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Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

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Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#71

Post by fooblitzky »

ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #67
miker64 wrote: post #47

Both UPS and FedEx deliveries arrive at my front door in good condition, the delivery drivers bag the packages up if I'm not home and it looks like rain. USPS consistently rings my doorbell and makes sure packages are handed to me rather than left outside. Amazon delivered packages have been: thrown from the street; arrive crushed, punctured, or otherwise damaged; left in the driveway; left in the neighbors yard; nev…

Am I correct in thinking that the last mile delivery solution from Amazon strictly relies on independent contractors or do they have corporate trucks/drivers?

Currently both Amazon and FedEx both use independent contractors (sorry, entrepreneurs) - and your experience will vary widely with the contractors operating in your area. We always groan when FedEx is doing the delivery, because in our area that usually means two or three days of 'missed deliveries'.

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#72

Post by riffic »

macintux wrote: post #14

Recent piece on the human costs of Prime’s next day delivery promise: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/carolineodonovan/amazon...

and the associated HN discussion surrounding this article:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20865006

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#73

Post by mschuster91 »

michannne wrote: post #69
Eric_WVGG wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in apartment building with ~100 units, lots of Amazon packages and many from independent contractors. I've never even heard of this, and can't imagine them bothering.

I also live in a complex with over 100 units and yet Amazon still manages to track my packages effectively, take pictures, etc, so I'm not sure what the point is. Different delivery people treat packages differently?

Ideally, processes should be the same worldwide except for differences required by local laws.

And ideally simply depositing a package on the porch for every random asshole to grab shouldn't be a thing either, it thankfully is not in Germany.

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#74

Post by lloyddobbler »

ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #67
miker64 wrote: post #47

Both UPS and FedEx deliveries arrive at my front door in good condition, the delivery drivers bag the packages up if I'm not home and it looks like rain. USPS consistently rings my doorbell and makes sure packages are handed to me rather than left outside. Amazon delivered packages have been: thrown from the street; arrive crushed, punctured, or otherwise damaged; left in the driveway; left in the neighbors yard; nev…

Am I correct in thinking that the last mile delivery solution from Amazon strictly relies on independent contractors or do they have corporate trucks/drivers?

IIRC, it's all independent contractors. Whether it's an independent company contracted by Amazon (which is the bulk of it), or a direct Lyft/Uber-style gig economy model of sourcing contract drivers.

Here's a (somewhat sensationalized, it's Buzzfeed News) article about some of the negatives that have shown up. It references that all of the delivery network is decentralized: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/carolineodonovan/amazon...

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#75

Post by sib »

blevo wrote: post #55
miker64 wrote: post #47

Both UPS and FedEx deliveries arrive at my front door in good condition, the delivery drivers bag the packages up if I'm not home and it looks like rain. USPS consistently rings my doorbell and makes sure packages are handed to me rather than left outside. Amazon delivered packages have been: thrown from the street; arrive crushed, punctured, or otherwise damaged; left in the driveway; left in the neighbors yard; nev…

I think service for any of these companies is highly variable and dependent upon locale. Perhaps it's a culture thing. The USPS worker never rings my doorbell for left packages and just yesterday a package was delivered damaged in my mailbox. I live in a nice part of town (I think) but the service culture here may be different than where you live (and different than other locales where I've resided).

Completely agree. Multiple times I've had USPS drivers report packages as "delivered" late in the day when they were not delivered at all, then they are actually delivered the next day. Sure makes their metrics look better, though.

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#76

Post by mrnobody_67 »

ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #67
miker64 wrote: post #47

Both UPS and FedEx deliveries arrive at my front door in good condition, the delivery drivers bag the packages up if I'm not home and it looks like rain. USPS consistently rings my doorbell and makes sure packages are handed to me rather than left outside. Amazon delivered packages have been: thrown from the street; arrive crushed, punctured, or otherwise damaged; left in the driveway; left in the neighbors yard; nev…

Am I correct in thinking that the last mile delivery solution from Amazon strictly relies on independent contractors or do they have corporate trucks/drivers?

