etc. included?
Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#139It seems like people who are responsible don't care anymore. Maybe it's the wages, the pressure or whatever. It looks like it's about time to replace even more humans from the equation.
It's also a whole attitude. I live in Japan now, and the wages here are just as shit and the pressure is if anything worse, but the service from the delivery companies is absolutely amazing.
Re: Bike manufacturer sees huge reduction in delivery damage by printing TV on box
#140It seems like people who are responsible don't care anymore. Maybe it's the wages, the pressure or whatever. It looks like it's about time to replace even more humans from the equation.
A couple of years ago I shot footage of two UPS trucks exchange packages in my parking lot. They were tossing them out into a great heap on the ground, then going through them and tossing them back into the trucks. It was something like the day before Christmas, so I hope no one was expecting to have a fragile gift arrive intact. I suppose UPS is fine dong this, I think they say you should pack to survive a six foot drop, but it does give you second thoughts about shipping anything fragile, and I always assumed the six foot drops would be accidents.