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FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

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Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#71

Post by moduspol »

jordanb wrote: post #49
godzillabrennus wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fully support upward mobility but it's a tough argument to make that it was culturally good for an organization to promote people in part because of seniority. Kodak is dead. In no small part because they lost their ability innovate.

I think it's kinda interesting that the HN takeaway is that Eastman was killed by its unions: if it had just treated its employees as disposable it'd still be the juggernaut today that it was in the 20th century. In fact our economy is littered with the detritus of collapsed or dying technology giants. To name just a few there's SGI, Sun, Thinking Machines, DEC and Yahoo. With the possible exception of DEC none of th…

> I think it's kinda interesting that the HN takeaway is that Eastman was killed by its unions: if it had just treated its employees as disposable it'd still be the juggernaut today that it was in the 20th century.

Is it possible the employees could be treated reasonably well without the unions? Is it possible that unions have downsides that might affect a company's health?

If either of those are true, it doesn't seem fair to frame "the HN takeaway" like this.

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#72

Post by adekok »

alexibm wrote: post #53
exabrial wrote: post #40

UPS: smash it to bits, hold it in the warehouse as long as possible, fake delivery attempts, all for higher prices

I work for UPS as a developer and responsible for software that manages/tracks actual deliveries and delivery window. Can you provide some information about fake delivery attempts ? I will personally make sure that if there were "fake" deliveries, you will get a refund and who ever "faked" is punished.

The typical complaint is that you're at home, waiting for a package. You check the tracking all day "on the truck". Then at one point, it says "no one home".

Uh... I've been at fucking home all day.

Or worse, see the truck drive by your house, followed by the tracking updated to "no one home".

That's a fake delivery attempt.

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#73

Post by bluedino »

godzillabrennus wrote: post #20
clumsysmurf wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of a story posted here not long ago "To Understand Rising Inequality, Consider the Janitors at Two Top Companies, Then and Now" https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/03/upshot/to-understand-risi... HN Comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15161445

I fully support upward mobility but it's a tough argument to make that it was culturally good for an organization to promote people in part because of seniority. Kodak is dead. In no small part because they lost their ability innovate.

At a company like Google or Apple, janitors are all employees of contractors. They aren't regular employees like Kodak. Also, no Google or Apple janitor will become a high-level, respected employee at Google or Apple through promotion.

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#74

Post by bluedino »

jordanb wrote: post #49
godzillabrennus wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fully support upward mobility but it's a tough argument to make that it was culturally good for an organization to promote people in part because of seniority. Kodak is dead. In no small part because they lost their ability innovate.

I think it's kinda interesting that the HN takeaway is that Eastman was killed by its unions: if it had just treated its employees as disposable it'd still be the juggernaut today that it was in the 20th century. In fact our economy is littered with the detritus of collapsed or dying technology giants. To name just a few there's SGI, Sun, Thinking Machines, DEC and Yahoo. With the possible exception of DEC none of th…

Can you really call Zynga a 'giant' after talking about DEC? That's a 140,000 person company and a 2,000 one

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#75

Post by bluedino »

cypherpunks01 wrote: post #3

Anyone know if the employment situation with Fedex or UPS is different now, 13 years after this was written?

I'd like to know more about the back-end, not just the drivers.

What about the salaries and benefits in the offices, sorting facilities, etc?

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#76

Post by 628C6l0 »

kylec wrote: post #22

I know it's anecdata, but in my experience UPS is way better about actually delivering packages to me than FedEx is. I live in a building with a call box, to which both FedEx and UPS were given their own codes, but most of the time FedEx "attempts" a delivery they mark it as undeliverable. It's gotten to the point where I'm now preemptively requesting my FedEx-shipped packages to be held at a local FedEx ship & print…

With me it's gotten to a point where I will pay for FedEx 2nd day air just to avoid FedEx Ground. My worst experience is this

https://www.fedex.com/apps/fedextrack/?tracknumbers=01384025...

It took ten days (counting from the 1st delivery attempt), and as far as I can tell five separate delivery exceptions (with the same address that I've used for any other delivery service, including FedEx 2nd day air), for them to finally deliver it. And guess what happened when I finally opened the package? The phone that is supposed to be in the package is gone (this is a pixel XL phone ordered from Google Store; fortunately Google is very responsible with this and in fact when I explained the situation to them they immediately acknowledged it to be a problem they are aware of)

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#77

Post by bmelton »

kalleboo wrote: post #47
godzillabrennus wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fully support upward mobility but it's a tough argument to make that it was culturally good for an organization to promote people in part because of seniority. Kodak is dead. In no small part because they lost their ability innovate.

Yet Fujifilm survived while seniority-itis is stronger at Japanese companies than anywhere else

Fujifilm had enough product diversity (in medical films, recording media, and digital, to name but a few) to survive the film camera downturn.

Kodak didn't.

They did try to innovate in their space, which they thought was camera tech, but their only real competency was in making film, and their only real focus was in making film cameras (despite some early forays into digital photography).

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#78

Post by RightMillennial »

bluedino wrote: post #75
cypherpunks01 wrote: post #3

Anyone know if the employment situation with Fedex or UPS is different now, 13 years after this was written?

I'd like to know more about the back-end, not just the drivers. What about the salaries and benefits in the offices, sorting facilities, etc?

Back in 2009 I worked part-time at the early morning shift loading UPS's brown delivery trucks. I made above minimum wage with no option of overtime yielding ~12k/year. They had an education credit of 1.5k/semester provided you were a full-time student (12+ credits/semester). I don't remember about the health insurance because I was under my parents'. At that time there was a 10 year wait queue for full-time employment because it's primarily seniority based. And the Teamsters union initiation dues suck your first month of pay.

Oh, make sure to properly pad your fragile packages because they may or may not be pushed, shoved, flipped, thrown, or dropped depending on how busy it is.

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#79

Post by RightMillennial »

ribs wrote: post #6

UPS has spent significant effort trying to put the Federal screws to FedEx in the past.[1] [1] http://reason.com/reasontv/2010/10/22/whiteboard http://reason.com/archives/2009/09/28/using-unions-as-weapon...

I remember sometime in 2009 the managers at UPS gave some talk about FedEx misclassifying their employees and it was unfair, and they encouraged us to write some letter or sign some petition (I don't remember the exact details). While it was likely true, it seemed shady to me to get employees/union members involved in a business spat.

Re: FedEx vs. UPS: opposing models in the delivery business raise questions (2004)

#80

Post by [deleted] »

adekok wrote: post #72
alexibm wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work for UPS as a developer and responsible for software that manages/tracks actual deliveries and delivery window. Can you provide some information about fake delivery attempts ? I will personally make sure that if there were "fake" deliveries, you will get a refund and who ever "faked" is punished.

The typical complaint is that you're at home, waiting for a package. You check the tracking all day "on the truck". Then at one point, it says "no one home". Uh... I've been at fucking home all day. Or worse, see the truck drive by your house , followed by the tracking updated to "no one home". That's a fake delivery attempt.

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