Im surprised Amazon isn't campaigning with Lyft & Uber on the new gig economy labour laws...

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#77

Post by delecti »

ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #67
miker64 wrote: post #47

Both UPS and FedEx deliveries arrive at my front door in good condition, the delivery drivers bag the packages up if I'm not home and it looks like rain. USPS consistently rings my doorbell and makes sure packages are handed to me rather than left outside. Amazon delivered packages have been: thrown from the street; arrive crushed, punctured, or otherwise damaged; left in the driveway; left in the neighbors yard; nev…

Am I correct in thinking that the last mile delivery solution from Amazon strictly relies on independent contractors or do they have corporate trucks/drivers?

They have at least some corporate trucks/drivers in at least some locations. Though without inside data it's impossible to say what proportion, but anecdotally it seems to be mostly independent contractors in Seattle.

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#78

Post by sigstoat »

miker64 wrote: post #47

Both UPS and FedEx deliveries arrive at my front door in good condition, the delivery drivers bag the packages up if I'm not home and it looks like rain. USPS consistently rings my doorbell and makes sure packages are handed to me rather than left outside. Amazon delivered packages have been: thrown from the street; arrive crushed, punctured, or otherwise damaged; left in the driveway; left in the neighbors yard; nev…

> Amazon delivered packages have been: thrown from the street

i watched a USPS driver do that. i'm amazed he could heft the package that far.

> USPS consistently rings my doorbell

i don't know that they've ever rung my doorbell.

> Amazon's last mile service is a complete shit show

they all vary in quality by location. fedex was nearly unusable at my last residence, but is great where i'm at now. anecdotes simply aren't valuable here.

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#79

Post by lloyddobbler »

balaksakrionon wrote: post #70
macintux wrote: post #14

Recent piece on the human costs of Prime’s next day delivery promise: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/carolineodonovan/amazon...

interesting article, thanks for sharing it. I have been seeing more and more of these 3rd party contractor vans milling about and it makes since they're skimping on safety, etc. in order to get a piece of amazon's shipping needs, meanwhile amazon attempts to disclaim all liability while turning the screws and upping the pressure

Yep. The real question is how prevalent these "skimping on safety" companies are. When taken individually, no doubt it looks bad - but when considering that there are thousands of delivery partners, each having 20-500 trucks, delivering >5 million packages per day (per the article), I would expect to see a few incidents crop up.

For example, it's reported that FedEx drivers were involved in 41 deaths in 24 months:

> In the 24-month period prior to December 3, 2017, FedEx Express drivers were reported to have been involved in 1762 crashes, 575 involving injuries, including 41 deaths.

https://www.frg-law.com/carriers/fedex/

The big question is just how much Amazon is applying pressure and causing those sorts of issues, and are they outside of the normal expected incidents for logistics companies? WRT the Amazon delivery network, is this a matter of a few bad apple operators trying to squeeze every cent of profit by overworking drivers and not deploying more vans? Or is it a case of systemic unattainable expectations from Amazon that force every delivery partner to cut corners so they can maintain a livable profit margin?

Difficult to say from this article...but in spite of the sensationalism, the examples it recounts certainly aren't good.

Re: Amazon’s Shipping Empire Is Challenging UPS and FedEx

#80

Post by lloyddobbler »

Stratoscope wrote: post #62
dmoy wrote: post #44

Huh, missing from this article is the thousand or so DSP that service Amazon for shipping, basically contracting companies. A lot of Amazon shipping is actually Amazon corporate, but a huge chunk is a thousand smaller shops. Turns out you can also contract with those shops as a private citizen to just ship random heavy stuff anywhere for super cheap. Because Amazon gives them enough volume, it's become cheaper for in…

> DSP Just so I don't misunderstand, does that stand for Delivery Service Provider?

"Delivery Service Partner"
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