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When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

bicycling.com

141–150 of 278 posts

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#142
post #76
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work as a postman. People don't really send letters any more, so a large and increasing percentage is packages. Many (most?) of my coworkers hate their jobs, and their lives, and are deliberately rough with packages, especially if they look expensive.

"I'm unhappy with my life so I'm going to make other people unhappy too." How about these people do something with their incredibly valuable short lives other than being miserable? Unless you're in chronic pain of some kind, being alive is a gift. It's a treasure. Every moment is precious.

Have you ever been hungry?

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#143
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't the parking tickets have to be paid by the driver though, and not the company? FedEx doesn't even own their delivery trucks, the drivers do.

Parking tickets are against the registered owner. Moving violations are against the driver.

So in the cases where the drivers don't own the delivery vehicles, just deduct the fines from whoever was driving it at the time of the ticket.

I admittedly have no idea how these situations are handled by accounting, but that seems like it would be the solution to me.

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One guy gleefully told me how he targets boxes marked Fragile for extra abuse! A close friend who owns a UPS franchise warned me of this behavior and advised against placing any indication of fragility on the box. If I recall the threshold correctly, $1,000+ declared-value packages are identified and set aside in a separate group within the store. When a driver comes by to pick up daily packages, the store clerk al…

Wouldn't it be a great way to make some money? If you know they target fragile boxes, and you get insurance on it under $1,000, you're guaranteed a payout! As a bonus, right some politically charged messages on it or troll-y statements.

That idea was a story arc in a "Seinfeld" episode (for USPS).

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#145
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I'm unhappy with my life so I'm going to make other people unhappy too." How about these people do something with their incredibly valuable short lives other than being miserable? Unless you're in chronic pain of some kind, being alive is a gift. It's a treasure. Every moment is precious.

Yeah, and why don't depressed people just cheer up? Seriously it's not hard...

I think we can all agree this is something completely different.

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#146
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parking tickets are against the registered owner. Moving violations are against the driver.

So in the cases where the drivers don't own the delivery vehicles, just deduct the fines from whoever was driving it at the time of the ticket. I admittedly have no idea how these situations are handled by accounting, but that seems like it would be the solution to me.

The solution is the company just pays the ticket. End of story.

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#147
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's cute, but wrong. Even the most law-abiding delivery company is going to end up with some parking tickets, so it makes sense to budget for them. You may as well decry the budgeting for legal as saying the company wants to break the law.

> Even the most law-abiding delivery company is going to end up with some parking tickets Why? If you don’t park illegally you don’t get tickets. They aren’t random or accidental.

The GP was talking about a delivery company budgeting for tickets. All the answers to the parent miss the point. The discussion is on a large scale with a significant amount of tickets. If it's a hundred tickets for 1,000 drivers a year, that's a few thousand bucks for a multi-million dollar salary. Doesn't something like that run under miscellaneous and isn't explicitly budgeted for?

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#148
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know these people, so do you have any insight as to why they did this? Is it envy? “Screw this guy getting his fancy TV that I don’t have.” If not, what? It seems needlessly cruel. I assume these are good people?

I've worked on multiple shipping and loading docks. If you haven't had this type of work experience it would be difficult to understand that the entire line is one big connected system. If just one person stalls their part of the process, the other pieces both upstream and downstream are affected. And believe me, everyone on the line instantly knows who is falling behind and you'll begin to feel the eyes on you immed…

That all makes sense, but it doesn't explain why shipping workers would be EXTRA careless with items marked fragile. I would expect equal carelessness with all packages.

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#149

I've always been curious about the shipping process. I have met or know 7 people who work/worked at the shipping hub in my city. I always ask them how the packages are handled. Every one of them said that they (and all of their coworkers) handle all packages on a scale ranging from rough to purposefully damaging. One guy told me how he targets boxes marked Fragile for extra abuse when he's exhausted/angry/having a ba…

I sometimes prepare my shipments as a kid preparing for bullies at school. Be ready for some abuse, everyone is tested. But don't look overly protected and don't just mark yourself fragile. That's "asking for it".

Re: When a Bike Company Put a TV on Its Box, Shipping Damages Went Down (2017)

#150

high quality, expensive bikes are usually designed to withstand a good amount of physical abuse and dynamic loads under a 90kg rider. i wonder what kind of damage they sustained. bent spokes? brake/shift levers?

My last bike came damaged. The box with the steel frame suffered a minor hit I didn't even notice it until after my shop reported the damage. Bent the right rear dropout less than two millimeters, dropouts are where the wheel axle connects to the frame. This prevented the rear tire from inserting and had bent the location of the rear derailleur mount.

Repairing wouldn't necessarily be safe and would definitely invalidate the warranty, luckily the company I bought it from sent me a new frame after I gave them proof of shipping damage.

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